Some interesting data analysis....

11235813 · July 1, 2008 4:27AM

Couldn't think of anything better to do, so I decided to spend the morning anylyzing the relative and absolute scarcity of 1950's cards. Also tossed the 1961 Fleer BKB and 1962 Topps FB sets into the analysis because of their reputed condition scarcity. Here's what I came up with:

ABSOLUTE SCARCITY (average PSA 8 or higher population for all players in a set):

1952 Bowman Small FB (10)
1953 Bowman FB (13)
1952 Bowman Large FB (14)
1957-58 Topps BKB (17)
1962 Topps FB (22)

The least scarce sets by this measurement were 1956 Topps (117) and 1957 Topps (107). 1952 Topps came in at 8th scarcest (34).

PSA 8 RELATIVE SCARCITY (total PSA 8 or higher population as a percentage of all cards graded for that set):

1952 Topps (12.7%)
1957-58 Topps BKB (15.2%)
1953 Topps (16.0%)
1952 Bowman Large FB (18.6%)
1953 Bowman (18.6%)
1955 Topps (18.8%)

The least scarce by this measurement were 1959 Topps FB (57.7%) and 1956 Topps FB (41.8%) and 1954 Bowman FB (41.8%).

The only three sets to appear on both lists were 1957-58 Topps BKB, 1952 Bowman Large FB, and 1953 Bowman FB.

Discuss....

11235813 · July 1, 2008 5:27AM

Anybody????

gregmo32 · July 1, 2008 6:09AM

The 1957 Topps Basketball set stands out as it is the first mainstream issue in almost a decade with the RC's of HOFers sprinkled throghout. It is the only choice for nationally issued basketball cards for the fifties. This makes the demand very high, and similar to the 1952 Topps for baseball collectors...

billwaltonsbeard · July 1, 2008 6:28AM

This is all very interesting. I wonder where 88 Donruss fits into all this?

WinPitcher · July 1, 2008 6:38AM

Tuesday July 01, 2008 3:27 PM (NEW!)

Anybody????

Yikes, some of us are at work ya know, we all are not like some trolls here (not you) that accuse
others of being on disability and sitting home all day.

Nice analysis btw.

Steve

VitoCo1972 · July 1, 2008 6:42AM

What did 61F BKB look like in that analysis?

11235813 · July 1, 2008 7:04AM

Steve,

I've always been a bit of a math geek. I majored in econ in college, and back in high school (mid-80's), I was the guy who volunteered to do the stats for our fantasy baseball league each week. This spreadsheet took me about 90 minutes....

Vito,

Surprisingly, 1961 Fleer BKB does not appear to be as scarce in high grade as everyone thinks it is. In terms of raw scarcity, there are about 86 of each card in PSA 8 or higher, with 34.7% of all cards graded being PSA 8 or higher. Both numbers place it near the bottom of the list (i.e. least scarce), but then most of the other sets in the analysis are from the fifties.

One thing to note is that with football and basketball, people seem to submit a lot fewer lower-grade cards...probably because unlike baseball, cards have minimal value in PSA 6 and 7. There are quite a few football and basketball cards where PSA 5's and 6's are scarcer than PSA 8's, which you would never see with 50's baseball.

The reason I did this is simply because I'm curious about inefficiencies in markets that are caused by misinformation. It's something I;ve been able to take advantage of to make a fair bit of money in the stock market, and I'm curious about how collector perception matches up with reality when it comes to the sports card market.

fkw · July 1, 2008 8:16AM

You might get burned if you use PSA pop reports as the only means to determine scarcity. Its far from accurate at any level. MANY oldschool collector despise graded cards and have large hoards of Topps cards raw. On top of that many other collectors who do have some graded cards would never get commons graded no matter how sharp they are.

lsutigers1973 · July 1, 2008 8:20AM

Apperantly Steve beat me to it. Why bump a simple discussion thread an hour after first posting it?

Some interesting data analysis....

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