1996 Skybox Premium Rubies print run?

Kstar27 · 10-14-2019, 04:15 PM

Anyone know if there was ever a stated print run on these? I think they were one per box. An Eddie George just popped up on ebay for a hundo obo. I have one already by might try for this one too? They rarely even pop up for sale

marinocollector · 10-14-2019, 07:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kstar27

Anyone know if there was ever a stated print run on these? I think they were one per box. An Eddie George just popped up on ebay for a hundo obo. I have one already by might try for this one too? They rarely even pop up for sale

No. Print run is unknown.

marinocollector · 10-14-2019, 07:49 PM

I would estimate 500 range of each. Seeing that it’s hobby only. With 500 made, you’re looking at 9500 cases. Seems feasible for that era.

Stifle · 10-14-2019, 07:54 PM

Marinocollector is correct. I'm sure it's over a 100 but less than 250. Even in the late 90's they were not difficult to spot or trade for but nobody ever had a stack of them. Larger set.
$100 was about the price for two boxes in 96, therefore it's safer than breaking them open.

rittdk01 · 10-15-2019, 08:27 AM

They were inserted 1 per hobby box, so figure out how many boxes and how many cards are in the set.

marinocollector · 10-15-2019, 08:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Stifle

Marinocollector is correct. I'm sure it's over a 100 but less than 250. Even in the late 90's they were not difficult to spot or trade for but nobody ever had a stack of them. Larger set.
$100 was about the price for two boxes in 96, therefore it's safer than breaking them open.

I cant imagine it less than 250.

If less than 250, you're looking at 4750 cases made. That would be less than one case per hobby shop with no allocation available for distributors. I just dont see that low of production.

88horsepower · 10-15-2019, 11:00 AM

The tricky part with a lot of the tougher 90's parallels isn't necessarily that they are low in print run, but rather part of a set that was made in mass quantities. While it may be true that 1996 Skybox Premium had thousands of cases made, many of those cases remain unopened. It's like any junk era product out there that was overproduced, while a lot does get busted open, a ton of it sits around and never gets cracked. That leaves a relatively tough set like 1996 Rubies even more challenging to find if you're looking for any particular player. One Ruby per box in a 250 card set means your odds of getting a particular Ruby you want are really low. If a case is 24 boxes, you wouldn't even get 10% of the Rubies in a case assuming you didn't get any doubles.

I've been working on the rookie set for over a decade now and I'm still missing several players, some of whom I've literally never seen Rubies for. It is a brutally tough set to complete.

SleeperCards · 10-15-2019, 11:05 AM

I think I only have 1 or 2 Biakabutuka, definitely a tough set to find whatever particular player you're looking for.

glen87 · 10-15-2019, 11:07 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by 88horsepower

The tricky part with a lot of the tougher 90's parallels isn't necessarily that they are low in print run, but rather part of a set that was made in mass quantities. While it may be true that 1996 Skybox Premium had thousands of cases made, many of those cases remain unopened. It's like any junk era product out there that was overproduced, while a lot does get busted open, a ton of it sits around and never gets cracked. That leaves a relatively tough set like 1996 Rubies even more challenging to find if you're looking for any particular player. One Ruby per box in a 250 card set means your odds of getting a particular Ruby you want are really low. If a case is 24 boxes, you wouldn't even get 10% of the Rubies in a case assuming you didn't get any doubles.

I've been working on the rookie set for over a decade now and I'm still missing several players, some of whom I've literally never seen Rubies for. It is a brutally tough set to complete.

Quote:

Originally Posted by SleeperCards

I think I only have 1 or 2 Biakabutuka, definitely a tough set to find whatever particular player you're looking for.

this - as a jmu collector, this has been on my WL since 1996 for Haley. i have never seen one, and have been looking since these were released.

Stifle · 10-15-2019, 05:44 PM

4 Rubies of the same player every 1000 boxes. 40 Rubies every 10,000 boxes. How many of the 96 Premium boxes were produced just before so many of the card companies began to short print base rookies?

Did Skybox produce over 50,000 Pemium boxes in a year when how many other Skybox products were produced as well?

Kstar27 · 10-15-2019, 07:29 PM

So if the print run is 500....thats 125,000 boxes. Thats 2,500 boxes per state...so even if there were 25 card shops in every state back then on average. Each shop would have 100 boxes of skybox premium football....were the 90’s really that insane?!

glen87 · 10-15-2019, 07:34 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kstar27

So if the print run is 500....thats 125,000 boxes. Thats 2,500 boxes per state...so even if there were 25 card shops in every state back then on average. Each shop would have 100 boxes of skybox premium football....were the 90’s really that insane?!

pretty much no way the print run is 500

50-100 was the rumor back then (but again, that was just speculative)

premium was more limited than regular skybox

brianshaft · 10-15-2019, 07:34 PM

Oh I’m pretty sure there were more than 25 shops per state on average- I live in an area of about 30,000 people and I can name 5 shops that were open at the same time as late as 98... 11 million people in IL... that would be somewhere around 1800 shops in IL alone if my math is somewhat accurate lol

glen87 · 10-15-2019, 07:42 PM

keep in mind, there are only 71 total currently on COMC (from a 250 card set).

compared to just over 160 refractors from 1996 chrome (a 165 card set).

Stifle · 10-15-2019, 07:56 PM

There was a massive change in the volume of cards created by companies from the early 90's to mid 90's, from mid 90's to the late 90's. In my opinion, the Rubies have never been a print run card that any of the dealers had a large number of and before EBay many cards would go to shops or dealers.

glen87 · 10-15-2019, 08:04 PM

ok, i finally got the info i was looking for. there were two box types.

24 pack hobby box - 1 ruby per box

and a 36 pack box which did not contain rubies

this is where all the math is being messed up. the hobby boxes were much more limited than the 36 pack boxes.

Kstar27 · 10-15-2019, 08:09 PM

Interesting..so hobby boxes went to shops only right?

Kstar27 · 10-15-2019, 08:12 PM

Pretty dope how you could actually win the entire game worn jersey back then instead of a little 3/4” piece of not game worn junk

glen87 · 10-15-2019, 08:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kstar27

Interesting..so hobby boxes went to shops only right?

they did and were limited from memory

all through the 90's i did 1-3 card shows a month and by '95, i was only football. it was getting too hard to keep up with everything unless you were full time. i started actively seeking haley cards around '92. ads in scd, in addition to the shows i was doing, and as stated earlier, i have never even seen a haley.

Stifle · 10-15-2019, 08:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by glen87

ok, i finally got the info i was looking for. there were two box types.

24 pack hobby box - 1 ruby per box

and a 36 pack box which did not contain rubies

this is where all the math is being messed up. the hobby boxes were much more limited than the 36 pack boxes.

Ok, this changes everything. I can see why Greg "88Horse" is having difficulties completing this rookie set and why Glen had heard the rumor of 50 - 100.

It might be worth researching how many hobby boxes were produced by other card companies in 96.

marinocollector · 10-15-2019, 08:52 PM

There’s so much misinformation in this thread.

There’s no such thing as 1996 skybox and 1996 skybox premium. There’s only premium.

The 36 pack box is retail.

The 24 pack box is hobby.

25 hobby shops per state is VERY low. This was before internet trading was common and way before eBay was common. The only way to get cards for most consumers was going to shops and shows.

IF there was any rumor of 50-100 made, these would have been the FIRST ultra premium parallel. How much would a card set with that low of a production run go for? $500 for the best players would have been easy. I don’t think these ever booked above $200.

Select Certified Mirror golds or Marino and Favre and Emmitt debuted at $1600. They made 35 of each of those. Those were 1:300 packs in a 125 card ultra premium hobby only set. Let’s have some fun. Let’s say 1996 select certified and skybox premium has the same print run in hobby (which it didn’t BTW, allocations for select certified was very low for the hot product). That would mean 239 rubies would exist.

This is why these cards are so hard to find. And I’m sure everyone will disagree with me, but this is reality.They were boxtoppers. Over half the cards went right into dealer showcases or the back room. A lot of these dealers went out of business. These cards end up in storage or in massive lots that aren’t valuable enough for anyone to take their time to dig out. Yes, I agree a lot of these are tough to find, but I bet a lot of these are overlooked or discarded as a cheap parallel, because these never have had major value.

Also, by the same rates of some of the guesses, the 1997 Skybox Rubies would be one in every 1-3 boxes. All of these variables are just not reality.

marinocollector · 10-15-2019, 08:58 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by glen87

keep in mind, there are only 71 total currently on COMC (from a 250 card set).

compared to just over 160 refractors from 1996 chrome (a 165 card set).

There’s only 379 total 1996 skybox premium cards on COMC. I don’t think this makes any connection to print runs.

marinocollector · 10-15-2019, 09:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by glen87

keep in mind, there are only 71 total currently on COMC (from a 250 card set).

compared to just over 160 refractors from 1996 chrome (a 165 card set).

The rubies were a 228 card set

marinocollector · 10-15-2019, 09:04 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Stifle

Ok, this changes everything. I can see why Greg "88Horse" is having difficulties completing this rookie set and why Glen had heard the rumor of 50 - 100.

It might be worth researching how many hobby boxes were produced by other card companies in 96.

I’d say it’s difficult bc most of the players he’s looking for were out of the league by 1999 when eBay became a huge part of the hobby.

marinocollector · 10-15-2019, 09:16 PM

Another card set I would like to point out is Fleer Ultra 1997 Platinums. That was a hobby only parallel. 198 card set inserted 1:100 packs with less than 150 made. Let’s assume 149 bc that’s less than 149. If 1997 fleer ultra hobby and 1996 skybox premium hobby has the same print run, you’d have 540 skybox rubies. I would concede that 97 fleer ultra would be the more popular product being that it was an early season release, but The figures would not be a huge percentage more in my opinion.

10-14-2019, 04:15 PM	#1
Kstar27 Member Join Date: May 2019 Location: Michigan Posts: 161 Ktmoney27	1996 Skybox Premium Rubies print run? Anyone know if there was ever a stated print run on these? I think they were one per box. An Eddie George just popped up on ebay for a hundo obo. I have one already by might try for this one too? They rarely even pop up for sale

10-14-2019, 07:49 PM	#3
marinocollector Member Join Date: Sep 2010 Location: Locally Posts: 8,178	I would estimate 500 range of each. Seeing that it’s hobby only. With 500 made, you’re looking at 9500 cases. Seems feasible for that era. __________________ There's 100 made! Lets hope that one of the .00000001% of the world population that actually own this card decides that today is the day they offer it for sale.

10-15-2019, 11:00 AM	#7
88horsepower Member Join Date: Jul 2012 Location: Somewhere In Time Posts: 23,358	The tricky part with a lot of the tougher 90's parallels isn't necessarily that they are low in print run, but rather part of a set that was made in mass quantities. While it may be true that 1996 Skybox Premium had thousands of cases made, many of those cases remain unopened. It's like any junk era product out there that was overproduced, while a lot does get busted open, a ton of it sits around and never gets cracked. That leaves a relatively tough set like 1996 Rubies even more challenging to find if you're looking for any particular player. One Ruby per box in a 250 card set means your odds of getting a particular Ruby you want are really low. If a case is 24 boxes, you wouldn't even get 10% of the Rubies in a case assuming you didn't get any doubles. I've been working on the rookie set for over a decade now and I'm still missing several players, some of whom I've literally never seen Rubies for. It is a brutally tough set to complete. __________________ https://www.psacard.com/psasetregistry/showcase/rookies/88horsepower-childhood-baseball-rookies-collection/imagegallery/15549

10-15-2019, 07:42 PM	#14
glen87 Member Join Date: Dec 2011 Location: VERMONT Posts: 67,490 glen87 glen87	keep in mind, there are only 71 total currently on COMC (from a 250 card set). compared to just over 160 refractors from 1996 chrome (a 165 card set). __________________ collecting James Madison University players of all sports JMU cards: https://www.flickr.com/photos/jmucards/ other cards: https://www.flickr.com/photos/glen87/albums

10-15-2019, 08:04 PM	#16
glen87 Member Join Date: Dec 2011 Location: VERMONT Posts: 67,490 glen87 glen87	ok, i finally got the info i was looking for. there were two box types. 24 pack hobby box - 1 ruby per box and a 36 pack box which did not contain rubies this is where all the math is being messed up. the hobby boxes were much more limited than the 36 pack boxes. __________________ collecting James Madison University players of all sports JMU cards: https://www.flickr.com/photos/jmucards/ other cards: https://www.flickr.com/photos/glen87/albums Last edited by glen87; 10-15-2019 at 08:06 PM.

10-14-2019, 07:54 PM	#4
Stifle Member Join Date: Nov 2015 Location: I've met great collectors throughout MI and N. Indiana / CHI. Posts: 8,085 Stifle	Marinocollector is correct. I'm sure it's over a 100 but less than 250. Even in the late 90's they were not difficult to spot or trade for but nobody ever had a stack of them. Larger set. $100 was about the price for two boxes in 96, therefore it's safer than breaking them open.

10-15-2019, 08:27 AM	#5
rittdk01 Member Join Date: Sep 2014 Location: Indiana Posts: 2,373	They were inserted 1 per hobby box, so figure out how many boxes and how many cards are in the set.

10-15-2019, 11:05 AM	#8
SleeperCards Member Join Date: Oct 2014 Location: The Internet Posts: 15,388 SleeperCards Sleeper	I think I only have 1 or 2 Biakabutuka, definitely a tough set to find whatever particular player you're looking for.

10-15-2019, 05:44 PM	#10
Stifle Member Join Date: Nov 2015 Location: I've met great collectors throughout MI and N. Indiana / CHI. Posts: 8,085 Stifle	4 Rubies of the same player every 1000 boxes. 40 Rubies every 10,000 boxes. How many of the 96 Premium boxes were produced just before so many of the card companies began to short print base rookies? Did Skybox produce over 50,000 Pemium boxes in a year when how many other Skybox products were produced as well?

10-15-2019, 07:29 PM	#11
Kstar27 Member Join Date: May 2019 Location: Michigan Posts: 161 Ktmoney27	So if the print run is 500....thats 125,000 boxes. Thats 2,500 boxes per state...so even if there were 25 card shops in every state back then on average. Each shop would have 100 boxes of skybox premium football....were the 90’s really that insane?!

10-15-2019, 07:34 PM	#13
brianshaft Member Join Date: Nov 2010 Location: Starved Rock Country Posts: 2,714	Oh I’m pretty sure there were more than 25 shops per state on average- I live in an area of about 30,000 people and I can name 5 shops that were open at the same time as late as 98... 11 million people in IL... that would be somewhere around 1800 shops in IL alone if my math is somewhat accurate lol

10-15-2019, 07:56 PM	#15
Stifle Member Join Date: Nov 2015 Location: I've met great collectors throughout MI and N. Indiana / CHI. Posts: 8,085 Stifle	There was a massive change in the volume of cards created by companies from the early 90's to mid 90's, from mid 90's to the late 90's. In my opinion, the Rubies have never been a print run card that any of the dealers had a large number of and before EBay many cards would go to shops or dealers.

10-15-2019, 08:09 PM	#17
Kstar27 Member Join Date: May 2019 Location: Michigan Posts: 161 Ktmoney27	Interesting..so hobby boxes went to shops only right?

10-15-2019, 08:12 PM	#18
Kstar27 Member Join Date: May 2019 Location: Michigan Posts: 161 Ktmoney27	Pretty dope how you could actually win the entire game worn jersey back then instead of a little 3/4” piece of not game worn junk

10-15-2019, 08:52 PM	#21
marinocollector Member Join Date: Sep 2010 Location: Locally Posts: 8,178	There’s so much misinformation in this thread. There’s no such thing as 1996 skybox and 1996 skybox premium. There’s only premium. The 36 pack box is retail. The 24 pack box is hobby. 25 hobby shops per state is VERY low. This was before internet trading was common and way before eBay was common. The only way to get cards for most consumers was going to shops and shows. IF there was any rumor of 50-100 made, these would have been the FIRST ultra premium parallel. How much would a card set with that low of a production run go for? $500 for the best players would have been easy. I don’t think these ever booked above $200. Select Certified Mirror golds or Marino and Favre and Emmitt debuted at $1600. They made 35 of each of those. Those were 1:300 packs in a 125 card ultra premium hobby only set. Let’s have some fun. Let’s say 1996 select certified and skybox premium has the same print run in hobby (which it didn’t BTW, allocations for select certified was very low for the hot product). That would mean 239 rubies would exist. This is why these cards are so hard to find. And I’m sure everyone will disagree with me, but this is reality.They were boxtoppers. Over half the cards went right into dealer showcases or the back room. A lot of these dealers went out of business. These cards end up in storage or in massive lots that aren’t valuable enough for anyone to take their time to dig out. Yes, I agree a lot of these are tough to find, but I bet a lot of these are overlooked or discarded as a cheap parallel, because these never have had major value. Also, by the same rates of some of the guesses, the 1997 Skybox Rubies would be one in every 1-3 boxes. All of these variables are just not reality. __________________ There's 100 made! Lets hope that one of the .00000001% of the world population that actually own this card decides that today is the day they offer it for sale.

10-15-2019, 09:16 PM	#25
marinocollector Member Join Date: Sep 2010 Location: Locally Posts: 8,178	Another card set I would like to point out is Fleer Ultra 1997 Platinums. That was a hobby only parallel. 198 card set inserted 1:100 packs with less than 150 made. Let’s assume 149 bc that’s less than 149. If 1997 fleer ultra hobby and 1996 skybox premium hobby has the same print run, you’d have 540 skybox rubies. I would concede that 97 fleer ultra would be the more popular product being that it was an early season release, but The figures would not be a huge percentage more in my opinion. __________________ There's 100 made! Lets hope that one of the .00000001% of the world population that actually own this card decides that today is the day they offer it for sale.