THWC 423: The Hobby Is Not Real Life

What's up? Everybody hopped with Cage. Episode 423 came on this Morning here real early July 20th, Monday. I was gonna do a Fanatics Fest recap. That's not what this episode's gonna be. Ah, maybe, maybe we'll get into it at the end, but I'll probably do two episodes today. There'll be another one because that's gotta, that's. There are so many things to cover, so many people I want to mention, so many stories I want to tell you. You know, I, I feel like I had two different shows. I was there Thursday and Friday myself, and then Saturday and Sunday with my son. So I just want to kind of go through that. I know I've done some content on it, but this morning, Monday morning, after a month, month and change of watching, you know, World Cup, I wanted to do a little, you know, hobby relevance here and a little bit of a conversation because so many people yesterday sent me messages after the World cup. And I'm not just talking about hobby people, you know, just people who I've. I talk cards with people who know the cards that I own, the cards that I've been buying, the cards that I've been selling. I took, you know, one of my cousins to the show. You guys who listen and watch this, you guys know how he, he was impressed to meet the king of the cards and told him he watched his content, but not mine. So that was a great little start to Fanatics Fest for. I mean, he messaged me and was like, you know, what's this going to mean to, you know, Yamal cards? What's going to mean to Messi cards? And, you know, he's new to the space, new to the hobby, and a lot of people are, and even folks who aren't who, you know, who may be new to soccer cards, maybe new to, to that kind of, you know, area. A lot of people kind of messaged me yesterday. They know I have some big cards. One of them may or may not have been the third prize card at Fanatics Games at the Fanatics Fest. So it's, it has been a topic of conversation for me. So this episode, we're going to talk about that. And this episode is brought to you by Arena Club, by Card Ladder. Use Code Cage. Save yourself a couple bucks. I got a message yesterday. Somebody messaged me. I finally, after so many episodes, use Code Cage. And I saved myself a couple bucks. I got a message yesterday that was fun and by the Philly Show. So, yeah, I mean, let's, let's Talk World cup for a minute. And really, it's not about the soccer for me. It's about the soccer cards, Right? It's not about, you know, the players for me, it's about the hobby, relevance of those players. And that's kind of where I want to make sure you guys understand. I'm. I'm drawing that line. I'm drawing that distinction, and I want to have that conversation with you because sometimes there's overlap. You know, you see Holland dominating during the World cup, and it catches a little bit of fun fire. You know, his cards start to get a little more hype. Why? Because my wife can probably name half a dozen people, maybe even not that many, who are in the World cup going in. She wouldn't have named Holland as one of them, but now she knows his name and, you know, has seen some of his social posts. And, you know, if you ask my wife who her favorite soccer player was before the World cup, she probably would have said my son. But now she'd say my son is still a favorite soccer player, is a little goalie for his middle school. But she could actually name another soccer player who would probably be her favorite professional. And it's. It's the. The Norwegian Giant. And just for a second here, Holland in soccer looks so huge, right? He looks like this big Norwegian Viking. They got him, you know, like 10ft tall. He would be a shooting guard in the NBA. Think Devin Booker, you know, not exactly someone who we think of as a giant in the sports card world, right? But he's basically. That's his comp for size in the NBA. So just take a second step back and kind of, you know, the guy's playing soccer a little different size than the guys playing in the NBA. So it's just. It was a funny thing that I, I thought of the other day. I was like, you know, this Holland, he's a beast. He's so huge, man. He's just huge compared to the Argentinian squad. You know, he's not something huge compared to the Phoenix Suns. You know, they. They wouldn't even let him play power forward. He'd be a shooting guard anyway. So I digress. Holland is one of those, you know, rare exceptions, right, where, you know, you have both. You have that on field success, you have that hype, you have that, you know, that, that aura. You name it, and then the cards. But even Holland, we're going to talk about his cards because I've, you know, I. I have famously come on here and, you know, sell jail and hurts Sell Aaron Judge. Sell myself. Sell. And it's not because I don't love these players. You guys know, I'm a huge Aaron Judge fan. I'm. I happen to really like Holland, you know, my son came home from Fanatics Fest yesterday with a cool chrome Holland, you know, Fanatics Fest exclusive that he pulled out of a box and kept it for my wife. This way, you know, she. She could start her Erling Holland collection, right? So anyway, it's. We're going to talk here about cards and relevance. And when I come on and I say, hey, sell, sell these guys, it's not because I think they're bad players at all. That's not the case. It's when there is a hype cycle or hype around somebody or favorable things happening around the player that often leads to a significant spike in their price, right? And it's a price spike that. That more times than not, is not sustained because that hype cannot be sustained, right? Think of Holland, right? The only thing he could have done more would be to advance to the finals and or, you know, win the whole World cup, which, you know, was not going to happen. And that was the whole point that I was making. But today, what is he going to do? The World cup is over, right? He's no longer playing, right? He's not here in America, you know, buying stuffed raccoons. He is, you know, back home. How many people who became Holland fans during this World cup because he was in the news, because he was here in America, right? And he was all over Sports center and he was an underdog for the Norway team that wasn't even in the World cup in 2022. People love cheering for him. How many of those people are going to convert? How many people even know what club he plays for? And this is one of those interesting things about soccer, you know what I mean? Patrick Mahomes goes out and wins his first Super Bowl. People convert over to Mahomes fans, they convert over to Chiefs fans. They wait a couple months and boom, the draft happens. Does my home get any weapons? Does he get any weapons? Okay, then, then, you know, we have. We have, you know, preseason, and they can cheer for my homes and his Chiefs team and they know what team he's going to play for and is he going to win another Super Bowl? Back to back, right? Tom Brady, you know, the Knicks, Jalen Brunson want to buy his cards, all right? He won his championship. He's in WrestleMania, you know, and he had surgery and he's gonna go play again. Is he gonna win a championship again? We all know he's a Knicks. Go buy your Knicks jersey. Okay, so Holland, you're out there, you're rowing. You're rowing, you're a fan, and you go buy a jersey. What teams he play for? 90 of the people who know his name now, and we're cheering for him here in America, don't know. They don't know his club. They don't understand. He doesn't just play for Norway. He doesn't go home now and play for Norway. He plays for a club. And it's a confusing thing about soccer, right? And when you look at his cards, you'll see that he plays for Salzburg. Oh, no, wait, he doesn't anymore. You'll see that he played for. For Barissa Dortmund. Oh, no, he doesn't anymore. Now he plays for Man City, at least right now. And. But that's very common in soccer, moving around teams, especially as you, you know, progress. Man City is. I mean, he's. He's the top. He is the player. And, you know, soccer fans would laugh and say, oh, how do they not know Man City? They don't. Here. They don't. And no matter how much press the World cup got, no matter how many times you tell me that this is the global sport, it's a huge sport, it's watched by more people than anyone in the world. And look, it's Shakira and colors and children and Bieber. And when they go back to play for their club, people aren't watching here. You know what question I got yesterday from somebody who was thinking about, you know, soccer cards or. I don't even know if they're thinking about buying soccer cards. They were more interested in soccer. World cup, okay, how long does it take for them to go back and start playing again in their league? And when does Holland play against Messi? Think about that for a second. When this season, does Holland play against Messi? It is such a normal question for American sport fans. You want to know, okay, we got a season here coming up. You know, when does Wemby play the Knicks, right? You're going to want to know when LeBron signs for his team. Let's look at the schedule. When does he play the Lakers? Is it LeBron against Bronnie on the schedule? You know, if he signs up for the Heat, when's he playing against the Cavs? Reasonable question, right? 100% reasonable, right? When do we have SGA against WEMBY for the rematch? You know. You know, in the NFL, you know, do we have a Super bowl rematch again? Is it on the calendar? Right. You know, did Mahomes and Brady, are they going to play against each other when you had the goat and baby goat conversation? When do they play each other again? When's the rematch? Right, that makes sense. Ohtani's playing against Judge the World Series. Oh, when did the Yankees play the Dodgers? It all makes sense. So it makes sense for someone to ask, when does Messi play Holland? Well, he doesn't because they don't even play in the same league. When does Messi rematch against Yamal? He doesn't. Not in the same league. Not even close. And that is a very difficult thing for the American sport fan and then the hobby to kind of digest because you don't have that champ crown, you don't have that super bowl champ crown and you don't have somebody to watch it. And you know, us lazy Americans, we could turn on the NFL and watch it and watch a team head towards the championship and win the Super Bowl. You don't have that in soccer, you know. And you want to tell me it's, you know, the Champions League. Okay, well, what team's Messi playing for? Is he going to be in the Champions League? No, you know, the Euro. Okay, well, what about the teams from, you know, not Europe? You know, I mean, there's nothing wrong with it. Soccer. Like I said, the people who are fans of it are rabid fans of it and they love it. Those rabid fans just really haven't become soccer card collectors. And now we've got the World cup ending. And I have in my stories talked about Lamina Mall because there has been so much money pumped into Lamina Mall and guys, he could play for another 25 years if he's Ronaldo esque. I doubt it. But, but he can play for another 25 years. He could. He could set every record in the world. He could be the greatest in the world. He really can or he cannot. Now he got the world stage. This was the World cup, his first one. Just like Mbappe did in 2018. He could have taken the world by storm and started scoring goals. He scored one meaningless one, none in any of these big end games. The quarterfinals, semifinals, the finals, no goals. The best player in the tournament came from his team. Rodriguez. I. He deserved it. He was everywhere. I was talking to a bunch of, of a bunch of soccer guys about him, you know, in the prior two games, I mean, just all over the place. What a motor on that guy. Fully deserved the golden ball, which I Say Golden Ball and 99 of you, like, what the hell is that? And that's one of the fun things. It's not a problem, it's just why soccer cards have me a little on edge. We'll get there. But at least there was a 19 year old youngster who won the best young player of the tournament for, for Spain. A 19 year old kid on Spain. It just wasn't Himal Kubarsi, the defender. And so it's interesting everybody's argument against what I'm saying about Yamal, how he was kind of invisible and he just wasn't there. Everyone's, oh, look at all he's done. Look at it. He's won the World cup, he's won the year, he's won the this, he's won that. No, his team's won it. And look at this team get the best player of the tournament, the best young player of the tournament and neither of them are him. You know the argument against somebody like Michael Jordan, that people who don't love Jordan is. Yeah, but he had Pippen on his team. He had a great number two. Okay, well, Jamal isn't even the two. You know, no one's calling Pippin the goat. I digress, He's a young kid, he'll probably be very great, but no one's gonna care for another four years. And that's part of the problem. 99 of the people don't know where Yamal plays. So much money has been spent on Yamal already that he better turn into the next Messi. And let me stop crapping on Jamal. Because if we're really being honest with each other, the World cup was amazing. What an amazing tournament. There were not a lot of penalty shootouts, which is cool, they let the teams decide it. You know, there were a couple there. But when the big games came down to it, these final games, the semifinals, you name it, the teams won. You know, on the field, it wasn't left to that 50, 50 chance that the goalie might guess right. You know what I mean? And while those are exciting and they're entertaining, this is what I personally would prefer. And the tournament was amazing. I mean, I think America did a very good job. I think in Mexico, Canada, I think North America did a great job hosting these, these games. The spect of it was huge. I mean, I walked around the city, I watched it, the game from Fanatics Fest. I mean, it seemed like everyone in New York was either in a Spain jersey or an Argentina jersey. And that's not an exaggeration. And it just shows you kind of the global reach. It shows you kind of, you know, the. The fandom that's out there. But. But I remember cards in the soccer world going up in the lead up to the World cup of 2022 and 2018 also, and them dropping afterwards. And it is reasonable. It's a reasonable thing for you to expect because this is the culmination. This is the. Everybody was buying the cards to lead up to World cup because they knew about the hype and the excitement of World Cup. And as great as it is, I love Roth cards. I love what he does for the space. He brings a lot of eyeballs to it. You know, he's always moving stuff. He does a very good job of posting the cards and showing these great cards and stories and you name it. But I don't believe for a second that if we fast forward the clock to a year from today that he is holding any of his Holland cards at all. Because he will realize that as much hype as they're in right now, there is for Holland, that will dissipate, that will fade away, and there will be Holland fans and Holland collectors, but there will be a lot less heat around him, a lot less talk about him. Even if he goes and has a monster season for his club, it won't matter because he's not doing it on the stage. Because there is no stage like this, not for four years. And people. That's a tough thing about soccer, right? The fanatics games giveaway for third prize was a soccer Messi. Huge card. And everybody loves Messi, but he's not gonna have this huge world stage. He may never have it again, you know, and if. If he does, he's gonna be a little older, just fine. You know, I hope he does continue to play. I mean, all us old guys are pulling for him, but you get it, you understand? Even messy. And I'll end it with a couple minutes of Messi. Even Messi, as great as he is, people messaged me and said, all right, well, he lost. You know, what do you think about that for his cards? And to be honest, I mean, he's already the, you know, the greatest. Whether he won or lost, I mean, he's kind of put that to bed. This was an amazing World cup and an amazing run for him. And it was on his foot. It was. It was on him. Like he did the goal scoring. He did, you know, he was the playmaker, set up the big goals, he scored the big goals. You know, he was in the middle of it all when they needed him to be there, he kind of didn't show up for the finals. But it is what it is. But anyway, even him, I have come on here and said to sell the super bowl winning quarterback right after they won that super bowl, because that's it. Like people are not going to be talking about it as much as they were. There's a reset and then everybody starts over for the next season. There will be a reset now and Messi will go back and play in Miami in the mls. And let's be honest, everybody out there who is talking about Messi and screaming about Messi and thinking about buying messy cards. Are you going to turn on an MLS game and watch him play against Cincinnati or Portland? No, you're not. Be honest. No, you're not. So if you're not watching, most people aren't watching. And even if he goes out there and has an amazing season for the MLS squad, Miami, what does that do? His legacy is kind of written. Who knows what else he may do? It doesn't matter. He's a goat. The point is that this humongous spectacle that is the World cup here in America, this huge spectacle, that's the culmination, that is the end of it. Now the next World cup is like a hundred year celebration. I think the first round actually there are games in South America. I think the host countries are Spain, Morocco and Portugal. And they'll have like the finals and stuff like that. But in the beginning, because it started there In South America 100 years ago, I think Uruguay and you know, maybe in Argentina might even have some games if he's playing. That will be huge and there'll be another big spectacle about it. But that's four years from now. What else is there that's going to have Messi's name on everybody's lips after this week? What else is going to make everybody talk about Messi? He's not winning a Super bowl, he's not winning a World Series, he's not even winning a Stanley Cup. And those things are great. I mean, they keep the ice in them, they keep your drinks cold. And he's not doing that. He's not going to win an NBA championship. He may win in the mls, but what's that trophy? I don't even know what that is. An mls. And what does that add? And you're not even going to watch it even if he does. So the tough part is sometimes the heat gets turned off and when that heat gets turned off, that usually impacts the hype. Around the cards, the amount of demand for those cards, and then in turn, the price for the cards. Now, I'm not saying his 2014 gold prism card is going to go down in value. It's not because the people who own it are just not going to sell it. They're holding it forever because he's a goat. And there's just not enough of those to go around. But those of you guys who bought some 2014 Prism base cards, I mean, or 20, 22 prison base cards, what is it that makes people want to continue to own those cards? I don't know. Maybe I'm wrong. You know, Michael Jordan hasn't played in a long time, hasn't done anything for a long time. He's retired. He's gonna go. His cards go up. It seems like every day, every hour, his cards go up. So, you know, maybe Messi is now solidified in that kind of category. And, you know, his cards are a great long hold. I just think that we've seen a significant enough run that we might see sort of a, you know, you know, let's call it a stall, you know, maybe a little bit of a lull before he retires. And then his cards do the Jordan thing. For me, they've kind of run a lot recently, and I think a lot of that is because the World cup was this culmination, this big event that we no longer have. And one more minute on Yamal. The girl does not go home with the wingman. He goes home with the guy who scores. Jordan is the one you collect, not Stockton. People want to buy the guy who scores the points. Kobe, not Chris Paul. Jordan, not John Stockton. He may be a playmaker, but just look them up and look beyond the hype machine of people who own them. The coaches in the league have said he's the guy who makes plays happen. He might not be the guy who scores one goal. Even on Barcelona, they play a little different. He doesn't get forced to the right edge as much. They let him roll towards the middle a little bit more with that left foot. So it's perfectly set up for him to shoot. But more often than not, it's perfectly set up for him to pass to Levandowski to score. He's a playmaker. I can't say he's not. But ultimately, the goal numbers, those scores, you know, the. The. The casual fan who's going to look at the score and say, okay, they won. How many did Lemine score? How many goals did Yamal have? He's not going to put up those numbers. I mean, listen, I could be wrong. He could grow into it. I got a lot of people hate me on the, on the. But I mean, we just watched all of these World cup games and he scored one goal. I mean, this is a different game now. You know, there's a lot of goals being scored. You know, not only did Messi not win here and this World cup, he lost in the finals. He also lost the overall goal record for the World Cup. I mean, Mbappe scored a couple in that meaningless third place game, but it counts. And those goals were enough to give him the golden boot and also overtake Messi for the all time leader in World cup goals scored. And even Bobby. Yeah. What's exciting about him anyway? That's my, that's my, my spiel on the World Cup. I just, I'm preaching a little caution. I still have a bunch of, you know, of fun, messy cards. I bought one, you know, while the World cup was going on, based on the hype. It's a cool one from Noir. I just, I am a little fearful for some of the folks who got into this because of the World cup hype and bought into some soccer players. And you're going to see six months from now, like, I have these soccer cards, you know, what do we. Hey, guys, let's go. Row, row. Let's roll. Let's roll the boat. Let's roll the Norwegian boat up the escalator. Look. Where, where, hey, tick tock. Where is that? Just. It's not. You're gonna have to wait four years for that. And I hope you don't have to wait four years for your cards to go back up in value after they go down now. And that's just my take. And that's what I want to tell you about the World Cup. Fun watching it with all these people, though. I felt like I should have bought a Spain jersey, an Argentina jersey, maybe a Barcelona jersey, so that can kind of COVID all my faces. Another episode's coming soon. I gotta do a fanatics fest recap. And that's 25 minutes. That's long. Matt the Mailman. I hope you enjoyed this one because I know, you know, you like longer episodes while you walk and, you know, deliver the mail. Thanks for your message yesterday. I appreciate it, man. Talk to you guys soon. Take care, everybody.