5 Things I Want to See in 2015

As we wrap up 2014, instead of reflecting on this year's hobby highlights, I'm looking ahead to what I want to see in 2015.

1. More old brands resurrected from the mid-1990s junk wax heap. Did you collect Upper Deck's Fleer Retro basketball set? Or what about Topps Archives baseball or football? Or Pinnacle baseball? As long as the hobby's hurtling down mid-1990s memory lane, let's go all out. I've already advocated for a throwback Studio set (complete with mullet wigs). But what about 1992's Topps Kids? It could work as a short standalone set, large insert set for a set like Topps Opening Day, or part of a tongue-in-cheek Topps Archives offering.

2. No more relic cards. Dear Card Companies, Nobody cares about these. Relic cards don't hold value. Stop including them in your products. Or if that's too radical, make relic cards better. What about stamping them with the game date when they were used? Or better yet, make them memorable. Nobody in their right mind should be excited about receiving a tiny square of David Freese's away jersey. But what if you compressed a jersey or autographed t-shirt into the size of a jumbo pack? I will definitely be excited about pulling an autographed David Freese Angels t-shirt out of my blaster box from Target.

3. Fewer parallels. Do collectors really want endless parallels of the same card? Red, green, blue, camo, pink, black, printing plates, red backs, green backs—the list goes on and on. I'm convinced that if we continue down this path, there will be more serial-numbered cards manufactured than non-serial-numbered cards. Yes, there may be less of each produced, but so what? There are so many different sets produced each year, each with their own parallels, that there aren't enough collectors in the world for these cards to retain their "value." This is already a slippery slope. Let's not slide all the way into the abyss.

4. A food set. I'd like to see the MLBPA, NBAPA, NFLPA, NHLPA, or heck, even MLS strike a deal with a consumer goods company to put cards on food products like cereal, granola bars, yogurt-cup six-packs, whatever. It would be good for sports, and good for collecting. I don't expect a gigantic 200-card set like the old Post Cereal baseball sets from the early 1960s, but a 40 to 60–card set would do the trick. I know I'm not alone in wanting to see this.

5. More videos from the card manufacturers—and not of box breaks. Topps, if you're reading this, you should create a series of videos of no more than five minutes in length, each showcasing a milestone in the company's history (like the revolutionary printing process that created Topps Finest in 1993), but without compromising the company's trade secrets. Have you ever read the story of how the Apple designers created the prototype iPod? I've read it many times, and it never gets boring. The same would be true of how the wizards at Topps created Topps Finest.

Let's Talk About 2015 Topps Archives

With the unveiling of the underwhelming design of 2015 Topps flagship—with its 25-year-anniversary homage to the 1990 Topps design, intended or not—and the prospect of collecting Heritage '66 next summer already uninteresting, Archives may be the set for me in 2015. 

So today I daydreamed about which old designs Topps will pull out of their storage closet for its 2015 Archives set. Here are my guesses.

1988 Topps Baseball
I happen to like the design of 1988 Topps. It's like a combination of the best elements of the 1966 and 1967 designs, with an easy-to-read orange back. Nine-year-old me bought a metric ton of 1988 Topps.

1983 Topps Baseball
Another hallmark 1980s design for a brand that so far has managed to miss it, despite using 1980's design twice.

1994 Topps Baseball
Honestly, not a great design, but the 1990s are sorely lacking from this set so far.

1978 Topps Baseball
What's the Archives brand without a token 1970s design? 1978 is one of the few they haven't cribbed yet.

1981, 1991, or 1970 Topps Baseball
I'm hoping the short-printed cards are in a separate uniform design, unlike in 2014's set, which used the same four designs from the base set. 1981 Topps would be a great choice, or 1970, or 1991.

The designs used for the insert sets have been a hodgepodge taken from all four major sports. I don't see 2015 Topps Archives being any different. Here are a few of the insert designs I'd like to see.

1956 Topps Football
1958 AB&C Footballers (UK)
1967 Topps Who Am I? (with disguises)
1968 Topps Baseball Game
1969 Topps Football
1979 Topps Baseball Comics
1981-82 Topps Basketball Super Action!
1983 Topps/Drake's Baseball Sluggers 
1986 Topps Baseball Tattoos
1990 Topps Baseball All-Stars
1990 Topps The Simpsons

The problem with all of this is that eventually Topps will run out of old designs to use for Archives. I've written about this before, but it really feels like every year Topps has to out-do itself in terms of designs to use in its Archives offering. At this pace, the well will soon dry. We can only hope that the Topps brand managers will have enough sense to stop while they're ahead.

Let's Talk About 2014 Topps Heritage High Numbers

We're a few months away, but I've started thinking about the 2014 Topps Heritage High Numbers set. Will it be an online-only factory set, or released in packs? Who will be included? Who will be overlooked? If we use the 2013 installment as a template, it's probable that each team will be represented, with somewhere between one and five cards apiece.

 Much like the "traded" sets from back in the day, the high-numbers set is mostly a showcase of young players and XRCs—although with so many draft, prospects, and minor league sets these days, there are virtually zero players who could have an XRC—with fewer traded veterans in their new uniforms. It's also a way for Topps to produce cards of players not included in the regular series. But with a checklist of only 100 cards, Topps has to be choosy about who's represented.

That said, here's a quick list of 25 players who may be part of Heritage High Numbers for 2014:

1. Masahiro Tanaka, New York Yankees

2. George Springer, Houston Astros

3. Jose Abreu, Chicago White Sox

4. Marcus Stroman, Toronto Blue Jays

5. Mookie Betts, Boston Red Sox

6. Brock Holt, Boston Red Sox

7. Jake Peavy, San Francisco Giants

8. Chase Headley, New York Yankees

9. Rougned Odor, Texas Rangers

10. Kevin Kiermaier, Tampa Bay Rays

11. C.J. Cron, LA Angels

12. Yangveris Solarte, San Diego Padres

13. Gregory Polanco, Pittsburgh Pirates

14. Tommy La Stella, Atlanta Braves

15. Jacob deGrom, New York Mets

16. Jake Petricka, Chicago White Sox

17. Joakim Soria, Detroit Tigers

18. Huston Street, LA Angels

19. Brandon McCarthy, New York Yankees

20. Jeff Samardzjia, Oakland Athletics

21. Ike Davis, Pittsburgh Pirates

22. Jose Lobaton, Washington Nationals

23. Nelson Cruz, Baltimore Orioles

24. Dellin Betances, New York Yankees

25. Oscar Taveras, St. Louis Cardinals

The World Needs a Retro Donruss Studio Set

Topps can conjure nostalgia for a wave of collectors just by opening a random file cabinet in its overstuffed HQ and producing a legacy design series like Archives or Heritage. And yet, the 13-year-old in me still thinks that nothing beats 1991's "sophisticated," "artistic," and high-cheese-quotient Studio. So tell us, Donruss: What's stopping you from jumping into the retro deep end with both feet?

Here's what I'm looking for:

1. Tasteful black and white photography of men with mullets. I understand that standard baseball hair fashion these days consists of goatees, mountain-man beards, and Mohawk variations, so you might want to stock a few mullet wigs with your photography equipment.

2. Hats optional. And actually, without a MLB license, I'd even accept a 225-card series of players in street clothes, or warmup shirts. Or even Ebbets Field Flannels jerseys of forgotten PCL teams.

3. Autographed buy-backs of Ramon Martinez, Steve Lake, Roger McDowell, Sammy Sosa, Jeff Bagwell, and Kevin Belcher. Really, it would need a 25-to-30-player autographed buy-back checklist featuring the most memorable photos from the original set.

4. Trivial personal interest filler on the backs. Who watches Orange Is The New Black? Or what about The Bachelorette? Or Adventure Time? Also, I'd like to know if more players today would list "Jesus Christ" as their personal hero than did in 1991 (11 players back then, including Alvin Davis, who listed his heroes as "Jesus Christ and Harold Reynolds").

5. No inserts. I realize that this last one is a tall order for a card company in the business of making money. So how about just a few parallels? Definitely needs a one-per-pack stamped, original buyback from the 1991 series. Then a six-per-box "Outtakes" parallel, which would be a photo variation. Finally, a much-harder-to-find "Negatives" parallel, which would show up once every few boxes, maybe like one or two per case.

Even without that pesky MLB license, this could be a nice, low-frills retro set that harks back to a simpler time when men wore a workingman's haircut, enjoyed shows like A Different World, Cheers, and Unsolved Mysteries, and collected porcelain figures of animals (well, maybe that was just you, Glenn Davis).

Possible "Errors" in 2014 Topps Heritage

So it's been reported that 2014 Topps Heritage will pay tribute to the various errors and uncorrected errors found in the 1965 Topps set. Perhaps the most well known uncorrected error is the misspelling of Jim Kaat's name on the front of his card (Jim Katt). 

Here are a few players I'd like to see as candidates:

Jake Peevy

Matt Holiday

Anthony Goose

Justin Smoke

Jarrod Saltalamacchiado

Ryan Dumpster

Zach Mozart

Adam Laloosh

Yu Dervish

Jacoby Smellsbury

Eva Longoria 

Robinson Camo 

and, of course, 

Shin-Soo Choo Choo Coleman

Some lesser-known uncorrected errors that probably won't be in the new set: 

• Cleveland Indians' manager Birdie Tebbetts' last name misspelled on the back of his card (Tebbets). Terry Francoa, anyone?

• Kansas City A's rookie Jim Hunter's first name misspelled on the back of his card (Tim). Maybe Baddy Boshers (LA Angels rookie, card #194)?

• Cincinnati Reds listed on back of Reds team card as foe during 1964 season (instead of Chicago Cubs). This one definitely won't be reprised in this year's Heritage set since team cards weren't included.

Average Real Pricing (ARP): The Future of the Price Guide

There's an oft-repeated, widely held misconception amongst vintage card collectors, one that reeks of that “old money vs. new money” elitism. That misconception is that new cards—cards made in the last 10 years—are worthless.

It’s not true, of course. After all, anything can have value if someone is willing to purchase it. The problem is, unlike cards manufactured prior to 1970, new cards are probably not worth as much as collectors are led to believe. Whereas the market and value for older cards is more stable, the value of a new card is dictated not so much by what the market will actually pay, but by an artificial, out-of-touch price: its “book” value.

Since the rise of the nationally consulted price guide in the early 1980s, “book” value has been determined by an aggregate tally of prices reported by a network of sources within the hobby, mostly card shop owners and touring show dealers. The reported prices were accurate and reliable because that’s where collectors bought cards: at hobby shops and at card shows.

But over the last 10 to 15 years, with the rise of online shopping and big-box, one-stop-shopping stores like Walmart and Target—combined with the dwindling number of card shows and hobby shops—the tried-and-true price guide model stopped working.

So why base pricing on reports from people with only half the story? One theory is that it preserves the card-collecting industry. Without a somewhat-inflated baseline, whatever shops and touring dealers remain would flag and fail. Another theory is that this model is still used because it’s convenient. Changing how book prices are determined would undermine more than 30 years of labor of transforming a hobby into a gigantic industry. And while changing the nature of how and from where prices are collected would erode the “wink-wink” dealer advantage and definitely shake things up, nobody wants to see the hobby fail. We just don’t want to be lied to anymore about the true “value” of our cards.

Enter the average real pricing guide, or ARP guide. With monthly prices based on realized prices of new, raw card sales from various Internet auction sites, any card’s ARP will be much more accurate than a traditional price guide’s pie-in-the-sky value.

Let’s look at an example. Topps 2013 Series Two came out in mid-June. And while most collectors don’t expect base cards of a flagship set like Topps—with a total print run probably into the millions of cards—to hold their value long-term, how should we value short-printed cards like the on-checklist variations? Realized prices from September and October were used to find the ARP values of 17 variations (see table below).

Card # & Player	ARP Value	Unregulated ARP Value*	Trad. Price Guide Value Range (Dec.)
1C Bryce Harper Sunglasses SP	$14.78	$14.66	$12.50–$30.00
10B Adam Jones Sunglasses SP	$4.95	$4.85	$5.00–$12.00
11C Yu Darvish Sunglasses SP	$5.93	$6.02	$5.00–$12.00
27C Mike Trout Sunglasses SP	$10.30	$10.19	$8.00–$25.00
28B Prince Fielder Sunglasses SP	$4.26	$4.07	$5.00–$12.00
34B Felix Hernandez Sunglasses SP	$3.13	$3.60	$5.00–$12.00
55B Tim Lincecum Sunglasses SP	$4.25	$4.25	$5.00–$12.00
110B Justin Upton Sunglasses SP	$2.38	$2.49	$5.00–$12.00
122C Andrew McCutchen Sunglasses SP	$5.64	$5.72	$6.00–$15.00
127B Giancarlo Stanton Sunglasses SP	$4.31	$4.10	$5.00–$12.00
242C Matt Kemp Sunglasses SP	$2.91	$2.91	$5.00–$12.00
316B Josh Reddick Sunglasses SP	$3.01	$3.23	$5.00–$12.00
362B Yoenis Cespedes Sunglasses SP	$4.20	$4.02	$5.00–$12.00
456B Pablo Sandoval Sunglasses SP	$3.47	$3.39	$5.00–$12.00
595B David Ortiz Speech SP	$17.06	$17.77	$10.00–$25.00
660B Miguel Cabrera Sunglasses SP	$7.43	$7.60	$6.00–$15.00
661B Hyun-Jin Ryu Sunglasses SP	$4.40	$4.42	$5.00–$12.00

*Unregulated ARP contains high and low in range.

The ARP values here aren’t arbitrary, like the traditional book values feel—the ARPs are made up of actual realized prices for raw cards on major Internet auction sites. (It’s important to stress that ARP values are for raw cards only. Graded cards are a different beast, and are not part of these calculations.) To determine each price, an aggregate of realized prices for each card was taken from a given a date range. Next, the highest and lowest prices were removed to avoid skewing the result (See note on Unregulated ARP above*). Whatever was left was factored into the ARP. In those few cases where five or fewer prices went into the price calculations, all prices were factored in. (In the example above, only the Kemp had five or fewer sales.)

One interesting quirk about an ARP value is that the number of individual prices that go into each average is not uniform. For instance, if a Yasiel Puig card is sold 20 times but a Dustin Pedroia is only sold 6 times, shouldn’t all 20 Puig prices be used to find its ARP? It’s a more popular card, after all. I used date cutoffs rather than number of individual prices. These values reflect whatever happened between September 1, 2013, and October 31, 2013.

And about that middle column... While the ARP is the more accurate of the two price values, the Unregulated ARP (UnARP) contains the single highest and single lowest values left out of each ARP range. With these values factored in, the ARP and UnARP form an accurate range of high and low for a given card (it doesn’t matter which is higher or lower). For example, your Felix Hernandez “Sunglasses” short-print variation in 2013 Topps Series 2 is valued between $3.13 ARP and $3.60 UnARP. This is how much you should expect to pay for it, and how much you should expect to get for it should you decide to sell it. Notice how the expected buy and sell price ranges are the same?

“Book” value has long been the starting point for negotiations, or baseline for dealers offering to buy cards. If a card books for $20, a dealer will usually pay 20% to 40% of book to buy, then turn around and charge 60% to 90% of book when selling the card. The dealer has to protect his profit margin in order to stay in business. That’s one of the inherent functions of the book value and a wrinkle in how the hobby currently works.

An ARP value doesn’t have to protect a profit margin. Internet auction sites don’t care who’s buying or who’s selling. You want to buy that Ortiz “Speech” SP? Expect to pay between $17.06 and $17.77 for it. You want to sell the same Ortiz SP? Guess how much you should expect to get. That's right: between $17.06 and $17.77. 

A level field is a new concept, one that won't be embraced by dealers. I expect the traditional price guides will fight ARP at every turn. But here's why you should use it if you buy and sell new, raw sports cards: it's accurate. And as you can see from the table above, "accurate pricing" and "book" value are rarely synonymous.

The Next Big Thing: A Mobile Trading App

I've been thinking about the baseball-card blogosphere and what the next big topic or trend will be. Custom cards have enjoyed a nice long run, as has live-blogging pack breaks. Video box breaks, humorous takes on individual cards, mustaches and glasses, silly names and superstar collectors have all had their time in the spotlight. Not to mention new-card worship. I feel like I just got into Heritage and already everybody's obsessed with Gypsy Queen. (Or are we on to Archives now?)

I lamented a while back that no one in the baseball-card blogosphere was doing anything really original anymore. That drew a lot of fire from others (rightfully so), but the question is still out there: What exactly are we blogging for? For just about all of us blogging is another way to enjoy our hobby, another way to connect with others and share our passion with the world. Should it be something more? Is it a means to an end, or an end unto itself? I'm not sure that I have the answer. 

But I have some ideas. Over the last six years, the baseball-card blogosphere has been a wonderful thing for a lot of people, including the manufacturers. As loud-mouthed collectors, we've done a lot of PR for them: trumpeting what we like and don't like about their new products, spreading ideas and opinions about their greatest hits and lousiest duds from their back catalogues. We've taught them a lot about the power of great search optimization, about the power of social media, and (probably over the next year or so) about the potential of apps and mobile media in general.

The Next Big Thing: A Mobile Trading App


As social-media and Web 2.0 ambassadors, bloggers recognize the massive audience the Internet represents. And as smartphones tighten their grip on the collective experience, when will manufacturers realize they should be putting real dollars against developing a mobile trading app?

If Topps came out with a mobile trading app, you'd download it, right? I've been thinking about this for a while now: I'd call it Topps Trader and have a Bump-like feature built in for easy trading. Topps has designed a functional, if a bit clunky, desktop Web browser experience in their Million Card Giveaway microsite. I see Topps Trader as an add-on and mobile gateway to this experience. Here's how I see it operating:

You download the app from the App Store for 99 cents. After entering in your My Topps account info, as well as your geographic location, you're welcomed to your "shoebox" or album of cards tethered to your account. As a special bonus, you get a welcome pack of five new "cards." These are cards that you can keep, trade for prizes (like in the desktop Web browser version), or trade with other users via Facebook, in your geographic area via the Bump-like feature, or in the online community (accessible via the mobile app). New cards are either purchased in packs of five for 99 cents or redeemed through codes found in actual packs of Topps cards. The cards within the app do not have monetary value, but the purpose is not really about monetary value; it's about trading and collecting. The bonus of creating this kind of app is that, for a company like Topps, they would have free reign over using their enormous back catalogue of classic cards.

I've been kicking the trader-app idea around for a few years now. When I came up with it, I thought it would be perfect for Facebook. And now that smartphones are ubiquitous, a mobile app with total Facebook integration is a no-brainer. I'd be shocked if this, or something eerily close to it, doesn't debut in the next year.

The Ten-Cent-Bin Nation

Ten-cent bins as far as the eye can see. Old baseball players wandering around, autographing everything in sight. Pallets of junk-wax door prizes. Crusty dealers refusing to make eye contact with anyone under the age of 30. Children bedecked with lanyards and Becketts. Stooped collectors jockeying for position in front of trays upon endless trays of 1952 Topps low-series commons. Old guys scarfing down over-priced hot dogs. Loudmouths squawking into cell phones.

Ah, the time-honored trappings of the baseball card show. From the small-time shows of just a few folding tables and gooseneck lamps at the local mall and elementary school gymnasium to hotel conference rooms and county arenas, I've been to a few. And next weekend, by attending the 33rd National Sports Collectors Convention in Baltimore, I'll have been to the biggest of the bunch.

According to its official press release, The National touts itself as a "collector's paradise" and by its estimate expects somewhere in the neighborhood of 45,000 [gawking, sweaty] attendees. There will also be something called the "TRISTAR Autograph Pavilion," with 90 "high-profile" athletes. (Out of curiosity, would J.D. Salinger's have been considered a "low-profile" autograph?)

Also, there will be something called the "Fantasy Football Fest 2012," which apparently won't be the real "Fantasy Football Fest 2012," but just a preview to an event taking place in Atlantic City, New Jersey, later in August. Snooze.

There will also be the usual stupendous, amazing auction previews and memorabilia finds, including Don Larsen's jersey and pants from his World Series perfect game and a purported Babe Ruth game-used jersey. And this year's big draw is the "Black Swamp Find" of Defiance, Ohio—700 cards from the E98 set found in pristine condition.

So besides the shock and awe of game-used rarities and high-end mega-finds, what should I expect? I don't plan on waiting in a three-hour line for Larry Sheets's autograph, and elbowing another collector out of the way for a free pack of promo cards doesn't appeal to me. No, I'm thinking I'll skip the loudmouth cell-phone-squawkers and the hot dog cart and make my way to the back of the convention floor and revel in a nationwide selection of ten-cent bins.

Of course, this plan could backfire. There probably aren't too many dealers at The National paying their fees so that they can sell ten-cent cards at the back of the convention hall, right? There will be dealers representing at least 36 states, plus Washington DC and Canada, so I'm guessing there will be tons of one-of-a-kind memorabilia from those places, and fewer ten-cent bins and junk-wax grab bags. 



So they've got a big place for autographs and snaking Disneyland-style lines, they've got a "Corporate Area" where I'm guessing the manufacturers will be, and then there's the rest of the convention hall. But here's something that isn't mentioned anywhere on the official floor plan or agenda: an auditorium (or room with folding chairs) for a panel discussion and talk-back session about the state of the industry. Likewise, there will be no forums or developmental workshops for how to create a baseball card blog, or start or maintain a collection, or a history of the hobby (before it was an industry). There will be no cocktail hour away from the trade show floor, and likewise no official meet-and-greet with the editors of Beckett, Sports Collectors Digest, or Card Trade.

Granted, The National doesn't bill itself as a conference—that's what the annual Industry Summit is for—but the summit is for industry insiders and enterprising dealers, not everyday collectors looking to expand their knowledge of the industry behind the hobby. I feel like I've been beating a silent drum over the past few years on this, but panel discussions and greater transparency between industry insiders, industry-specific media, and everyday collectors would do the hobby a great service.


I'll be blogging about my experience at The National starting next Saturday, August 4th. 

For the Love of Sitting Around and Flipping Through a Price Guide, Part 2

Let me be the first to say it: I didn’t realize that so many people feel the same way I do about the meaningless-ness of prices listed in Beckett and Tuff Stuff. Very interesting stuff.

Let me also be the first to say that I didn’t realize just how big an issue this assessment really is. There are lots of thoughts out there about how the apparent demise of the price guide affects collectors, ranging from very much (count me among this lot) to not at all.

In the last post on this topic, I brought up the idea of price guides as hobby infrastructure and claimed that without their consultation the hobby would be thrown into chaos. Tonight I would like to take this a step further. Tonight I want to examine…

A World Without Baseball Card Shops

Here’s the situation. The list prices in price guides have been deemed useless on such a massive scale that Beckett and FW have ceased their publication. With no widely available prices, the majority of collectors now consult eBay for accurate card prices.

Dealers do the same. And after they view the umpteenth autographed patch 1/1 card go for less than $20–pulled from a box that dealers paid a premium on to sell–they stop ordering high-end products from the manufacturers. The dealers understand that if they’re seeing these auctions on eBay, their potential customers are winning them.

So many dealers stop ordering these cards that the manufacturers have a difficult decision to make: finally listen to dealers and put more value in each box of product, or dismiss dealers altogether and work exclusively with big box stores like Target, Kmart and Wal-Mart. It comes as no surprise when the manufacturers go with the latter choice.

Because the majority of shops deal primarily in new cards, they start to close. Collectors don’t notice right away, as most of them are tuned to eBay. And besides, the hobby’s gone through this before and survived, so what’s the big deal? Also, everybody’s got a Wal-Mart near them, so who cares if one more shop goes out of business? Shops sell off their inventory and shutter.

Dealers at baseball card shows don’t feel the same pressure right away, though many of them do feel their brethren’s plight. Instead, without book prices to consult on every transaction, desperate, frenetic dealers result to using their best judgment. Collectors, fully aware of the situation dealers are in, refuse to be charged “judgment call prices.” Many dealers, citing lack of meaningful sales at shows, stop booking booths. What few shows remain shrink in attendance until they cease to exist. The National is the lone exception, chugging away, though it’s a magnet for news media to lament the hobby crisis. “Ain’t in the Card$,” is the New York Post headline.

Without dealers, the manufacturers are no longer in the dominant bargaining position. They’re at the whim of the big box stores. Product’s gonna be late? OK, we’re diminishing your shelf space. The manufacturers are not used to their role as ‘just another product.’ What happened to all those dealers they used to push around?


If I haven’t given my critics enough fodder already, here’s some more:

• The future of the hobby most certainly will not play out the way I’ve got it, though certain aspects of it are very close to happening now.

• No matter how much we distrust the prices within price guides, they’re essential to the well being of the hobby. If you’ve got a plan for injecting realistic card values into the hobby without killing hobby shops and show dealers off, please, I’m all ears.

• One last thing: I wanted to work graded cards into this somehow, but never found a good spot. If raw singles aren’t really worth their book value, what about graded cards? I know that entire price guides cater to graded specimen, but will/should these prices be combined with prices for unslabbed cards? Or would that negate the values assigned to those that have been slabbed? Also, why does it feel to me that dealing in graded cards is going to be what saves shop owners and show dealers?

For The Love of Sitting Around and Flipping Through a Price Guide

Today I walked down to the supermarket and for the hell of it bought the new Tuff Stuff– excuse me, the new Tuff Stuff's Sports Collectors Monthly. And while it was fun to flip through it, scan the ads and learn about cards from the Dark Ages of the hobby (1996 - 2005), I got to the point where I felt like I was deluding myself if I actually believed what was printed in the magazine's price guides. I found myself agreeing with the anonymous commenter on the "Toppstown" post: a conventional price guide has become the string quartet on the Titanic.

I'll admit, that's a dire read on today's hobby, but let's examine the situation. The hobby doesn't need price guides to exist, and yet would be chaotic without them. Beckett and FW Publications (publisher of Tuff Stuff) provide infrastructure for the secondary market. Dealers consult them when setting prices. You want to see a world without the consultation of book prices? Look no further than eBay.

With its low prices and open-source approach to assigning realistic value to cards and memorabilia, it's the new face of the hobby. It's slowly killing independent in-shop dealers. It's taken the bottom out of the value of game-used, relic, auto and other seemingly hard-to-find cards. That Poley Walnuts insert of the squirrel at Yankee Stadium from last year's Topps? Tuff Stuff has it at $40. Here are two eBay auctions: one's at $1.25, the other at $0.99.

I know I'm not the first person to bring this up, but have you really thought about what the hobby will look like in the next five years? I think it's fair to say that both Beckett Publications and FW have enough money to continue publishing their respective fleets, but what will be in those magazines? Or, more appropriately, what will be on their websites? Will there still be price guides? And if yes, will the prices they hold mean anything?

Ebay's not going anywhere. Beckett.com has a large community forum on the site, as does TuffStuff.com. Beckett's got guest columnists, Tuff Stuff's got bloggers...

With realistic pricing coming from a relatively unexpected third party, is original content the infrastructure of the future? Or can the Becketts and the Tuff Stuffs reclaim their relevancy in a traditional role in the hobby? And what about all the dealers who got into the industry only to watch their roles in it disintegrate?