Are Bowman Chrome Prospect Prices Forever Changed?

[pdxprospect]

So, I was looking through my Beckett this morning...

(Okay, start the jokes where no one uses and it how out of date it is. I agree, but still enjoy looking at it. I helps me better understand what cards are out there as somewhat of a checklist. Okay, so back to the thread...)

When I got back into the hobby back in 2010, the only $100+ prospect autos I remember were Starlin Castro and I think Ackley was around 80+. high end seemed around $80ish.

Then in 2011, the hot cards (Starling and Bundy) started around the $120 mark (and have since fallen dramatically!). Even Jose Fernandez seems reasonably priced.

I could go on but it seems now the "hot prospects" are now closer to $200 instead of $100. With Bregman, Swanson and others, it's seems the hype is much greater than even their ceiling. Look, Moncada seems like a great prospect, but is he not a 2nd baseman? Is there any second baseman with a base prospect over $100?

(There is part of me, that would reply to this thread stating that Trout has forever changed the way we look at prospects. Everyone is looking for the next trout...before anyone else. But it seems to be coming at a much higher price than even trout was as a prospect.)

With all of that said, it seems that most all cards, outside of possibly a select few (Correa, Springer). dramatically drop once they get the show. The longer they are in the show, the lower they go. (How is Donaldson not the highest priced card in the 2010 set? Arena do is great, but no MVP of great post season achievement.)

Is Bregman and Swanson going to be a better value in the long run than AddRuss, Rizzo, Wacha, and/or Cole?

Perhaps I just talked myself, and possibly one other member, out or prospecting, leaving it to the "professionals" and those with more of an expendable income For cards than myself.

Are prospects hype driving prices higher than those winning awards, etc?
Did Trout change the hobby forever?
What do you guys think?

[jmscoggin]

You just hit on exactly why I got out of prospecting. It can still be done successfully but the margin for error is far higher and much more expensive. I think it can be argued that the Trout phenomena has been bad for the hobby. He's great for the sport but too many people jumped in trying to catch the next Trout only to end up holding Starling, Skaggs, Rhymer etc, etc, etc. When that happens, people tuck tail and run.

[Hollywood42]

You're right. I am one of the people that thinks prospecting has been bad for the hobby, too many people breaking solely trying to hit that one guy and make a profit. Nothing wrong with opening some boxes and selling the better stuff you want, but when you are doing it 100% only trying to make money, that's where I think the hobby starts to get hurt

[Bhenry4]

Unfortunately, prospecting has absolutely NOTHING to do with collecting. It's all about maximizing your profit. Yes, if you hold for the long haul, you will almost certainly lose.

[Davesportscards]

I remember pulling a 2103 Bowman Chrome Kris Bryant Base Auto for a customer from 2014 Bowman Inception, card was selling for $600 at the time. 9.5's can be had for less than $450.

I pulled and sold an Abreu Base Auto from 2014 Topps Chrome for $150. $150 for a base RC Auto. Now they're <$25. To be fair, he did hit .317 and 36 Homers his Rookie year but still.

[Hail2TheVictors]

You just hit on exactly why I got out of prospecting. It can still be done successfully but the margin for error is far higher and much more expensive.

Starting to drive me away from prospecting as well. The starting price for some of these guys is way too high, and that is because so many prospectors are in the market to buy.

[davidk]

Unfortunately, prospecting has absolutely NOTHING to do with collecting. It's all about maximizing your profit. Yes, if you hold for the long haul, you will almost certainly lose.

prospecting is a losing game. But i don't think it'll die away because let's say you get a young kid in the minors next year who is suppose to be the michael jordan of baseball, it'll blow up again. People will pay thousands and thousands of dollars looking for that silly card.

BUt in the long run for the "investors", it's a losing game. Invest in vintage. Your kids will love ya.

[pdxprospect]

Pricing seems purely on the highest potential output of a player, assuming they do it season after season.
Take Donaldson for example. His performance is great, but hype is low.

[rainbowkiller]

Prospect pricing isn't based on anything to do with baseball, cards or anything tangible. Its just about reading the emotions of people who don't understand prospecting and selling to them.

It's not like people who don't know better can easily find historical information on prospect prices... or that there are any market controls or regulations to keep the prospect market from getting out of hand.

If pricing were based on anything tangible, people would say that a prospect worth $100 (or whatever amount) is projected to win at least one MVP, play 20 years and be a future HOFer. But prospectors don't want to say this.

There's more than enough information available to have objective pricing on modern prospects, but objectivity isn't what prospecting is about, its about selling to people's emotions and hype. Prospectors like this arrangement and so the people who don't know better lose their shirts!

[letsgoSkins]

Arenado is 24, Donaldson is 30 and has played for multiple teams. That's an easy one to assess. Now that more established MLBers have BC autos, I think we will see many stay in the $200+ range for stars. eBay has that data for you, the trend is already starting (Machado, Correa, Arenado, Harper, etc). It should only continue growing IMO as long as the hobby maintains interest. PS Bregman is ~$120, so even selling at ~$200 minus fees, you take home a 50% return. 50% is more than worthwhile to me, especially with upside for it to go higher if he performs.

I think one thing you may be overlooking with BC autos is the aspect of time. When you purchase a card of someone like Bregman/Moncada at release, you are purchasing development time, not unlike an option on a stock. Nobody knows how high prices will go, because there is lack of data on their major league capabilities. Similar to a stock, a hot steak can change collector's expected trajectory for development. When someone like Bregman hits 5 HR's in a week, it's tough not to dream on what he can become by extrapolating that week/month/etc. to the rest of his career. It seems trivial, but that's the only data to make a prediction from. In the case of Kris Bryant, I would agree with how the market is valuing him, he hasn't reached the trajectory that some thought he would when he was tearing up the minors. The fact that the '13 BC sells for $350 raw this far out from release speaks volumes to me, it's exactly where I would value it based his and the Cubs level of success. Collectors need to improve their analysis skills of what production the market is pricing in. No one is required to buy the top selling players at release. Trout was <$30 at release.

There is also a keeping up with the Jones' where when people see a card start to rise they don't want to miss out, so they purchase at a higher valuation than normal. That can be really bad in the short term for the hobby if people make uninformed decisions. But people make uninformed decisions in all aspects of life, it's human nature.

Players like AdRuss, Rizzo, etc. have a lot of data on them, so it's not unreasonable for people to think they have reached the apex of their development. To investors, that's boring. I want to identify the next guy that will receive the hype. There will surely be plenty of players whose values ultimately fall, but the chase for the next Trout is what makes prospecting fun. The fun is what has fueled me for the last 10+ years.

Lastly, I don't buy the argument that BC autos can't be long term investments. Kershaw is a perfect example, they have steadily risen throughout his career. Will most players fail in the long term? Yes, but so will most everything in this hobby.

[RandysHobby]

Bottom line is you need to sell prior to the call up or the day they are called up. Huge profits are to be made doing that, but unless you hit the next Trout, you will miss you big time.

[pdxprospect]

Bottom line is you need to sell prior to the call up or the day they are called up. Huge profits are to be made doing that, but unless you hit the next Trout, you will miss you big time.



I heard this and sold during trouts first call up.
Hype of September call up ended up being no where close for his following April call up with Harper.

Outside of that, I agree.

[JayEvans813]

I think they are. Especially considering guys from pre-Trout days. Take Evan Longoria, who at one point was well over $100 per chrome auto. He's a 3x all star, gold glove winner and potentially a borderline hall of famer and you can pick up his chrome auto for under $50, which is comparable in price to a mid-upper tier prospect.


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[Ottomatic]

Everyone wants the next Trout, the guy that becomes a 500+ chrome auto. It rarely happens so they move on to the next thing. Inflation is a factor as well, albeit a bit smaller.

I just stick to the cheaper guys who look like safe bets to become major leaguer, and sell them when thwy get called up. Minimal risk and it's fun to me. Guys still slip under the radar all of the time, not all are expensive.

[T_Hamilton]

I use to prospect as well... would complete sets of bowman autos for bowman, bowman chrome and BDDP. It was a lot of fun and by the best way to keep up with players in the minors bc I had a vested interest. However I got out of the prospecting game when they started artificlaly limiting production of some of the autos (see: Hosmer and Bryant).

Now I focus completely on HOF autos and vintage, which are much better stores of value. Outside of that I am a dad to two boys and I am much more excited about passing down my current collection to them than bowman autos.

In the past year I have liquidated all my bowman stuff and have bought a T3 Ty Cobb, 1956 Hank Aaron PSA 8, 1941 Play Ball Ted Williams PSA 6, Jackie Robinson autographed postcard and a 1932 Ticket Stub from Game 3 of the World Series when Ruth called his shot.

In my opinion way cooler baseball artifacts than anything Bowman.

[Ferg1945]

It's all about buying low and selling high. You can do it with the popular guys too. When draft comes out buy a few of the popular guy and wait for Spring Training. Sell off a few to recoup and make the total investment easier to make the rest back at a later date.

You have to get lucky.... and be willing to hold a few long term. The guys who bought Donaldson, Story, Rizzo and Matz are happy. Recently someone sold Mazara and turned it into a nice graded Mickey Mantle. It's all about picking the right guys.

[texmcpherson]

I still don't mind prospecting, but I do it with little risk (Inception, Sterling, Best, etc) and I don't do high profile prospects. Look at it this way, I'm a Cubs fan and I'd love to have a Contreras auto but I don't want to pay $60+ for his one Bowman Chrome auto. He's 24 and once he has autos in more products and longer years it'll all go down, I can wait. And I don't need a Bowman Chrome auto anyway, I'm fine with a different product. Yes, everyone is waiting for the next Trout, and the reality is that 90% of prospects autos go higher than what they start at in the minors. I like to do it but not for profit nor at high risk, just for fun to see if a guy actually pans out. I'll stick with my boy Buster Posey, at least he's a 100% proven player.

[Ferg1945]

I think they are. Especially considering guys from pre-Trout days. Take Evan Longoria, who at one point was well over $100 per chrome auto. He's a 3x all star, gold glove winner and potentially a borderline hall of famer and you can pick up his chrome auto for under $50, which is comparable in price to a mid-upper tier prospect.


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And that's the other part of prospecting. The players get hyped so the cards sell really well. But once they make the big leagues the prospectors have moved on and it takes mainstream fans to carry the ball. You mentioned Longoria... same thing happened to Matt Wieters. He was hyped up big time. Made the big leagues... was a 2 time All Star and Gold Glove winner. But he never caught on with the mainstream fans and his cards tanked.

[theflushingmets]

people drive up prospect prices because they see them as an investment because no one knows what they will do in the bigs. once the speculators money goes from one player to the next, you only have the actual collectors purchasing. less people in on auctions from a speculation standpoint, the less the card will go for. Wil Myers is having a great year and i bought 2 of his BC cards for under $10 shipped over the winter. I could sell them right now and double my money, but anyone that bought into the hype from a few years ago lost their shirts. for every 1 bryce harper there are 10 wil myers and 30 bubba starlings.

Ive always found that avoiding the hype is the best way to go. find guys whos skill sets you like that you feel are undervalued. I've never bought a single bowman chrome base card auto for over $25, but i've made and also lost plenty of money in the prospect game.

[zacsoccer6]

I think they are. Especially considering guys from pre-Trout days. Take Evan Longoria, who at one point was well over $100 per chrome auto. He's a 3x all star, gold glove winner and potentially a borderline hall of famer and you can pick up his chrome auto for under $50, which is comparable in price to a mid-upper tier prospect.


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Some of that might have to do with Longoria autos were easier to pull then most players today. 25 auto card checklist without a million parallel's compared to 35 prospect and 14 rc's as in 2016 bowman along with all the parallel's. This is comparing a finally small checklist as well. That's before even looking at how the SP the crap out of the top guys now.

[houstonrules51]

Arenado is 24, Donaldson is 30 and has played for multiple teams. That's an easy one to assess. Now that more established MLBers have BC autos, I think we will see many stay in the $200+ range for stars. eBay has that data for you, the trend is already starting (Machado, Correa, Arenado, Harper, etc). It should only continue growing IMO as long as the hobby maintains interest. PS Bregman is ~$120, so even selling at ~$200 minus fees, you take home a 50% return. 50% is more than worthwhile to me, especially with upside for it to go higher if he performs.

I think one thing you may be overlooking with BC autos is the aspect of time. When you purchase a card of someone like Bregman/Moncada at release, you are purchasing development time, not unlike an option on a stock. Nobody knows how high prices will go, because there is lack of data on their major league capabilities. Similar to a stock, a hot steak can change collector's expected trajectory for development. When someone like Bregman hits 5 HR's in a week, it's tough not to dream on what he can become by extrapolating that week/month/etc. to the rest of his career. It seems trivial, but that's the only data to make a prediction from. In the case of Kris Bryant, I would agree with how the market is valuing him, he hasn't reached the trajectory that some thought he would when he was tearing up the minors. The fact that the '13 BC sells for $350 raw this far out from release speaks volumes to me, it's exactly where I would value it based his and the Cubs level of success. Collectors need to improve their analysis skills of what production the market is pricing in. No one is required to buy the top selling players at release. Trout was <$30 at release.

There is also a keeping up with the Jones' where when people see a card start to rise they don't want to miss out, so they purchase at a higher valuation than normal. That can be really bad in the short term for the hobby if people make uninformed decisions. But people make uninformed decisions in all aspects of life, it's human nature.

Players like AdRuss, Rizzo, etc. have a lot of data on them, so it's not unreasonable for people to think they have reached the apex of their development. To investors, that's boring. I want to identify the next guy that will receive the hype. There will surely be plenty of players whose values ultimately fall, but the chase for the next Trout is what makes prospecting fun. The fun is what has fueled me for the last 10+ years.

Lastly, I don't buy the argument that BC autos can't be long term investments. Kershaw is a perfect example, they have steadily risen throughout his career. Will most players fail in the long term? Yes, but so will most everything in this hobby.

Well said.

[pdxprospect]

I also feel there is less money to be made in prospecting due to more people grading! Anyone else agree?

I used to be able to buy raw "gems" get them graded and sell for quite a profit. Lately when i buy raw, i feel i am buying an RCR 9. It seems harder and harder to buy great cards raw.

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[bear0555]

Chrome autos are definitely worth more than they used to be. Looking back, I feel Topps made a mistake by creating a monster so big even they can no longer compete with it. In around 1999 and 2000, base Bowman Chromes were very much in demand. There was also Bowman, Topps Traded, and Topps Traded Chrome. There was demand for all of it, yet the top card to get was the Topps Traded Autograph. Now that the best of everything has been combined into one card, buyers don't want anything that isn't a Bowman Chrome autograph.

Also forgotten in all of this is the death of the Rookie Card. In 2006, MLBPA [or someone, who really cares?] decided a player has to have MLB experience before getting a Rookie Card. It went against everything collectors believed in and over time, buyers showed that they weren't going to let someone else tell them what to like. Ten years later, the Bowman Chrome Autograph has replaced the Rookie Card. Almost all players now have one available. There aren't other go to cards, like a UD Prospect Premieres Prince Fielder XRC or an Ultra David Ortiz RC. If a guy makes any kind of splash, his best card is likely his Bowman Chrome Autograph. There's no reason to buy anything else anymore, which drives up prices.

While I'm a believer that prospecting is a better form of investing than almost anything else card related, the risk has certainly increased in the last year or two for reasons previously stated. I've done my best to adjust accordingly, but it has been harder lately.

[bobthewondercat]

It's a giant bubble ... It will collapse. High level prospects outsell everyone on the mlb level outside of Harper and Trout. It's completely unsustainable. Prospecting will continue but market corrections will make it a whole different ballgame.


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[markinca]

Players who currently have a >$750 base Bowman Chrome auto (I hope I didn't forget anyone):

Trout
Pujols
Harper

Players who don't:

Literally every other major leaguer who's played since the inception of Bowman Chrome.

These are the odds you're facing if you're keeping long-term hoping to hit it big.

[pdxprospect]

It's a giant bubble ... It will collapse. High level prospects outsell everyone on the mlb level outside of Harper and Trout. It's completely unsustainable. Prospecting will continue but market corrections will make it a whole different ballgame.


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I have been thinking this for a bit. It is a wave that is constantly moving towards the current year top prospects, getting larger and larger each year.

The problem is, those same hot prospects with $120 prospect cards, 3+ years down the road are everday major leaguers batting .240 with cards worth around $60.

[itsinusall]

Kudos to the op, good topic/thread. With our society, teetering on the brink. The national debt being what it is, IMO no matter how Trout/Harper play there cards also will go down. The apex or high should be a Pujols auto that was SP not someone who is 3-5 years into there career regardless of how great they look.

Guessing print runs of Pujols compared to Trout/Harper would be Trout/Harper has 3-5 times more base autos. That is what demand has caused hoping to strike the next big thing.


Please don't take offense to anything I said about our society just my opinion. My opinion is not based just so I can infuriate or irritate others just another perspective offered. Good day

[shayscards79]

It's all about buying low and selling high. You can do it with the popular guys too. When draft comes out buy a few of the popular guy and wait for Spring Training. Sell off a few to recoup and make the total investment easier to make the rest back at a later date.

You have to get lucky.... and be willing to hold a few long term. The guys who bought Donaldson, Story, Rizzo and Matz are happy. Recently someone sold Mazara and turned it into a nice graded Mickey Mantle. It's all about picking the right guys.

It is true.. sometimes guys have a second peak after hype spikes.

Maikel Franco is a good example of this. I'll wait for guys to get called up, watch their stuff drop after they don't produce instant results in the majors like everyone expects and the buy cheap with the idea that they'll turn it around.

[jmscoggin]

You have to get lucky.... and be willing to hold a few long term. The guys who bought Donaldson, Story, Rizzo and Matz are happy. Recently someone sold Mazara and turned it into a nice graded Mickey Mantle. It's all about picking the right guys.

It's absolutely about dumb luck in most cases, I'll describe two recent examples of mine;

1st - Bought a couple of Mazaras around release, I want to say they were $6-7 each. He never really developed any buzz and I just had them sitting around collecting dust. He gets called up, gets hot and I send them off to COMC where they sell almost immediately for $250 each. That wasn't skill or prospecting, it was sheer luck and an overpay by a ton in my opinion. No way they should be more than $75 -100 cards tops and will be $40 before too long.

2nd - Pulled a 2011 BC Story gold /50 out of a blaster in 2011. He had some hype and I sat on that card for years waiting for something to happen but his star was getting dimmer not brighter. Finally sent it into COMC and sold it this year during ST for $75. I still had a hunch I was making a mistake but his stuff was ice cold. Little did I know that just a couple of months later it would be a $2k card.

In any event, no way any of these cards stay anywhere even remotely near what I sold them for. Prospecting is nothing more than a con. Eventually enough buyers get burned bad enough and leave the hobby for good, that's bad for all of us.

When I say con I don't mean it's criminal but we all know that a hot prospect card will always go down and it's like a game of hot potato. We all hope to be the one doing the burning and not getting burned and that just doesn't seem like a healthy long term play for the life of the hobby.

[kyaa]

I see what many of you are saying, and to an extent I do agree. Many prospects are way overpriced to the point of absurdity. My current most overpriced pick would be Mazara. The guy has talent but his Chrome auto prices have already surpassed players who are much better, have been doing it longer, and are often in bigger markets like Mookie Betts, Jose Fernandez, or Buster Posey. That's nuts. So I understand the idea that this isn't sustainable and so on.

On the other hand, I've recently come to view prospecting more as a form of gambling or investing and when compared to comparable pursuits like playing poker or buying stocks, I'm not sure prospecting is so unsustainable.

I used to play poker in LA casinos and I couldn't understand how some fish could consistently lose over and over again for months or even years. It didn't seem sustainable. How could they afford it?

But then I realized that for many of them, losing money at the poker table was what they did with their disposable income. And though some may have left the tables for good eventually, there was a supply of new fish entering as well. Nowadays I view prospecting the same way.

Some people consistently make money prospecting and others, perhaps the majority, lose money in the long run. But that doesn't mean the entire hobby is doomed or that some inevitable market correction will occur. I suspect many people who lose money stick around for the reasons those fish at the poker tables did--they enjoy playing the game, they've got some disposable income to lose, and every now and then they win and it keeps them going for a while. Plus, there are new prospectors entering the market all the time.

Three years ago I thought the prospecting market was poised for a huge crash or correction and I scaled my operation down but when I returned to the market it was actually more vibrant than I had remembered so I don't think the value of chrome autos is going to drop across the board any time soon.

So as I said, though I see how many of you can view the prospecting market as a bubble that seems poised to burst, I think if you look around you'll see that there are plenty of other "bubbles" in various sectors of our economy and I'm not convinced this one is any more perilous than the others.

[Hail2TheVictors]

prospecting is a losing game. But i don't think it'll die away because let's say you get a young kid in the minors next year who is suppose to be the michael jordan of baseball, it'll blow up again. People will pay thousands and thousands of dollars looking for that silly card.

BUt in the long run for the "investors", it's a losing game. Invest in vintage. Your kids will love ya.

This is just flat out wrong. Prospecting isn't a losing game--it's like anything, those who do it well are rewarded, while others...well, not so much.

Since starting in 2010, I've done really well (and I know many have done even better).

[itsinusall]

I see what many of you are saying, and to an extent I do agree. Many prospects are way overpriced to the point of absurdity. My current most overpriced pick would be Mazara. The guy has talent but his Chrome auto prices have already surpassed players who are much better, have been doing it longer, and are often in bigger markets like Mookie Betts, Jose Fernandez, or Buster Posey. That's nuts. So I understand the idea that this isn't sustainable and so on.

On the other hand, I've recently come to view prospecting more as a form of gambling or investing and when compared to comparable pursuits like playing poker or buying stocks, I'm not sure prospecting is so unsustainable.

I used to play poker in LA casinos and I couldn't understand how some fish could consistently lose over and over again for months or even years. It didn't seem sustainable. How could they afford it?

But then I realized that for many of them, losing money at the poker table was what they did with their disposable income. And though some may have left the tables for good eventually, there was a supply of new fish entering as well. Nowadays I view prospecting the same way.

Some people consistently make money prospecting and others, perhaps the majority, lose money in the long run. But that doesn't mean the entire hobby is doomed or that some inevitable market correction will occur. I suspect many people who lose money stick around for the reasons those fish at the poker tables did--they enjoy playing the game, they've got some disposable income to lose, and every now and then they win and it keeps them going for a while. Plus, there are new prospectors entering the market all the time.

Three years ago I thought the prospecting market was poised for a huge crash or correction and I scaled my operation down but when I returned to the market it was actually more vibrant than I had remembered so I don't think the value of chrome autos is doing to drop across the board any time soon.

So as I said, though I see how many of you can view the prospecting market as a bubble that seems poised to burst, I think if you look around you'll see that there are plenty of other "bubbles" in various sectors of our economy and I'm not convinced this one is any more perilous than the others.



I just want to point out that I agree that there are major bubbles in our economy and when they burst it will directly impact the prospecting bubble. I feel like something huge is imminent, it's going to be disastrous to our country, and our citizens.

[BigSeph]

It's a giant bubble ... It will collapse. High level prospects outsell everyone on the mlb level outside of Harper and Trout. It's completely unsustainable. Prospecting will continue but market corrections will make it a whole different ballgame.


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Don't think so. I'm sure there are plenty of people who have lost their shirts on certain guys and swore never to get into it again, but the basic psychology of it (trying to get in early on the next big thing) won't go away.

Given the massive spikes in BC autos when a guy gets called up (Sano, Mazara, Story during his hot start, these went through the roof) there will always be people looking to capitalize on the basic dynamic.

I remember looking at a Trevor Story 9.5/10 gold ref auto the moment I heard he was going to be starting SS for Colorado, it was < $300. Talked myself out of it and picked up some other cards to hold long-term.

If I had been one of "those guys" who gobbled up Trevor Storys before the season and right after he was named starter, I would have made exponential $$$. 2 gold ref autos 9.5/10 went for $650ish total right when he was named starter. 2 gold ref autos 9.5/10 sold for $4,000 after he went on his hot streak.

Needless to say I could have bought myself a lot more cards to hold long-term if I had just splurged and flipped those Story golds after a couple of months.

I remember it vividly, the guy who bought and flipped remembers it vividly, and that's why this bubble will never burst.

There will always be whales and fishes.

Prices won't come down because the "consignment" ebay sellers will always, always manipulate pricing on ebay. The rare occasion when they let something ride, it sells for 50-75% of their usual "sale price." And other people bid on the same card from another seller thinking it's worth what the consignment guys pumped it up to, they in essence create the reality and the market for the cards that sell on ebay.

TLDR: - it's a rigged game, but everybody wants in on the action. Pump and dump, buying on hype, these basic psychological dynamics exist in the stock market, in coin collecting, there are still people holding onto beanie babies that they got suckered into accumulating.

But in card collecting, any draft pick or minor league callup can recreate the beanie baby craze in an instant. And when that hype dies down, there's another guy on his way to the show. It never ends....

[mwash1983]

Heck Lindor Base 2011 Bowman Chrome Draft Autos can be had for 60 or so and he's better than anyone in the 2016 Bowman Prospect Auto checklist.

[pdxprospect]

Heck Lindor Base 2011 Bowman Chrome Draft Autos can be had for 60 or so and he's better than anyone in the 2016 Bowman Prospect Auto checklist.



Did I not mention Lindor? He is one the guys I was thinking about when writing this. He is a stellar SS and turning into a great hitter. Do I think Swanson will be better than Lindor? No. I am a big Swanson fan, but also a realist.

[pdxprospect]

I just want to point out that I agree that there are major bubbles in our economy and when they burst it will directly impact the prospecting bubble. I feel like something huge is imminent, it's going to be disastrous to our country, and our citizens.


As doomsday as your post sounds, I tend to agree with you, but I am conservative in nature. I personally am not a stocks guy and feel even the housing market is on too much of an upside.

With that said, and back to baseball cards....

I am not sure the "Great Recession" has played a role much in prospecting or card values. I guess I think the American Dream is: I can have what I want, when I want it, whether or not I can afford it.
I am not trying to get political, but feel...

People will still buy cards because it is a hobby. Hobbies are an escape from the real world, no matter how bad it is or gets.

People are just paying more right now for similar hyped prospects than they used to (general idea of the original post).

[ericg531]

Yeah the prices on new top prospects are insane now. Glad I only really buy new Pirates cards and I got all the top prospects of theirs that I want so far (minus pitchers i dont PC pitchers) in at least a Refractor auto.