The Glory of Old Price Guides
jimmyg
Posts: 139 ✭✭
Every couple of months or so, an oldtimer posts a copy of a price guide or sell sheet from the 60s or 70s. Mantles can be had for $1 apiece. Whole sets of 50s cards run in the $10-$20 range.
While in my hometown last week, I went through my parents' garage and came up with my own old price guide: a June '94 Beckett with Griffey on the cover. By '94 I'd stopped and re-started collecting about four times. I had been in the Air Force for a year and had a real paycheck. I could afford to spend $40 on an ex-mt Murray rookie and $20 on a Near-Mint '83 Topps Sandberg because I had traded mine from the '83 Topps set my parents got me for Christmas in '83.
I thumbed through the Beckett. The prices took me back. They were shocking really. I expected a 90 Leaf Thomas to be in the $60 range and a '89 UD Griffey to be $75ish.
What I didn't expect were the high prices of the 'vintage' stuff (I define vintage as '53 (my dad didn't have any 52s) to '80 (I started collecting in '81).
An '80 Topps Ryan was $20. A Brett rookie was $200 or so.
So now I'm going to buy cards with those prices in mind. Think of the deals I'll get! My '81 Topps set has a $15 Henderson in it! I need to find the Beckett where the 84D Mattingly went up to $90. My friend came back to school after receiving his Beckett in the mail and ran around the schoolyard yelling the price.
Like that old guy sang on my dad's tv show, "Those were the days!"
While in my hometown last week, I went through my parents' garage and came up with my own old price guide: a June '94 Beckett with Griffey on the cover. By '94 I'd stopped and re-started collecting about four times. I had been in the Air Force for a year and had a real paycheck. I could afford to spend $40 on an ex-mt Murray rookie and $20 on a Near-Mint '83 Topps Sandberg because I had traded mine from the '83 Topps set my parents got me for Christmas in '83.
I thumbed through the Beckett. The prices took me back. They were shocking really. I expected a 90 Leaf Thomas to be in the $60 range and a '89 UD Griffey to be $75ish.
What I didn't expect were the high prices of the 'vintage' stuff (I define vintage as '53 (my dad didn't have any 52s) to '80 (I started collecting in '81).
An '80 Topps Ryan was $20. A Brett rookie was $200 or so.
So now I'm going to buy cards with those prices in mind. Think of the deals I'll get! My '81 Topps set has a $15 Henderson in it! I need to find the Beckett where the 84D Mattingly went up to $90. My friend came back to school after receiving his Beckett in the mail and ran around the schoolyard yelling the price.
Like that old guy sang on my dad's tv show, "Those were the days!"
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WTB: PSA 1 - PSA 3 Centered, High Eye Appeal 1950's Mantle
the evening i hung out at an old friend's card store and was informed that the '86 Donruss Canseco had zoomed up past $200.
it wasn't about the price guides anymore as much as it was hypnosis.
PSA ready!!!!