The Joy of Collecting and the Wisdom of Investing
I have loved collecting baseball cards since I was a kid in the mid-1970s.
Like many young collectors, I wanted cards of my favorite team, the Kansas City Royals. For me, there was nobody better than George Brett. It seemed like every big game and every big moment somehow involved #5. But I was excited to pull any Royal. I was just as happy to find a Nolan Ryan, Reggie Jackson, or Pete Rose card in a pack.
Back then, I collected because I loved baseball and I loved the players. To me, they were heroes.
As I got older, I started paying attention to something else: value.
I would spend hours in card shops looking for specific cards to add to my collection. I remember becoming fascinated with cards like the 1980 Rickey Henderson rookie. Not because I was a Henderson fan, but because I started seeing prices listed in magazines and hearing stories about cards bringing huge money.
The stories about the T206 Honus Wagner, Mickey Mantle rookies, and other hobby legends captured my imagination.
Like many collectors, I got hooked on both sides of the hobby: collecting and investing.
Then came the late 1980s.
The hobby exploded. Multiple manufacturers entered the market and production increased dramatically. Cards were no longer collected only because fans loved the players. Many people were buying cards because they believed they would become investments.
Unfortunately, supply eventually overwhelmed demand.
Today we look back at many great players from that era—Tom Glavine, John Smoltz, Gary
Sheffield, Roger Clemens, Wade Boggs, and others—and find rookie cards that remain surprisingly affordable despite Hall of Fame careers.
That experience taught the hobby an important lesson: scarcity matters.
Returning to the Hobby
Eventually life took over.
I got married, raised children, and built a career. For about ten years,
baseball cards became a distant memory.
Around the year 2000, I started digging through my old collection again.
As I flipped through those cards, the memories came flooding back. Suddenly I was a kid again.
I bought some modern cards, but what really interested me was vintage. I wanted to fill holes in my collection and finally own some of the cards I couldn't afford when I was younger.
To my surprise, I discovered that buying a vintage card I had wanted for twenty years was more exciting than opening a modern pack.
To help fund those purchases, I started selling duplicates. Before long, I found myself taking the selling side of the hobby more seriously.
Today, I consider myself both a collector and an investor, but my focus remains heavily centered on vintage cards.
Why Vintage Still Appeals to Me
Part of it is nostalgia.
There is something special about owning a 1975 George Brett rookie card.
When collectors think of George Brett's rookie, they think of that iconic 1975 Topps card. It is the card. There aren't hundreds of versions, colors, parallels, and variations competing for attention.
There is clarity.
And that clarity often creates lasting demand.
Compare that to modern collecting.
Take Shohei Ohtani as an example.
Ohtani's 2018 rookie year produced one of the largest rookie-year catalogs the hobby has ever seen. Across Topps, Panini, Leaf, Topps NOW, autographs, relics, parallels, printing plates, and one-of-one variations, collectors are dealing with thousands of distinct cards and variations.
There is no universally accepted master count, but hobby research strongly suggests the total number of Ohtani rookie-year cards and parallels numbers in the thousands.
As a collector, I find that overwhelming.
Where do you start?
Which cards matter most?
Which cards will collectors still care about twenty years from now?
Many of Ohtani's most valuable rookie cards sell for well into six figures. Some sealed packs that offer a chance at those cards cost hundreds or even thousands of dollars each.
While I enjoy modern cards and still open packs today, I sometimes struggle to understand how long-term value will be distributed among so many variations.
The Difference Between Collecting and Investing
I want to be clear about something.
I am not saying modern cards are ruining the hobby.
In many ways, today's hobby is more exciting than ever.
Collectors have access to incredible autograph cards, game-used relics, low-numbered parallels, and chase cards that previous generations could only dream about.
The thrill of pulling a huge card from a pack is alive and well.
But collecting and investing are not always the same thing.
When I buy a vintage card as an investment, I understand what I own.
There is enough historical data, enough sales history, and enough collector demand to make educated decisions.
When I buy a nice 1965 Mickey Mantle or a 1975 George Brett rookie, I know what the market has done over decades, not months.
That gives me confidence.
With many modern ultra-rare cards, especially one-of-ones, there may be little or no sales history. Sometimes there are no true comparables at all.
That doesn't mean they are bad investments.
It simply means they carry a level of uncertainty that I personally prefer to avoid.
Why I Invest in Vintage
There is another reason vintage appeals to me.
The cards survived.
When children opened packs in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s, they were not thinking about PSA grades, population reports, or future values.
Cards were traded, flipped against walls, stored in shoeboxes, and carried in bicycle spokes.
Many were thrown away.
The surviving high-grade examples are genuinely scarce because nobody was trying to preserve them.
That history matters.
When I hold a vintage card, I am holding a piece of baseball history that somehow survived decades of use, neglect, and time.
I find that compelling as both a collector and an investor.
Final Thoughts
In the end, I love collecting and I believe in investing, so I do both.
I still enjoy opening packs. I still appreciate modern cards. I still admire the incredible talent featured on today's cardboard.
But when I invest serious money, I prefer the proven track record of vintage cards.
Maybe that's because I'm a collector first.
Or maybe it's because after fifty years in the hobby, I've learned that trends come and go, but great vintage cards have a way of standing the test of time.
About the Author
Richard Brooks is the owner of Remember When Cards and a lifelong baseball card collector. Collecting since the mid-1970's, he specializes in vintage baseball cards and enjoys helping collectors understand both the hobby and investment side of the card market.