Anyone buying 1986-1987 unopened baseball?

doog71

I have no illusions that '86 Topps, Donruss, Fleer or '87 Donruss and Fleer will explode the way late '70s-early '80s wax have. I understand there is lots more product of those years out there.

Is it unreasonable to think that some of the '86-'87 product will see nice increases over the next few years though? The unopened bug has hit so hard, and increased prices so quickly and significantly, that those products are looking more interesting to me. I'm not expecting '87 Donruss to hit $200/box, but these products are from the same mid '80s collecting period that people buying for nostalgia sake would be familiar with. Why not drop $400 on a 20-box case of the stuff and check in on it in a few years?

Don't count on putting the kids through college with this stuff, but it seems like a reasonable gamble to me.

jfkheat

Without even concidering the fact that all of those were over produced, one thing that will keep the values down on the 86 and 87 baseball products is the fact that a lot of the key rookies from those years got caught up in the PEDs. I like the 86 Donruss and Fleer and the 87 Fleer but I don't think they have much investment potential. JMO
James

mtcards

I actually think that some of this product is not bad from an investment standpoint and while I agree that the whole PED thing has held back some of the values, I think that over time, some of that will soften. I think the best of the group is 87 Donruss, I have bought 7 cases of blister racks and 2 wax cases over the past 2 months. There is a lot of it out there, but consider the rookie crop. First and most importantly, it has the ONLY Maddux Rookie you can get out of unopened. You then have the regular rookies of Bonds, Larkin, Will Clark, Bo Jackson, Palmeiro and many other minor rookies as well. Then you have the black border issue....grading a 10 from this year is a lot tougher than the other 87 brands.


Now, I am not saying that these things will balloon to $100 a box anytime soon, but I can realistically see these going from the current $18-$20 to near $40 as some of the earlier years dry up.

As for the other stuff, I dont see 1986 products being that popular since the rookie crop is awful outside of Canseco and McGriff maybe. The 1987 Fleer is decent, but without the Maddux and the 1987 Topps is at least perceived to be overprinted and again, no Maddux.

Just my opinion

doog71

<< <i>Without even concidering the fact that all of those were over produced, one thing that will keep the values down on the 86 and 87 baseball products is the fact that a lot of the key rookies from those years got caught up in the PEDs. I like the 86 Donruss and Fleer and the 87 Fleer but I don't think they have much investment potential. JMO
James >>



That's true, but some of those PED guys still have their fans, and there are also RCs of "clean"/popular players like Maddux, Bo, Larkin, Will Clark, etc. The other thing is that some of the '79-'85 that have skyrocketed don't have many big RCs, but people are buying them because hey, it's really fun to rip and hey, "I used to collect these when I was a kid".

grote15

Way too much product out there for any significant uptick in price, imo. By the mid to late 80s, everyone and their mother was socking away sealed cases of this stuff, specifically baseball, so I think the supply is always going to outstrip demand and keep prices suppressed. Not to say you won't see prices rise to some extent, but it will be modest, imo.

Dodgerfanjohn

1986 Topps has its fans due to the very difficult task in finding 10's out of that product.

Theres a ton of 1987 Donruss and Fleer, but like others pointed out, they are nice product with a really healthy amount of rookies.

1987 Topps is like finding hay in a haystack. Although I suppose I turned a 300% profit on it as I picked up a cello box of it for $3 about 15 years ago.

ReggieCleveland

I buy a lot of this stuff because this was my wheelhouse as a kid growing up. Do I look at it as an investment? Oh hell no. I mean, a lot of this stuff only just recently surpassed its MSRP when it was released 25-30 years ago. This is also the period where manufacturers were increasing production 100% on a yearly basis. That's tough to fully wrap one's head around but think about it -- 100% growth EACH year. So much of it out there.

On the other hand, we haven't seen nearly any activity for these years on the registries. I suppose anything can happen but the production numbers are so dwarfing of previous years that there will never be a comparable correlation in appreciation. It sure is fun to collect though.

skrezyna23

I bought a 2 wax box lot (86 Fleer/86 Donruss) for $59 and a 87 Donruss wax box for $20 yesterday. Merely for the fun of ripping it whenever I return to the US.

initialD

Speaking of volume wise in accumulation, 87 Leaf would of been a good buy before Maddux got into the Hall

Little more value and less produced than its counterpart

Also, 87 OPC would be a nice pickup as it's less available than the globs of Topps out there. And proven to be condition sensitive

I will admit guilt that I have picked up 86 Topps in Rack case form only at the right price. IMO it's the best chance of pulling potential high grade more so vs. wax or vending

You still can't ignore the production numbers, so rock bottom pickups have some potential

1957Braves

I thought of this the other day when I saw some posts for cello cards with stars on top; has anyone tried to get a set of cellos with every card on top? Such as 792 different 1987 cello packs with each different card on top? That would be an interesting challenge, along with storing 792 cello packs.

Stooge

I have been collecting 1986 Topps by the rakpak box and case for the past couple of years and now have about 5 cases worth. When I started buying it from BBCE the rakpaks were about $0.50 each, now the are going for about $1.75 each. I believe that 1986 Topps is the last year before the explosion of production at Topps.

Here is what I think. This is a very under appreciated year for modern issue Topps as everyone thinks that there is so much of this lying around unopened that it will be around for our grandkids grandkids to open, well that just may be our Achilles Heel, as we may just have looked at it from the wrong angle so to speak. If everyone thinks that there are thousands and thousands of cases of this stuff and they destroy it by the cases looking for that rare Sandburg PSA 10 worth $3,000 and going up, not to mention that several rippers have said that they have gone through an entire case of rakpaks only to submit the best cards and receive less then 5 PSA 10's, there will be a day real soon where we will be seeing this like 1980 Topps and we will be paying a hefty price for it. Now I certainly do not see $1,000 for a wax box like 1980 Topps, but certainly not $20.00 where it is sitting at right now either.

I'm actually quite hoping I'm really wrong for a long time, as I would love to have a wooden pallet set up in the corner of my basement and stockpile these by the case and wrap them up with a roll of plastic.

Paul.

ThoseBackPages

Sealed Rack cases are the way to go.

olb31

right now 1986 and back is really the only way to go, most 1987 through 1992 product is practically worthless.

Frozencaribou

1986 Topps baseball as an investment? Please. Ooh, black borders. OOoooh, low pops. Come on, people. Don't make up reasons to collect ugly baseball cards.

ReggieCleveland

I like 86 Tools as much as the next guy but don't fool yourself into thinking it was pre- Tools boon. The production may not be as much as 87 and later but it was still a hell of a lot more than 85.

MiniDuff

Of the stuff in question, I like 86 Topps for the difficulty in hitting key 10s, but overall, I think the real sleeper if you want to call it that is 86 Fleer. You never saw it in the quantities of Donruss let alone Topps. I have also long been a collector of Leaf, Tiffany and OPC from the period and have been the source for at least a dozen Maddux Leaf 10s over the last year or so from wax cases I have broken.

If you are going to collect 87 Donruss, buy the 10 box cases, not the 20. The 10 box were 8 Donruss and 2 Leaf, a very nice bonus.

ReggieCleveland

<< <i>If you are going to collect 87 Donruss, buy the 10 box cases, not the 20. The 10 box were 8 Donruss and 2 Leaf, a very nice bonus. >>



Is this true?

mtcards

<< <i>

<< <i>If you are going to collect 87 Donruss, buy the 10 box cases, not the 20. The 10 box were 8 Donruss and 2 Leaf, a very nice bonus. >>



Is this true? >>




Yes, if you look on the side of the cases, it says 8 boxes of #xxxx and 2 boxes of #xxxxx (I dont remember the numbers)