New Topps Policy Enough Of A Deterrent To Prevent CT Scanning In The Hobby?; Pokemon Shop Introduces Interesting New Store Policy; Playing Over/Under With Cards Worth Below or Above $10,000

You're listening to Cards to the Moon, a podcast about trading cards from both a collector and investor perspective. We hope you'll stick around for the ride as we take a deep dive into the state of the hobby, share some hot takes, hopefully some useful advice and fun stories along the way. Hey guys, welcome back to Cards to the Moon. This is episode 267 and my name is Clark from 5cardguys.com and 5cardguys on Instagram and on YouTube. Co-hosting with me as usual is Hyung of Integrity Sports Cards. John, he's away this time, but hopefully he'll be back on our next episode. Okay, off the top, I wanted to get your thoughts Hyung on this recent development I guess, but I don't know if you know, but Pokemon cards, their prices are going a little crazy. It kind of reminds me of the hobby hype in 2021-2022 for sports cards, the pandemic peak of course. So I'm going to kind of lay out the context. There are these elite trainer boxes for this new Pokemon set called Prismatic Evolutions. And these ETBs are like megaboxes, I guess you can say, for all you sports card collectors who are confused right now. And normally they retail for about $50-60 US. If you check on eBay now, those ETBs, elite trainer boxes, they're selling for about $100-110. So pretty much you can double your profit just like that if you have one of these boxes. Alright, on Reddit, someone posted a sign from a Pokemon hobby shop that read, quote, to preserve the true spirit of the hobby, we're going to have our customers break the seal of any purchase of Prismatic Evolutions ETB at $59.99, limited to the first 20 ETBs. For our customers, this is the interesting part, for our customers that will be keeping it sealed, it's $119.95. So what do you think about this store policy and do you think something like this would have worked during the hobby hype a couple of years ago for those who wanted to rip sports card hobby boxes? This one's tough because I like the idea. I do like the idea because then it kind of serves the purpose of, okay, those that want to rip can rip, but then if you're telling me it's limited to 20 boxes, that's such a small scale relative to how many people actually would like to rip. Maybe it's a standard policy where stores could keep their margins still and offer that to all their customers, not limited. I think that would be cool. But I'm torn. I don't think, people are people. Who in their right mind is going to, if they have access to it at $60, where's that profit going regardless? So it's like even the store saying, limited to 20 boxes, well, if they have 150 boxes allocated then that means they're still going to make the profit off that secondary market. Like I said, this is what I love about the hobby. It's all about innovation. I'm looking for these creative solutions too and I love that people are implementing it because at the end of the day, that hobby shop, kudos to them because they're trying to do something to keep their customers happy, at least from the 20 people that get to rip. At this point, it's like, why don't I rip all 20? It's limited to one per customer. One per customer. It's like the Costco grabs where they set up the carts with two boxes. Have you seen those IG reels? It's freaking crazy. It's like WWE and Costco just to get a few boxes. It's crazy, man. I'm telling you. And what you said is correct. It reminds me of that 2021 hype where it was so ridiculous and we're back at it, at least from the Pokemon side of things. And I think Pokemon has had a couple of these. It's not just one. I think they had a bump earlier, probably 2022 or something like that. And then now another surge. Yeah. No, it's interesting. And you know what? I agree with you from the standpoint of the hobby shop. Good for the hobby shop to do this. And I didn't tell you this one detail, but they're also giving a free pack if you let them kind of record the break, right? These guys are marketers, huh? Hobby shop, man. They're doing right things, right moves. So I like it for the hobby shop. Yeah. If you went beyond 20 ETBs, I guess that eats into their profit margin too, right? And then my second question about whether it would have worked for sports carts. I don't know. I don't think... The one main difference, in my opinion, is that no one really sells wax, like sealed wax on the sports cart side of things. Because for it to really profit, you got to almost wait to see if the players in the boxes, the rookies and top prospects will pan out. So it's like more of a mid to long-term hold, right? Whereas Pokemon boxes, the characters are the characters and if there's a chase in it, you can pretty much flip those boxes right away. That's why I think it probably wouldn't work on the sports cart side of things. That makes sense. But there's something there. If you rip it in-house, then you get some kind of incentive. I like that. I kind of like that. So is Topps doing something at all with that or no? In terms of involvement? Or is that strictly kind of like... I guess it wouldn't be Topps. It would be whoever owns... The Pokemon Center, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. The manufacturer. Yes. No, I don't think... I haven't heard anything like that. And you know, this is interesting too. So I don't know how... So does Pokemon run through suppliers, like distributors, I'm guessing, hobby shops? Do they sell direct at all? Good question. I've seen... I started following more Pokemon accounts and it looks like there's some kind of allocation process, but I don't know what the exact relationship is. So it seems like you have to be a distributor or a dealer or a big box retailer like a Walmart or Costco, whoever is distributing it. And that's going to be interesting because I feel like Topps and Fanatics has kind of like not the same business model where, you know, hobby shops become, I guess, not as important. And it depends on how you see it, right? Because then if you're selling direct to consumer, like online Topps releases, then it's a totally different story because you can't really policy the secondary market. Whereas if you do have distributors, you could somewhat, I guess, put in whatever... Certain rules. Policies, yeah, internally for distribution. So I think with me saying this, I just had a couple of questions regarding that. Would that affect a direct to consumer business model at all? Or would it even be able to policy it because Topps does go direct? Good question. And you know, that's a good segue because we have our friends, Roy and Will, we're trying to figure out a time to do a podcast together on non-sports cards, specifically Pokemon. I'm going to have to listen to that because I want you guys to frame it because there's a lot of, obviously, sports card collectors as our listeners, not as much Pokemon. But I would like to be convinced. For me, it's still like, I love prospecting. I love Juan Soto, that I got to see him in 2016, 2017, and then see card prices and extrapolate data from that. What am I looking at Pokemon? I'm still trying to make that connection. So I want to, I'm genuinely curious. There you go. You can look forward to that episode. We're going to try to do it within the next week or two. You know what? I think other collectors, sports card collectors will be interested in this too because there are some, like our friend Paul Hickey, that are more flippers and investors and you see something like this go off, there's opportunity if you know what you're doing. I think, yeah, if you're one of those collectors or more of the investor type or flipper, sorry, people are going to get upset at me for saying investor. But if you're a flipper, this might be the episode you want to listen to because there's certainly a play. And I'll share my story at a recent fan con here locally. I was able to trade up for $1,000 Pokemon card, which is kind of crazy because I'm a sports card collector, but even I'm getting into the, yeah, into Pokemon cards. It makes sense for you because you have kids probably that enjoy it too, right? So I think that's a big factor. If you don't have kids, I don't see guys who break open like $2,000 boxes of Bowman First Chrome. I don't know, man. No, I don't know. As long as it's for the money. I think you'd be surprised. Yeah. We don't want that. We don't want those guys in the Pokemon space. Do we? To each their own. All right, let's, let's move on to hobby headlines. Okay. So we've kind of touched upon this whole controversial issue of some vendors and hobby shop owners reportedly CT scanning high end boxes and cases to see, you know, if there are any big hits in them. And presumably if there is, they would rip the box themselves. And if there isn't, guess what? They would sell it to their customers. Now it looks like tops, according to a recent article from the athletic is doing something about this. So what I'm going to do is read some of the main points in the article and I'll link the article in the show notes below so you guys can read it for yourself, but we'll go over some of the main points and we can discuss our thoughts on each one. All right. So first what tops has officially done is added something they call an quote intrusive device policy as part of its tops MVP direct buying program agreement and quick shout out to neocards and comics for being, I believe the first to reveal this document. But anyway, this policy states that tops will permanently suspend all direct accounts with a vendor or hobby shop that uses or has ties to the practice of CT scanning products. And the article says it also includes using weight scales and we'll get into that in just a second. So on top of that, it says, quote, tops will ban the person or entity from all tops related platforms and recover any and all direct and indirect damages, right? If they're caught breaching the policy. So initial thoughts on all of this and I'm curious, how effective do you think this will be as a deterrent? I don't think we've talked about the whole CT scanning on this pod at all, because obviously there's a lot of controversy takes, but I'm glad, man, I think it's trash. I think it's absolute trash that, you know, there's this all started like it's insane. It's like, they should have done it quicker. I'm just glad that tops is doing something about it. And this is we go back to the last conversation we had. It's like, these are the leverage points that why dealers become valuable, for instance, like you couldn't police that if tops is selling direct. So is that going to be an issue with boxes? Yeah, you're policing, you know, dealers. What about like the 50-50 Otani boxes or whatever that are shipped directly to the customer, right? So I'm glad tops is addressing it, but I think they're addressing it to the wrong group of people because I think majority of hobby shops or anybody who has dealer accounts, I think would respect that regardless because they're trying to keep the hobby shop alive. They're not trying to take advantage of their customers by they're not the one scanning. I don't think you don't want to risk that too. Why would they? Yeah, and to me, it defeats the why are you open in the first place if that's going to be the way you're running a hobby shop? So then the whole element is you get to rip cards and you want your customers to hit because that's what keeps them bringing... Coming back. Coming back, right? So yeah, I'm glad that somebody's saying something because like I know it's such a... Wherever you sit because if you have $10,000 box of cards, morally you might think it's okay, right? I don't, but that doesn't mean I'm right. Do you know what I mean? So I'm just glad that more people are voicing their concerns and there's actual action that's at least giving us a chance to make it better because I think it's absolute trash. I think to each their own, like I said, but in my opinion, it's trash that people would do that because it puts such a stain on the whole experience of the hobby. Yeah, the collecting. So it's like think you're bidding on a box on eBay. You have no clue that it's been freaking exposed, right? People know what's in the box and you're buying it with the take that you could potentially hit something big and there's nothing in it. And it's always been an issue even you mentioned with like weighing packs. I remember these conversations were way before the COVID hype, right? Pre-2019 even. So I think you'll never get rid of like the bad grapes, but you got to also somewhat police it in a sense where it doesn't become standard like it's okay like this is okay to do it's like no as a hobbyist it's not okay to do it's not okay to weigh packs and especially it's like you could do it on your own time whatever and if that's what you choose but if you're doing it I see people at like Walmart's and Targets they pull out the scale from from wherever they pull it out and start way packs like are you kidding me like yeah yeah that's true and I want to get into that too because we're gonna touch upon you know the age-old issue of weighing packs but going back to this as a deterrent I agree with you I don't think it's a actually this is kind of my last question but we can address it now and and that last question was how prevalent do you think this issue is in the hobby I think it is a few bad apples but that's all it takes to cast doubt on the you know the industry do you know I mean and I think that's the issue we're dealing with so I hope it's a deterrent for those few vendors and hobby shop owners that are doing it and you know depending on whose take you take whose take you take but depending on whose you know hot takes you're listening to it seems like some people think it's a growing issue and the only reason why I could see that it could be a growing issue if this is left unchecked is you know human nature right your people get greedy you know and especially if the hobby continues to grow in terms of financial value it's hard to look the other way when you know there's a five six figure hit in there right and if you could get away with it I don't know you know that's could be tempting for for some dealers and some vendors so I think at the very least you needed some kind of policy like this in place now to the question of whether it's effective it kind of depends on how you can enforce it like that's I feel like it's gonna be really difficult to enforce it's kind of like you need a snitch line or something and then you and then you need like proof after that you know to and then it's it's really hard to you know quote-unquote convict someone on this on this hobby crime right but but that kind of segues into my next question because you know the article continues and says there's this company called industrial inspection and consulting and they specialize in industrial x-rays and CT scans within the medical and aerospace fields normally but they apparently publicly started to offer a service to scan trading card packs boxes and cases now my question is do you think this policy will effectively shut down this kind of service or does it just go underground and reason why I'm tying it with what we're just talking about is that's kind of one way to prove that a client might be using it although in the article this company says they don't keep track of what they scan you know and so they're just offering it as a service right and talk to the user to kind of decide what to do with the information exactly and and then just like does that this is it worth tops or fanatics getting involved in that side of things you know I mean say hey I don't think they have the jurisdiction or authority to do that anyways to say hey this company you need yeah I don't think they have the jurisdiction to do that for sure yeah yeah especially if they're not in the hobby they have a lot more control if they're in the hobby right like if they're like a dealer or whatever you know they have a direct relationship but these aerospace companies could care less about fanatics right right but I like yeah it's I think it's it's it's it's tough because one it's not good I couldn't say there's benefits to these third-party people that have no clue about the hobby kind of doing it just for because they're doing it for money why else would they services if their machine if they have debt on their machine and they could service that debt through that machine through a different industry they just found so I can't necessarily knock those companies for that although I think it is trash still it's like if they actually knew like what actually go and maybe they do and they just turn a blind eye towards it but here's the thing I think tops just doing this as an actionable step whether it's executable or not whether it's effective I think they had to voice at least voice their concerns because I think the majority of people would kind of say okay now we see this as a negative thing in the hobby so I think there was never oh we see this as a whole a negative authority saying that this was a negative thing in the first place now that tops have come out and said we don't support this it's trash I agree it is trash more people more influencers thing have to say this is morally incorrect for the hobby and now people know it as a standard at least there's a voice of authority that supports it right so now it becomes up again to it's the same thing it's like how about shill bidding that's and that's been an ongoing issue but we know that shill bidding is not good for the hobby and people choose not to participate in it and that's what makes the hobby great is morally you have people that say you know what this is where I draw the line I'm gonna stand whereas before if tops is not addressing it it's kind of like a gray area where it's like well no one's really said anything right same with shill bidding trimming card trimming there's so much crap in our hobby and if we don't define those boundaries of what we believe is morally correct and morally incorrect then we could never get to where we need to be and you're never gonna police anything a hundred percent because it's up to the individual to make that decision whether to be moral or immoral so at the end of the day it's like that's that's the thing but I think it's what that with all this said it's in a positive direction that one of the biggest authorities in the space is doing something about it yeah no I agree too there's something that said there's something to be said for social pressure you know like right if people start really voicing their displeasure in it and and like you said even companies like tops the manufacturers themselves make a stand then hopefully that's another deterrent for hobby vendors and dealers that might even think about doing it now fanatics didn't comment on this article but the reporter quoted someone from fanatics previously stating that the company is working on innovations and solutions to address this issue okay and and I wonder do you think that's a necessary step or now that they have this policy that this is you know good enough or do you think they have a further responsibility to hey we're gonna go another step further because you know we want to maybe inspire more confidence in the hobby that even if you know dealers try to do something like this it'll be even more difficult what do you think where do you stand on this I think they need to keep on pushing to make the hobby whatever makes the hobby better because like it for me if I'm running fanatics it has to be as equally important to stand up for what's right in the hobby as revenue and a lot of people see fanatics is just revenue like oh they're doing everything to meet their quotas and their goals which could be true in in some extent it is a business they do have shareholders they do have investors so they're trying to hit their financial projections but at the same time I think it's their duty to constantly evolve to build trust from a customer business relationship so I think it's in their best interest to continue to police stuff like this where you know you're you care about the hobby you care about what's best for the hobby and if people if there are majority of people complaining about an issue or there's a lot more negative coming out of an issue and if fanatics that doesn't address it I think in the long term it's gonna bite them in the ass because it only takes someone who does care and then builds the brand loyalty and trust within you know that relationship for them to for another company to seize the opportunity right so for me yeah I'm I'm big on that I'm big on fanatics you know they have to step up their game they have to invest more money and stuff like this where they have the voice and reasoning to say what's right and what's wrong and that it's a slippery slope to right and that that that's a thing it's like well what's to justify fanatics always being the authority or that leader or that voice right so I see both sides to it I see and I only say this because I know how many people don't like fanatics right like but like to me it's I don't care because like they see it in their light but it doesn't make sense I think fanatics has been nothing but great in the last two three years that we've seen in the involvement it because it's all it is is what they're doing within one year would have taken the old hobby five years to accomplish so of course there's gonna be a lot of changes there's gonna be a lot of failures there's gonna be because we're going so fast right but that's the whole point it's like at least something's getting done because yes the hobby was great pre-kovat to I could say Oh pre-kovat man nobody was buying anything and I was just like man this I'm telling you this cards gonna be so valuable right but it's not that anymore and I can't if I if I'm always like oh the times of pre-kovat were so great and I want it to be back to where it was before there's so much that I hear of that and their best argument is because their motion bro come on let's be realistic let's be realistic here yeah no we can't live in the past but certainly there are elements of the hobby traditionally that we can still enjoy and I think that's parsing that out right and and we're also realizing kind of to your point that we're moving forward the hobby will evolve and you know that's you know the hobby will change and and we try to make the hobby pleasurable for yeah more and more people out there so we can grow the hobby together so yeah I agree with you there I do think yeah it's it's almost in their best interest to continue to you know explore the different technologies that are available in the near and long-term future too it's always a cat-and-mouse game right with people that trying to fraud the system for sure and I think you just got to stay on top of it that's just a reality of running a business like this you know so so yeah I hope they start to allocate and invest funds to use different technologies to prevent something like this you know it's crazy I just thought of a couple years ago you know who tried to be that policing remember it was card porn and this is why you can't have independent people doing it it's because you don't so you don't think you have an independent body I just don't think you can have a anonymous independent person doing it well that we we didn't yeah maybe maybe that's the case but yeah we didn't know what card porn was who was behind it whether because they're technically there were they were a brand right and it's like you we trusted that brand because they showed up every day you know giving value in their way so we trusted that brand but little did we know that you know it was it might have not been best because then people could get bought out right so and this is the dangers of kind of like that not having the legitimacy of the watchdog I don't think we need more watchdogs which which could be so dangerous in every single aspect right so yeah it's that just popped up to my head when I was thinking about policing like is policing good is having watch that's that's that's even bigger discussion to be had in general in society I guess with the role of watchdogs over different industries but I think one I think I could say to that point is the hobby is one of the best places where self-policing really works well because of the members and the collectors in it are so passionate they don't want anything to screw it up you know I mean so that's what the hobby has for it compared to other maybe industries that that's good you have watchdog roles right so yeah one last thing I want to bring up for this article and then we can move on to our next segment and we kind of teased it by talking about the whole issue of weighing packs right the age-old tactic of weighing packs to see if there are any hits but there's kind of a twist in this one scenario I'm going to outline for you okay and I want to get your thoughts the article actually uses the example of what you previously mentioned the Shohei Otani 5050 commemorative sets which I'm still waiting to get my hands on it's coming it's coming in February but they they used this set as an example because because if you look on eBay I actually didn't know this but it kind of makes sense but if you look on eBay they show packs that are on digital scales like someone takes a photo of a pack on a digital scale and it shows that it's a heavier pack okay and and so those go for premium and I don't know if you want to guess but regular pack you know if you open a box which I'm getting right for I think there's 10 packs in a box but a regular pack that weighs normal would go for about 20 bucks a pack so I could sell each one for 20 bucks 200 bucks a box so you're not making any profit but you know you're getting something back but if it's a heavy pack because you know some of the hits are in heavier stock they're thicker those packs are going for about 400 to 500 dollars a pack right so here's the thing we frowned upon weighing boxes at retail stores like you said at Walmart or Target if we saw someone with a mini digital scale I'm like dude what are you doing you know you we frown upon that but here's the twist if you bought the box already like myself I'm not I'm gonna be clear I'm not gonna do this okay so I don't want any hate mail but I want to play devil's advocate here if you bought the box already right and you're you want to sell these individual packs and you notice that one of them is heavier and you take a picture of it you post on eBay advertising as such do you have a problem with that that someone is willing to pay a premium for a heavier pack just being straight up front right from the beginning that's that's why it's so tricky it's like who am I to say like because some people capitalism baby some people want that right right some people don't want to go through all the base cards they they're willing to pay the extra premium for the guaranteed hit sure right and this is where like whether that's morally right or wrong it's really not a gray area it's more of a gray area I think I think morally it's it's more wrong than right but it's not about that that's just my spectrum because some people are like I'm providing a service or product to somebody that wants it so who am I to say oh like you can't have what you want you know what I mean so if that's the tricky part but my solution to this is why can't tops or fanatics come up with a solution where from a manufacturing standpoint that doesn't happen do you mean they should insert like someone sometimes they insert those extra cardboard to make the packs work here's what I learned if you have millions of dollars it is so easy to solve problems right like it's and and and somebody's saying that you can't freaking weigh each pack like the same even though there might be a heavier slightly heavier by whatever grams it is you're telling me you can't figure out a solution with millions of dollars in your pocket to figure this out and it probably wouldn't even cost them any more or any less you know I just gave you a solution that doesn't cost that much adding an extra cardboard stock paper to make it well you know and I think they did they did something like that I did yeah in the past and to me it's like it's same thing with like redemptions right like like redemptions technically way less I guess than a relic so it's like you could depending on the blaster box you you might not you know which ones the relic the guaranteed relic or whatever right so it could work in both ways but yeah like who also wants to go back to the redemption days that's a that was a big issue back in the day you know when we talked about on the pod two three years ago for sure absolutely and this is the evolution of it right it's like getting rid of redemptions the evolution of getting the hobby better for whatever reason this is a simple fix for me it's like you can't argue I think from the individual perspective because every individual is gonna do what's right for them right and there hasn't really been anything that they're technically doing wrong or like from a criminal standpoint but the way you address these things is you know the authority again has to say is this good for the hobby this is this what we want to be known for can we do anything from a manufacturing perspective that can solve this issue and I think that's where you have to snip in the butt it's like figure it out like of course people are gonna be people it's like if you're gonna have the the valuable things that are in individual packs then figure out that problem like it's such a small problem if you have millions of dollars like yeah you know I mean yeah I guess it goes back to what you were initially saying though some people might not think this is a problem they're like yeah I want the pack with the hit of course they get a chance of getting a hit of course they do but it's like does that does that make the hobby better hmm yeah that's a good question right and then that's why I always say Clark who the people just like any great country it's not the politicians that make the country great it's the people that make the country great just like the hobby it's not the policies that make the hobby great it's the people that make the hobby great so as long as the people you know voice their opinion on morality I think it will push towards that but if people aren't saying anything about it of course the people who are gonna take advantage of it are gonna take advantage of it it's human nature so you'd be okay if there was this grand town hall meeting with all the hobbies in the world and they said you know what we like the heavier packs you know we like to know so we can buy we like the option of buying a heavier pack at a premium you'd be fine with that no I would you think that would never be possible it would never be possible because I think from a moral standpoint I think most people sit on the fence where if they're if they're ripping it or they're on the receiving end I guarantee you there they would be very upset if they knew that the packs were weighed knowing that there was nothing in it and then not knowing it like I think that that that would deter to tear people from participating in the hobby more than staying in the hobby because education is everything at the end of the day and that's why it's like any investment if you're telling are you gonna blame the crypto are you gonna blame whatever the influencer that's pumping the crypto it's like do your own research if you lost the bag in any type of investment whose fault is it is it the bags fault is it the person that told you to buy it we all know it point like point the finger at yourself it's it's the lack of knowledge or the lack of research that you've done individually and if you are part of that person that got burnt by anything it's a learning lesson and you learn not to do that so it's up to the individual at the end of the day and that's my whole point it's in saying all of this it's not saying that we need a town hall and we need influencers to step up it's like it's okay to kind of like voice your opinion on the issue and we need more of those people because I I've met so many great hobbyists throughout this and it's not even a issue I know where they sit on the fence with stuff like this yeah it's no different than trimming cards it's no different than shilling bids we all know what's morally right and morally wrong and this falls into that category of yeah it's like weighing packs is such a trash move see again I want to make that distinction yeah if you go weighing boxes retailed for sure I'm a I'm an agreement but if you bought a box and you're just out you know one is to sell a heavy pack for premium to you but you have the right to but but that being said I agree if you if we had this hypothetical town hall forum there'll be so few people that would benefit from that right buying the heavier pack right to be able to pay that premium that I think the majority will say no we don't want this in our hobby so in that case in this case I think I think adding that extra cardboard stock might be more beneficial for for everyone or for most people just think of think of this way to Clark what if a hobby shop had a scale would you buy individual packs off them if you see a scale on the table and then they're selling prism basketball that costs whatever it costs you know and and they there's a scale would you buy a pack from them yeah no that's a really good question because in this scenario of the show a 5050 we're assuming that it's just direct-to-consumer right and then you can you could resell by yourself but there's that added element I'm glad you brought it up of hobby shops can do the same thing but you have no idea which pack was wait so there's other greater implications to this but I and I will say the majority of hobby shops would be innocent on this they would sit on the moral fence of no this is not what we're about this is not why we're open right it brings zero value to us and at the end of the day the majority would agree and that's why hobby shops I think in general wouldn't be of course they're gonna be that one or two hobby shop that is trying to make a bigger buck you can't stop those yep and it goes kind of full circle and it will well fear about the CT scanning we just believe that most hobby shops aren't doing this right and I guess the the greatest lesson here is if you find a hobby shop you completely trust that's where you go just keep supporting your business yeah there you go all right let's move on to our next segment we're calling over under all right so we haven't done this in a while either but it's simple game I'm gonna give you five cards and today's number is $10,000 okay you tell me if the last sold price sold over or under the $10,000 mark all right we'll have a couple basketball cards to start off with the 2018 panini contenders optic gold of our Canadian homeboy Shea Gilgis Alexander could win the MVP this year his autograph gold rookie PSA 9 Auto 10 PSA 9 Auto 10 gold gold contenders so this is out of 10 I believe so yeah for for contenders I'm gonna say it's over I think I think SGA in general like I remember when we were talking about SGA back in 2019 2020 but his time you could do whatever he was doing there was no bump no hobby love no hobby love so I think from organic perspective based on his career so far I think people realize he is one of the top dogs in the league and it required him to have a few years where people actually believe that so I think he was under the radar this whole time compared to the Lucas compared to the Trey Young's compared to the whoever you know blew up at the time John Moran you know all those guys so I think SGA was still low in that spectrum undervalued and now it's starting to get priced where I guess the superstar pricing becomes so I'm gonna say it's over yeah I thought I could get you with this one because everything to your point where we should have bought SGA a long time ago we're talking about him we did just sold way too early I did have one I did have one I split it for a profit but it's worth 5x what I sold it you're right he's finally getting the respect 13,000 800 and that's and then you compare it compare that to other gold contender autos I guarantee you it's very reasonable yeah or even on the lower end yeah on the Lord that's what I'm saying like I haven't like that's not my game like basketball is not my game but like I could see a Luka contenders out of 10 being so ridiculous right like not even like 13k would be a deal yeah for his rookie contenders optical yeah for sure all right this is an older card but iconic the 2008 tops chrome x-factor number to 288 of the Kobe Bryant card being guarded by LeBron James card PSA 10 10 K do you have an image of it yep I could share that with you who do you have the pop count on that 44 44 so relatively low pop count which is a good sign I think I think LeBron and Kobe both had like really highs during the kovat peak and then really lows in the last I'd say couple years I will say there's there's a lot more like Kobe collectors I think out there too I think Kobe in general is going up so I'm gonna say it has to be on an uptick so I'm gonna say over Wow bang on analysis so at the kovat peak it's sold for over 57,000 oh my god that's great card it's dipped all the way down to 6,300 in December of 2023 so a couple years ago and from 6,300 the last sold for 10,800 Wow makes sense definitely on up yeah over the last year do you think that was a good buy at 6,003 no at 10,000 10,008 still expensive you know when you look at the chart the last sales like higher than the three four previous ones I hate being that guy I'd say that I don't mind being that guy because I feel like like anytime I buy like and look at the trends I don't mind not being the low of lows sure because at the end of the day yeah and at the end of the day it's like that's the cash you're putting in towards something that you believe in anyway so I don't mind putting extra cash into something that I believe in so like I'd rather buy the trend upwards on the lower side of things but on an upward trend rather than being the risk taker and trying to guess when the low is if that makes sense I hear you I just wish I was like the guy that paid a little bit more than the low you know not not three people before me but kept on increasing getting at higher prices but anyway okay let's go baseball uh 2022 gold refractor bowman chrome his first auto of jackson churio psa 10 gold number 50 2022 bowman chrome i know a couple years ago it should have been higher i know jackson hall bay and jackson merrill took a huge hype this year away from churio my opinion churio still undervalued but gold is very desired i would say in first bowman chrome but i'm still gonna say is it a psa 10 it's a psa 10 oh man no auto grade just a psa 10 so i would say normally it should be in that 6 to 7k range so i'm gonna say lower because i think jackson churio had such a dip but there is a lot of hype around him so i i could see both happening but i'm gonna say lower here all right sold january 21st for 7 700 so you're right three for three it's under okay here we go this is getting trickier this is that was a setup i thought that you would get that right i thought you'd get that right but this is a setup 2024 tops chrome update of paul skeens gold refractor autograph card psa 10 is it on card auto it's an on-card auto it is tops chrome update is yep according to this picture it looks pretty on card sorry can you send the picture i want to make sure it's the right card he's in mid pitching form with his elbow out but yeah let me here you go okay so tops chrome update gold i i have a feeling some sucker paid more than 10k for that oh man i hope not i'm gonna say yeah it's above 10k the answer is 7 500 okay okay yeah but i think sucker i will i will say that 7k is even expensive because like you're not even talking the booming chrome right you know what i mean you're talking about tops chrome so technically like yeah that should not even come close to even 7k to be honest it should be like a three four thousand dollar card in my opinion agree but you know paul skeens is super hot right now that's why he's super hot we that but that's what we like roy because roy roy still has the black out of 10 luck yeah don't don't worry roy you'll you'll get a good sale for it hey and anybody on the show watching if uh if anybody wants to buy a good paul skeens before spring training hype yeah we got you roy's your man yeah here we go okay last one we'll end off with football he's not in the playoffs anymore but he got his hype certainly a couple years ago i want to know whether you think there's some value here brock purdy remember brock purdy oh yeah 2022 panini flawless his bronze rookie card and the laundry tag patch autograph card number two six okay so there's a lot there bronze rookie card number two six and the laundry tag patch auto card psa 9 auto 10 where's can you tell me the high on that card or no would that be given it away i don't think there was one there was a chart for this one but i could double check brock purdy 10 980 in september of this past year so this one that i'm talking to you about sold january this this year i'm gonna say under i'm gonna say under i think that gave it away 10 10 980 yeah definitely definitely dipped under it's at 7 539 yeah as of jan 19 but that i mean yeah like that's to me it's like that yeah it kind of makes sense yeah for sure yeah the niners didn't have the greatest season either yeah so there you go some people might be surprised by it though brock purdy was a guy for for at least a year and a half before the season that's a thing it's like you just never know and i this is what i notice it's not like a we we see the marketplace as what everything sells for i think in this game it's what you buy like what price point you buy in it and i think that's more important in the long run is your purchasing price rather than so for instance with that said it's like even when you buy in season versus off season long term it's not where the card will go to it's what when did you purchase it and was it a good buy and that's it right so for me i think with brock purdy's case it's like yeah this is not definitely not the time to be purchasing but a card like that could potentially hold value in the future dependent on what you actually paid for it for sure yeah you know what brock purdy this card at this value could be a good deal like the niners underperformed right and it's not like you have to tweak that much to get back up on top so yeah all right that's our uh over under segment we'll conclude this episode with a regular weekly segment we call pick one all right as usual do you want to start things off for us yeah absolutely we'll um we're gonna do things a little differently because i'm not gonna necessarily compare two sold prices okay i'm i'm gonna so one soda obviously massive massive deal uh overpaid in my opinion but that doesn't matter uh his card value i i feel it's it's it's still it's still down from when the hype was which is crazy because he's done crazy stuff uh what do you consider the hype i would say one soda's hype was probably 2021 it's when he won the batting title it's coveted year okay right or 2020 maybe 2020 2020 between 2020 and 2021 i think he had so much hype there that we've been on a downward climb since that peak yes so i feel like based on his contract and his projectability of the type of player he's becoming like i said i think i i projected him to be one of the only position players with 100 plus war type careers and obviously he's only 26 or whatever he is 25 so there's a lot of career left so again it's the when is the best buying period for that right if you look at it as a long term this guy's a hall of fame type player right and i i think with the numbered cards and you see it with the otani's it gets a lot harder to purchase it as they develop in their career and it's a steady race rather than you won't see a lot of rare cards being sold daily even now you don't see too much one soto numbered cards selling daily right like for instance uh i'll give you an example the black out of 67 tops update there's no comps for it right so how would we know what's a good buy really because these cards don't sell as much but with one soto i feel like there's a lot of good valued cards like there's cards that are super inflated like any gold chrome orange chrome autos massive massive um uh inflation on them whereas a card like the 2018 tops chrome update refractor out of 250 i believe john has the psa 10 yeah a bgs sold for 1150 and this is recently okay a bgs 95 okay so i think there's so much value in a card like that so that was a sold comp last week so i'm going to pair that 2018 tops chrome update refractor out of 250 bgs 95 yeah 1150 so would would you buy in at that price versus this is not sold because the tops update black out of 67 has haven't had a comp in three months on ebay there's one listed for 3500 or best offer right so if you what's that price point let's just say the dealer or the seller agrees at 25 or 2700 would that be a better buy a tops update black you know out of 67 a bgs i think it's a min gem versus an 1150 by of a tops chrome refractor update at a 250 bgs 95 dang that's like a like forget it yeah it's not so much about 1100 is the price point it's it's maybe 1150 that card versus three thousand dollars let's just say of tops update black yeah tops update black i'm trying to remember what the image was like is this and the reason i say this is because during the hype yeah like a juan soto tops update black you couldn't even see them for sale let alone one available for 3500 so it's like i've known that card was double or triple what it used to be you didn't even see it and this was before the whole hype i guess because juan soto brought that hype with him so is the same image the chroma factor if they're the exact same image which is something to note of because he doesn't have too many flagship rookie cards so his tops paper was that tops update that he didn't have anything before update so there's a limited run on all his rookie cards and that's why i think it's a great buy in general because there's either a base or a parallel i i you know i think this largely depends on your budget obviously but i would be willing to pay 3k for the card number to 67 i just think it's the image is the same of course but the rarity i think i think that's what's the most appealing to me and the value that you get from bgs95 that was my next question uh not necessarily value for the bgs9 because they're both bgs95s it's more the paper parallel versus chrome parallels i guess because during the last three years chrome parallels have been everything yeah and i yeah previously in the hobby paper parallels were everything because of the the the difficulty of grading yeah you know for me personally i prefer chrome cards i just think i like the shine and you know just more visually appealing to me but i don't know i maybe this is a bias a recent bias for me i'm all about black parallels black refractors in general i just think it's so clean and so just black in general so whether it's a black refractor or black paper parallel you just like the black net yeah i mean like there's that remember the fanatics fest they had a tops chrome exclusive uh hits the swinging for the stars right subset right right the tops chrome and i bid on a vladdy um swinging for the stars uh black parallel that was numbered to 10 and only the lettering swinging for the stars was was in black but even that was like oh that looks amazing so i didn't win the bet i don't want to bid i bid under but uh but yeah i'm all about the black these days and then that 20 on top of that 2018 black was probably one of the best out of 67 blacks and i would say 2019 too but other than those years i don't think blacks were great okay fair but yeah i'm going with the black man if i could if i could whittle down to 3k 29.99 i'll do it there's one for 3500 clark or best offer yeah but there's other ones there's other one soda cards i want too so you know what you're giving me these two yeah yeah yeah no i i would say like i agree with you i think there's going to be a long-term paper parallel opportunity i think we've been so fixated on chromium cards and the parallels that that's been the trend so i think the better buy in terms of rarity right now is paper paper parallels that will hold long-term value and like i said there's a lot of the newcomers in the hobby don't see the value in paper products which is fine because it could be my question is would there be ebbs and flows and is this the ebb and flow of the lower side of paper parallels the last five years where paper parallels went compared to chrome because i would say it was probably 60 40 paper parallel to chromium now it's totally reversed and i would say it's even like 80 20 from chrome to paper parallel which is insane so i'm going with the black i like the long-term legs on that soto card i think it's it's a beautiful 2018 black parallel there's only 67 of them so this is the one you buy at a good price and you keep it in the safe agree there you go black parallel numbered to 67 sweep all right we'll end off with my pick one shohei otani i feel like we haven't talked too much about shohei this episode so we got to change that super high end okay fifty one thousand dollars for a 2023 tops definitive shohei otani autograph card it's a one-of-one it's a red logo man you got to see it it's amazing 51k versus so it's 2023 tops definitive not a rookie year but and is it also great at psa 1010 as well right for added bonus or this card right here the 2018 bowman chrome rookie image very i already know my answer where he's carrying his bat bag and the old auto, number one out of 25, BGS 9.5, auto 10. You know your answer? What is it? I would tell you, if there were three top Otani cards that I would get, this one would be one of them. Really? Yeah. Carrying the bat bag. It would be one of the, I think there's a couple cards that are super underrated that nobody knows about. And this is one of them is, and for those that can't see it, it's basically the image variation with auto of the Bowman Chrome Otani, him carrying the bat bag with the on-card auto, numbered to 25. So it's super rare. People don't even know this card exists because all the love goes into the Bowman Chrome pitching and hitting images, right? So with this, I think there's a top Chrome employee set that nobody knows about. I think those are, that's such a good card in terms of nobody knows about that Otani as well. So I believe it sold for like 10K or 12K and it was numbered to 25 as well. So it's like, those are the sleeper cards that I'm like, man, you don't see them come up often. These are grails. These are long-term grails that are gonna age really well. This by far would be one of those, even though it is super expensive. And the Logo Man, I get it. It's a Logo Man. And Otani, we always say if MJ had a Logo Man, or I guess you look at MJ's Logo Man, you're like, man, even though it was 2003 or whatever it was, whenever his Logo Man was, it's not his rookie card. So there's a lot of value in Logo Mans in general. But I think people are overpaying right now for that card. Whereas the true fundamentals are in Otani's rare, rare rookie autos that have extreme, extreme value. Because if I say a Bowman Chrome Orange Otani auto, let's just say the pitching or hitting image, what were the sales for that? There are six figures, right? So for me, a $54,000 justification on that card is a deal. Yeah. Right, so I'm going with the true rookie auto variation, the Bat Bag, for sure. Can I be honest? I was leaning towards the Logo Man, but you convinced me otherwise. I'm going with the, I'm like, wow, it is weird that it's numbered a 25 and it's not atomic or, you know what I mean? It's not orange. Yeah. So it kind of has that kind of like, yeah, the strange, odd, yeah, rarity to this card, so I'm sold. I'm going for the Bat Bag. Clark, I'll even say this. There's a similar card in Topps Update as well. It's usually, there's a SSP of the paper version, and then there's a SP of the paper version. There's autos, and they're not on-card autos, they're sticker autos. So the SSP is at a 10, and then the SP auto is at a five, actually, but they're not numbered, but that's the known print run, right? Oh, I see, okay. So these, but I had a chance to purchase the BGS one for like six grand, BGS nine, five, out of five, it's a SP auto, and I didn't, and now that card is worth so much, and I remember, I was like, you know what? Trust your gut on these cards. You knew that these are SP and SSP, like technically it'd be SSSP. The only downfall was their sticker autos, so it's no different than somebody just sticking an Otani sticker auto on an SP, and then you kinda have, because it's not numbered, right? But in this case, it's on-card auto, it's one of the grails, I'm telling you. So I'm gonna, yeah, just leave it at that. All right, well, if you ever get an opportunity, that was sold in September of 2024, so yeah, you just don't know when the next one will come out. Yeah, and you don't see them for sale too often. 54,534 last sale, wow. All right, thanks for tuning in to another episode of Cards to the Moon. We appreciate you guys, and we'll see you next week for a brand new episode. Talk then, bye. Hey, thanks for listening to Cards to the Moon. We'd really appreciate you subscribing to our podcast wherever you listen to your podcasts, and you can also connect with each of us on Instagram at 5cardguys, or you can follow Hyung at Integrity Sports Cards, or John at TradeUatRecess. You can also check us out at 5cardguys.com. Thanks again, and hope to connect soon.