Quick Update From Japan; Replay Of A Favorite Past Episode Featuring OG Members Of Five Card Guys

Hey guys, welcome back to Cards to the Moon. My name is Clark from 5cardguys.com. You can also find me on social media at 5cardguys on Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, and TikTok. Okay, I think this is my first cold open in our podcast history and that's because I'm still in Japan. I'm not gonna lie. Each day we've had a jam-packed schedule doing a lot of fun things with the family and just enjoying time away together. But that leaves little time to record for the pod. Still, I wanted to get a fresh intro out there for you guys. And like I said in the intro on Tuesday's episode, I do have a recap episode coming, hopefully for next week, when I'm back home in Toronto, back on Eastern Time, which I'm more familiar with. But in the meantime, just a heads up, I did a super quick IG reel and YouTube short on my visit to Mint card store in Japan. I'm going to try to do one for my visit to Hobby Korea in Seoul as well, sometime over the weekend, I hope. So please visit any of my social media handles and look out for that. I'll include all the links in the show notes below. But I'm gonna have to cut this episode short because I'm on my way to Tokyo Tower, hoping to stop by another mint store. I think we're gonna have Japanese curry for dinner. So again, another action-packed schedule. Oh, I almost forgot to mention, I went to this crazy chain store. And if you've been to Japan, you probably know what I'm talking about. It's called Don Quixote. I think that's how you pronounce it. And they sell pretty much everything. And I saw that they had some Topps Chrome and Topps Finest and the special Japan edition pack of Topps baseball cards. So you know, I had to pick up a package and I'll rip those while I'm here. And we'll try to put that up on social as well. And you can see if I got any hits from retail packs in Japan. Okay, that's it for me for now. But I wanted to replay one of my favorite episodes from season five, which was last season. And it was actually the premiere episode that season and featured two of my longtime friends and original members of Five Card Guys. They're not in the hobby as much anymore, but they had a really cool story about a Juan Soto first Bowman Chrome orange refractor autograph card that they actually pulled. And I helped them sell via golden auctions for a pretty nice price. Here's that episode for you guys, if you haven't heard it already last season. Okay, enjoy. And I'll talk to you guys soon. 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. All right, welcome back to Cards to the Moon. My name is Clark from fivecardguys.com. And you can also find me at fivecardguys on Instagram and on YouTube. This is episode 262. And the first episode of 2025. It also happens to be the first episode of season five of the podcast. And since this podcast is produced by Five Card Guys, you see what I did there, I thought we could start this year with a special episode talking about how Five Card Guys got started. Now, my regular podcast co-hosts, Hyung and John aren't with me today, but I got a couple of special guests to help me out specifically for this episode, because they are two of the original five guys that started Five Card Guys with me about eight or nine years ago now hard to believe. So David and Kosa, welcome to the podcast. Thanks for having me. Thanks for having us. It's a long time coming. And I'm glad we could do this to kick off season five. So I'm really excited about it. But I'm going to teach something real quick right off the top. And I promise we'll get into it later in this episode. But David and Kosa are also the two friends I've talked about on this pod before, who sold their Juan Soto orange refractor rookie autograph card for 144,000 US dollars, which was a fun and crazy and insane story of how all of that happened. But let's start from the beginning with how we got together to start Five Card Guys. And we'll end with why you guys both deserted me in the end. But okay, so if if I recall correctly, and please correct me if I'm wrong. I got back into sports cards. After randomly reading a blog, this is me personally. And I think I started talking to you guys about it, you know, whether I was at church or whenever we hung out back in the early days. And along with a couple of our friends, which makes five of us hence the name. Yeah, so we I remember talking to you guys about starting a sports card website with you know, the hopes of monetizing it one day. But that kind of evolved into us just buying hobby boxes together. Because we wanted to split the cost and see if we got any hits right. So does that sound about right to you guys? I know there's a lot of other details. But what do you guys remember about when we first met? I do remember that. Like I remember us just wanting to get into baseball cards. Or I don't even know if it was just baseball cards. But I think at that time was just based on it started with baseball cards. Yeah. And then I do remember like you did talk about a website. And there was an actual website at that time. And you're just writing articles on different cards. And but yeah, and then we eventually went into the box breaking we we put we pulled in our money and then we just ended up looking for hoping to hit some good cards. And then and then you obviously Clark was the one who was the one who would like go online and check the prices and see if there's any values and a good hits. And yeah, I think that's how it all started. And we would just kind of meet up. What? periodically? Yeah, every couple months or so. Yeah. What do you remember? Yeah, I mean, for me, I my interest was, I mean, I like the idea of investing in these trading cards. And yeah, I mean, it was definitely a hobby. But then there was also the intrigue of actually, you know, making money and flipping I that was the part that I like that drew me into this whole, this whole area is being able to see if we could, you know, buy a card, hold it, you know, it's basically speculation, right? You, you, you hope that this player or this prospect will, you know, do something significant and you're able to capitalize. Yes, at the right moment. So I remember there were a few cards that aside from the box breaking, there were a few cards that we actually bought through, I guess, auctions like eBay. Yeah. One that comes to mind was the Bregman. Alex Bregman. Yeah, right. Right. And then I think we also got a green refractor of Dansby Swanson. Oh, yes. That was our first one. Our first one. Yeah. Did we make any money on that? I don't remember. We didn't remember though, on our first block. First the first break. What was that picture that we got? The picture? Remember, we named, we named our chat group after him. Oh, David Hess. David Hess. So originally it wasn't five card guys. It was the David Hess sports club. Right? People listening to this right now. It's like, who the heck is David Hess? Exactly. He didn't work out. Okay. But he was our, it was a blue refractor. Yeah. Number two, one 50 blue refractors are still number two, one 50. We're like, Oh, if this guy turns out, you know, to be a real pro, we're going to make money. Oh, I just kept remembering like, Oh, let's try to check his stats. See how he's doing. He got blown out. Every game became a middle relief pitcher. And then, yeah, it didn't work out with David. I almost forgot about that, but we had Bregman and Dansby Swanson going back to Dansby. We, I remember we made a couple hundred bucks. Like that was our first real flip. And I remember like, you know, buying into the green refractor at the time. It wasn't cheap. Like it wasn't dirt cheap or anything. Cause it was a green number to 99. And I, you know, Kosa, I believe was the ones that, Oh, let's get into Dansby Swanson. Like Kosa is kind of the risk taker of the group. He's like, yeah, it just costs a few hundred bucks and we could flip it. And I think I remember kind of hesitantly going in on it. Oh, but Dave, Dave knew a lot about Dansby Swanson. He's like a Braves fan. So he was pretty high on him too at that time. Yes. I think we bought him or bought the card after his first full season with the Braves. So he got traded from the Diamondbacks to the Braves. And I think there was a lot of, I would say a lot of hype around him. So I thought, yeah, I mean, I see this guy as having, you know, a good future with the Braves. So I thought, why not? Yeah. And to people who don't know Dave, who was born and raised in Toronto is a huge Atlanta Braves fan for some reason. Why is that? I started following the Braves when Dave Justice, he was a, you know, what was it in 1990? He was a big prospect for the Braves. And yeah, I liked, I liked the guy. So I ended up following the Braves because of him and stuck with them since. And yeah, unfortunately it didn't work out in 1992, but it's okay. Yeah. We, we remember 1992 because the Jays beat the Braves and it was an amazing feeling. Yeah. And that also tells you how old we are. Well, I did have a reel on me getting Joe Carter's autograph after 30 plus years. So people know that we're all kind of in our forties now, which is, which is pretty much our key demographic of this podcast. So yeah, I was just checking up that green Dansby Swanson card that we sold for a few hundred and it just recently sold June, 2024. So just this past summer BGS 9.5 auto 10 for $51. So there you go. We sold at the right time. Dan's be Swanson. And he did have a high, like a top prospect pedigree. Yeah. Right. So yeah, that, that shows you about prospecting. You got to flip quickly with those guys. Cause not everyone can be a Shohei Otani or, or a Juan Soto, which we'll talk about later. But I want to go back to what you were saying, Kosa, about the website and how we're just writing articles. And it was really 95% me. You guys weren't doing anything. So guys, you have any articles to contribute? No, not really, but I don't, I don't fault you for it. Cause obviously ripping wax, breaking boxes were, there's much more fun than writing. I mean, plus you, you were the writer. I mean, that is what you did. That's true. That's true. Former journalist, everyone knows on the podcast and it came more naturally for me, but we found out quick that if we really want to make money in this hobby, it was about flipping cards and not building up a following for our website. But but you know, fast forward and we'll get into this at the end. I'm the only one that kind of kept it up cause I just enjoyed doing it. And we'll talk about why you guys want to do something else. But but this is awesome that I get to talk about five card guys, even after all this time, because if I'm sure you guys follow some of the content I'm still putting out there and we're almost at 50,000 followers on Instagram. So I love this hobby, but yeah, let's go back in history when we're talking about five card guys. And do you guys remember our first official quote unquote meeting? You know, when we met at, I believe Lloyd's condo at the time, were you living with Lloyd at the time, Dave? Yes. We were roommates. Okay. So Dave and Lloyd's place. And then I think we ordered like a couple of pizzas, had a bottle of wine, had some beers. Yeah. I remember that. Right. Like, was it originally like, do we know it was all five of us coming or did we come in and then because we're at Lloyd's house, he joined us and he became our fifth member. He just came out of the shower one day like, hey, what are you guys doing? I know like four of us were into it. And then I think I remember Lloyd being there. And then he's joined in as our fifth. I don't know. I can't remember. Freaking Lloyd. We really loved the name four card guys and then Lloyd had to ruin it. You know, that's a good segue of how we came up with five card guys. This is Kosa, I believe, who came up with the name. We were trying to think, oh, we need a name, good name for our website. And then I guess by that time there were five of us just hanging out, eating and then about to rip open a hobby box. So how did you come up with the name? Once and for all settle it. Cause I've been trying to communicate. I've been on several other people's podcasts. They're like, why did you come up with five card guys? I'm like, it's my stupid friend Kosa. So now out of your own mouth, what do you recall coming out with that name? Honestly, I just wanted something simple. And I knew because there were five of us. I really honestly like it because I knew there was that burger joint, five, five guys. Very popular. Yeah. Why don't we just do five card guys? It's simple. It's catchy. And I think I think it'll catch on. So that's what I used. And then that's kind of like where I figured it would hit. I didn't think it would actually be that great. But then you guys all agreed with it. You know, here we are. Just a simple story like that. And if you don't know Kosa, he always comes up with like jokes and thinks everything is funny that we kind of politely laugh at. But then I think really none of us could think of anything better. So we just went with it. And there you go. There's the story once and for all how we came up with five card guys. I remember you telling me, Dave, about one of our first box breaks. You know how when you do everything for the first time, you're super careful. Do you remember that time? Yes, I do. It was at our place. Yeah, the time when Lloyd and I were roommates. Who was it that was actually doing the box break? It might have been me. Yeah. Yeah, and I remember Dave saying okay clear out all the glasses Yes. Yes. There was a lot of a lot of plates a lot of glasses on the table And I wanted to make sure it was debris free and free of any grease or any other contaminants Yeah, I wasn't too fond in the fact that you didn't have gloves, but it's okay No white gloves or rubber or latex gloves, too Yeah, but it worked out. It didn't matter anyways because those early box breaks we got nothing. Yeah, it was a moot point Yeah, it was a Nothing good came out of those early box breaks And you know what something's never changed because I still haven't really gotten a major hit under these stupid boxes The only thing that's changed is that these boxes cost three times as what it did when we first started eight or nine years ago I'm sure even though you guys haven't been in the hobby day-to-day Like everything else in this world. Everything is going up in price and that includes sports cards, okay, so we talked about our group name and and That's when I started all the social media accounts for five card guys And I know you guys didn't really care about that. So I just kind of you know in the hopes of Monetizing our website trying to get our name out there Just a quick backstory I had a Twitter account which I kind of converted into five card guys because I had a few thousand followers on that account I'm like, oh might as well just use this for our sports card. And I think I had like 3,000 followers on Twitter I'm like, oh, this is pretty good. And and right now on Twitter. I have about 3,000 followers. That's a good But then, you know, everyone was really getting into Instagram too at the time like it's you know Ten years ago, right almost ten years ago and Instagram is not as big as it is now Obviously, it's it's a global phenomenon And and I I just started to put up my own cards up on the five card guys Instagram account that I created and it began with like some of the cards I owned which wasn't a lot and then it Segued into some of the cards I wanted to get and then I ran out of ideas for that and then I started to see Oh, let's look up on eBay What are these high-end cards that people are selling for and that's pretty much how five card guys got started where I could post Daily and I've been doing that for about seven eight years without skipping a day, which is kind of crazy And then it's become, you know Reals and videos and I've been trying to build up that content and Instagram is the account the social media account That's by far grown the largest with like I said earlier We're closing in on 50,000 hopefully by 2025 You guys surprised at all about the growth What do you guys think when I was like starting to just kind of grow that account? Me not really. I mean really you were You were the one who kind of spearheaded this whole Group, and I mean you are a hobbyist even prior to us coming together So and for sure, I mean you had done most of the research, you know You know with collectibles and so I mean, I I'm not surprised that you've grown it to what it is today And you know, you're you know with your German journalism background and your you know knowledge of social media Yeah, it's it's it's it's a it's great seeing, you know, what it's developed into today. And yeah, I'm proud of you appreciate Yeah, I think I remember you talking about and what you started to do and yeah, I think you are the type of person that is very diligent and consistent and Well for me, I easily give up Again I'll have ideas, but then you're good at execution and then and just keeping up with Consistency, I think that was the key with everything because you would do it every single day and then every week when we're talking about A church like oh, yeah, like I can see you actually start building up and start getting more and more exciting. Yeah Yeah, I remember that. Yeah. No, I appreciate that but I Like what Kosta mentioned he he does give up easy on a lot of things But he starts a million things too, which is you know, which kind of works out for you know, one of them's got a hit That's Kosta's philosophy and you know, he's done well with that in his life but Early on the us going together. I think that was key for me too. Like if I just had started by myself I don't know if I would have kept it up as long as I did and I think you guys The five of us at least have stuck with it for at least the first two or three years and and that was kind of fun to do and especially I tell people on other podcasts when they talk about when they ask me about the five card guys or origin story and We actually started before the pandemic like everything really blew up during the pandemic But we started like maybe a year or two before and then and then in year three I think everything kind of blew up So we I you know with five card guys, at least we had that kind of running start within the two three years I want to talk about this too. We've done several box breaks by that time and and then 2018 Was the shohei year, you know when we we first began to realize this global phenomenon and you know Fast-forward to now 5050 season and you know, all his cards are continuing to go up but then early on we're into the shohei chase because You know now I don't know if you guys know but for every major new release There are bounties for like the top cards. So anyone that can hit whatever the top chases. There's someone giving a bounty of like six figures, so There's a football prism release right now and Jaden Daniels is the top rookie QB Alexis Ohanian who started reddit. He just recently put out a video Putting a $200,000 bounty on anyone that hits that card But shohei that there was a super factor, which is the one of one and that's what we were chasing ultimately that card sold for a hundred eighty five thousand or so and And then when that card so we're like, wow, that's crazy Like I remember Lloyd and I had a had a bet on How much that card will eventually sell for and I said I won't hit a hundred thousand, right? And then of course it blows that mark and I had to owe him a shake shack or something But we were chasing it and then do you guys want to tell the story of like what what happened? We back at Dave and Lloyd's place again, I believe and we we said, okay Let's go in on a box and then Lloyd wanted his own box. You remember that? Oh, yes. Yes without telling us I believe he decided to purchase his own box and Yeah, so he did a parallel break while we were breaking our you know our communal box and Yeah, well, I mean good for him, but in the end we got no hits or no notable hits from that I remember though and Kosta could talk to this but There's there are two boxes and then Lloyd was like, okay you guys you choose the box that you guys want to break together And I'll take the other box and they were like no No, we don't want to be the guy that chose the wrong box in the city show Super fractures in that box that we didn't choose and I I feel like coast it's like, you know, I let's just pick this up because no one was choosing anything and then Ultimately, we got the better box, you know that had the bigger hit which was like 75 bucks and then Lloyd got a hit That was like 20 bucks Worth so we won but at the end of the day, they're both probably worth nothing. Do you remember that? I do remember that Actually, no, I don't Like how much how much was a hobby box like man, it must have been to 250 at that point. Yeah to 250 Were we better off just holding on to the box? yeah, for sure because it's The otani rookie cards are still there like, you know So that's one of the things where some people actually do that. They buy the the box sealed and they don't open it and if you have a 2018 Bowman chrome, that's gonna be worth thousands of dollars because Just for the potential of hitting a show a Otani rookie card So in hindsight guys, we should have just kept those two boxes Sealed what 2018 so six years later, right? We could have been like, okay, let's flip it for However much it costs now in the thousands for sure, but you know hindsight is 2020 Yeah, so Okay, we're gonna go back a year from that box opening and this is why I teased at the top about you guys Going in on a book. Okay, speaking of you guys doing your own break the two of you This is what I'm trying to wrap my head around okay, because I was we established I was probably the most involved in the hobby with sports cards and and then you know one day I Find out that you Dave and you Kosa go downtown to 401 games and buy your own box. I don't I just tell me the story How did that even start or just the two of you go? Was it a random thing? You're like, oh, we're together. We have nothing to do like you. Tell me the story. Yes. No, we we had no You know Basically, it was after It was one Sunday where Kosa just out on a whim If we would go if we could go downtown and go to 401 games and just see what they had available Yeah, so I think it was more spontaneous than anything. And so yeah, we went to 401 games downtown and we saw that they had the 2016 Bowman chrome boxes and Yeah, we thought you know, how why don't we just get a box now? Right and just split the cost? So, yeah, I think I think it's not like something we kind of deliberated over it just kind of happened on the fire You sure it wasn't like a screw the rest of the guys over just the two of us and this is 2017 So this is a year after 2016 So the prices might have even come down since then because it wasn't a brand new release at the time, right? Yeah, like I don't even think we were hunting for anything in particular like Dave and I were just together I don't even think we were hunting for anything in particular like Dave and I were just together and We decided just to go ahead and go to the hobby shop and look for it Yeah, I don't even remember if you guys were even around that time obviously not because I don't remember being asked but Lloyd Remembers being asked do you remember that like was he around and Lloyd said? Like what wasn't around at that time was just literally just me and Dave Lloyd was at his apartment when we're where we opened it and he just happened to be there And at that time too, the box was only like 90 bucks for us insane It was like only in 90 bucks for that hobby box. Yeah, Canadian Canadian And then so yeah, we just bought one and then we decided to take it back to Lloyd's place Where you guys were you were staying to and then that's when all the magic happened, right? So when you got back to Lloyd's place, do you not offer him like hey Do you want to go in on the break or we're just using his place? You're just using his place. Yes yes, I mean so Lloyd was present and Yeah, it was on the exact same dining table where we oh we did the box break for the chasing the show a card yeah, and Yeah, so, okay. Here's a funny story about that. So you had mentioned earlier how We had a choice between choosing one of two boxes, right? When we're chasing the show a card, so Kosa actually pulled this stunt at the time when we're doing the box break for the Bowman chrome 2016 box and Oh just as on a sidebar who was who was the Top prospect that people were chasing. Do you remember? I don't even remember Was it was Chris Bryant on the 2016 box. Let me check quickly On the cover of 2016 Bowman chrome was our homeboy Vladimir Guerrero he's in the set and Michael Conforto Remember Michael Conforto. Yes of the Mets and now I believe he's with the Dodgers. He's been a journeyman so so Michael Conforto and Vladdy, I guess where the where the chase if you're going by the Guys on the box. Okay. Yeah But what I distinctly recall is as so basically we had the box on the dining table and we However, many packs were in the box We we split it and decided to just open it, you know Separately, you know at one point Kosa Kosa asked me. Hey David, how about you just keep the cards that you're gonna rip and then I'll keep the cards Packs that I'm gonna rip and I said, wait a second. I thought we were in this together. Why why are we now? Why are we now like separating the cards and In hindsight, I I should have I should have accepted his proposal Okay before before you get into that Kosa. What were you thinking? Were you thinking like I want to be greedy and what what's what? Do you remember this stunt that you tried to pull? That's exactly I just I'm a risk-taker Yeah, and You know, I was just looking I just thought I just thought would be more fun and more funny either way Okay, it's just be hilarious. It's like if I ended up with something much better than what they've got But obviously I'm glad that that we were in this together like it like it like it should have been from the very beginning I think it was funny is like we offered we asked Lloyd What what did you ask Lloyd? We asked him if he wanted to join in on us. Oh, yeah Yeah, and then to be part of this so instead of splitting it two ways we split three thirty bucks each But then yeah, he opted out I don't even know why he did but you do you remember no, no, but yeah I think he just yeah, he just decided any interest. All right, okay, so Go on with the story. It was good that Kosa didn't get his way because Because as I was ripping through the packs, I came across this orange refractor and it was of a player I've never even heard of And of course the coast has never heard of this guy either. Yes. Yes, and we were just genuinely excited that we got an autograph card, right and even if it was someone that we never heard of and But right away Kosa starts to Google him. Yeah, and he found out doing his search that this guy was a top prospect for the Nationals right 17 years old at the time I believe yes and for people who don't know we're talking about Juan Soto who just signed a 765 million dollar contract with the New York Mets highest in sports history right now but yeah so you what did you remember of that Kosa when you hit Juan Soto well yeah I mean obviously yeah I didn't know who Juan Soto was at the time I think I was just I was just really excited to get an orange refractory right because there's only like 25 of those yeah and as soon as I saw the name I just remember just going through my phone and just looking up his history his stats or anything about him and then everything I read just looked extremely positive I'm sure they do this for all but at that time because he's only 17 years old yes I wasn't even sure if he was drafted but I think they I remember I remember he had a contract at 17 year olds for like maybe a couple million dollars for the losses and I was like if they're willing to pay this guy that much money it needs to be like really good right at least that was just that was just what was going through my mind and then sure enough like you know fast forward every time as soon as soon as he made his MLB debut yeah I started following him since then and like while we were trackling I remember there were a couple times when his car just started gaining more momentum and that was the time when Dave was like let's sell it let's sell it but me I'm like I'm a holder like why sell unless you actually need the money it's like none of us were going broke at the time so you know why not see what happens and then anyways that's always gonna be my attitude like I'm always like a long-term holder yeah but yeah I was just I just remember just being exciting just seeing his baseball stats go up and up every single day because you didn't have to wait long because he was pretty phenomenal early on you know a lot of these young guys especially as teenagers like you're saying they have all the potential in the world and most of them don't live up to their potential but Juan Soto won a World Series when he was 19 I think you know and you know he started to build up accolades and obviously we know now he's in his mid 20s and he has so many more awards and his stats are incredible but yeah yeah and I think they fast-tracked him from single-a all the way to the majors or I remember he did skip yeah like I don't think we had to go through all the different you know stages to end up in the majors and I'm not even sure what was the reason do you guys remember the reason why they called him up that early it was a dude of an injury it's always the case probably Harper right yeah it was a Harper back in the day yeah but that national team was loaded too right when they won the World Series but yeah you while you're going you're saying Kosa that Dave wanted to sell early on and do you remember like when you're tracking his prices at what point Dave says okay let's start this price like do you remember that so I think they're sorry there so I think they were like a few times so the first time was when it was at $3,000 if you want to sell it for $3,000 you know what which is a good job early that was very early but this is orange tractor I mean hindsight 2020 but if you bought a box for 90 bucks and you're flipping over 3,000 that's a good flip yeah but in my mind I was like it's only $3,000 but Kosa remember there's no guarantee with these prospects right I mean he was a runner-up for the rookie of the year yeah yeah right your boy yes so I was torn actually I was happy for Ronald but I would have preferred if Soto was rookie of the year because that would have I would have elevated his value yeah but yeah I thought you know anything in the four digits I was happy with and yeah so I think we were tracking what I was going for on eBay at the time so I thought yeah why not and you know Kosa wisely said listen there's no urgency and we should hold and see what happens so when did he ask again and what price was and I don't know at one point I I began to notice one Soto because everyone the world began to notice one Soto I'm like and then I found out you had the orange refractor I'm like what the freak and then uh I said as a good friend I'm like you should get that graded and you guys gave it to me remember that so I brought it to sport card Expo here in Toronto because I knew that would be the best way and the safest way to drop it off in person and to and I sent it into Beckett at the time and and I don't know if you guys are where PSA is the king right now Beckett has fallen off they actually changed ownership a couple months ago because the previous owner their holding group their CEO got arrested for fraud so anyway that's a long story so now Beckett is owned by another group and they're just sinking ship right now but at the time all the baseball cards most of the baseball cards had BGS grading because that's just been the history and and now everything's PSA because it has more value but I got the card graded for like 85 bucks and do you remember it you thought it wouldn't come back at 9 5 because you thought that there was a yeah I thought because I don't know it just that one of the corners looked a little little like nicked in my eyes who immediately I thought of Lloyd because when we did the box break I did let him hold it and I thought of myself oh my goodness I bet just out of contempt he probably like flicked it or something right but I do remember when you got back the greeting it was almost like nice when we saw that 9-5 yeah it was almost like getting that orange refactor again from the beginning right yes like yes yeah that totally increased the value immediately yeah cuz there's a big difference between 9 and then 9-5 yeah I knew you're gonna get at least 9 just from I don't I don't I'm not a professional thing but from my eyes it looked really legit but I didn't think I would get like 9 like we would get 9-5 yes so once it was a BGS 9-5 you could really track the prices right because you knew the grade you knew the condition so you you turned the offer to sell it because you both you have to agree at 3,000 and then at what point did you go back again Dave saying hey it's it's up at this price point let's let's try to sell yeah so at one point on eBay it started to well I don't know if it necessarily sold at that price but people were trying to sell it for about 20-25k US yeah so I thought to myself okay that that's that's a like that's a price of a car right there okay maybe we should really consider doing it now yeah and so I I started to push Kosa more at the same time though I didn't want him to do something he didn't feel comfortable with and vice versa right we wanted to make sure it was a unanimous thing Kosa actually at one point said okay listen you know like I personally don't want to sell I'd rather hold it right you know as he said before because he is more of a long-term investor but in my mind I thought well we don't know it like this guy could get injured he could suddenly be yeah he can be involved in some kind of scandal and you know that could affect you know his you know Wander Franco yes yes yeah so yeah I mean I I was a little nervous because I thought maybe this is the best price we will get for him and I mean I knew the guy had potential and you know there was nothing in the good thing about Soto is that he's a very consistent hitter yes so I mean still is yes yes and and he didn't seem like someone who was very injury-prone to me so I mean those are things that were and that's the biggest fear when you when you're when you have a card of a prospect mm-hmm and unfortunately like Rondo Akuna yeah right with the ACL issues right so yeah it could happen to anyone for sure and I mean 25,000 is a chump sheet so at that point Kosa were you like okay yeah maybe or were you like let's hold a little longer oh I want to hold he was on a good team too and I was like if this guy just wins like it's some kind of if he wins like rookie of the year or like the MVP like you need to win a title you need in one accolade yeah right and sure enough like I was waiting if this guy wins the World Series then yeah like this is a legitimate card yeah right and I thought long term like man this could be like the next Mike Trout right like it could be that high and then yeah I just want to I just wanted to hold it but at the same time like I would have been fine if he was really adamant about selling it to I don't know what changed his mind personally like why you decide like not to do is it like because I said I was that I think I said I was like fine whatever you want to do like I'm okay with it but then David said he wanted to he was okay holding for a little longer yeah yeah so at that point I think the card was in Kosa's possession and then yeah so after it was right so so Clark so first to Kosa yes yes so Kosa was the custodian and then and then he gave it to you to get it graded yeah and then at one point I believe it was in your home Clark for some time that's correct and I was a little nervous about that I thought myself oh he better not be like displaying this like you know in his living room or something and anyway and I remember when it got to the five figures right I I politely asked you do you think I can get that card from you and so at one point you gave the card to me and I threw into my safety deposit box okay and I try to remember what happened next because oh you know there was a point where you were okay with selling it because you asked me if you want if I could list on eBay and kind of take care of the selling part because I was you know at that point I wasn't buying selling five-figure cards but I was selling buying selling $1,000 $2,000 cards and even I was uncomfortable you know I was like I had to ask first I had to ask eBay to increase my selling a little bit because if I want to list for a higher price you have to go ask them to lift that limit and then I did and then and I was just kind of doing my own research because I don't want to like make a big mistake especially with your card you know and at the time golden was becoming a thing like they had that auction house and you guys didn't know anything about golden right no you brought it up to us okay I brought up to you I'm like yeah there's this there's this company golden auctions they're becoming a bigger name and this is before of course the Netflix series the what was it called again can golden his show King of collectibles King of collectibles yes season 1 and season 2 so this is all before then and I remember reaching out to well at first you guys saying hey I think this is a better option because they'll have more eyes on it and and then you know like it's probably even safer to have them take custody of it and then go through the selling process and everything was supposed to be smooth right but what did you guys think when I suggested that to you guys well just to backtrack a little I believe you were also looking into another auction company do you remember oh yes PWCC at the time which is now fanatics collect yes and so I believe you were talking to someone there that's right about the potential having you know to consign the card there and I don't think they were very professional with you I don't know if it was lack of professionalism but they just didn't respond I guess all right but yeah so they didn't respond and they were I think the leading auction house at the other than eBay which is anyone could go on it and then I and then golden you know shout out to golden they're the ones that were pretty responsive and I think they're also eager to make a name for themselves to you know how new companies want to get started they're looking for higher end auctions so actually that the gentleman that I email back and forth he always periodically emails say hey do you have any other high-end cards we'd be happy to auction it off and in truth I will never come close to the card and what it ultimately sold for but that was during at this point it was like peak COVID right it was a peak COVID I remember it was a good time to sell at that point yeah because everything was just shooting up and obviously one Soto they got their championship in 2019 yeah and then yeah everything just started falling into place and then you were pretty much acting like almost like our agent almost right between like talking to golden and then coming back to us and then I just remember being so nervous when it was time to actually send the card to the auction because it was somewhere in the States right it's like in the New Jersey yeah golden's yeah located so I remember I remember like just waiting like did they get it like they have a sign for it yeah and there's like supposed to be proof yeah and but yeah that was very nerve-wracking but I'm glad at the end they received it yeah because it was our first time doing anything like this and when you're dealing with a card of that high value yeah yeah I mean if it was a $3,000 card and something happens to it gets lost or you know stolen in transit then yeah I mean it sucks but I mean you can deal with it but now we were potentially dealing with a card that was in the six figures right and we had a sense that it was gonna be in the six figures or based on what you were kind of copying it as yeah at the time and so yeah we kept on asking I remember we kept on asking questions like so what's the procedure like we want to go through it step-by-step the logistics yeah how do we end up getting it from my safety deposit box to this company we've never heard of and you know what safeguards what measures yeah did it would they put in place to make sure it gets there safely and then you had mentioned that you know they had this whole process and I remember even scrutinizing using their contract, and I wasn't even fully happy with the terms of the contract, and I looked over it, you know, the entire thing, but in the end, I thought to myself, like, what are we gonna do? I'm not gonna, they're not gonna alter their terms, right? You either take it or leave it, and I'm pretty sure all the other companies kinda have the same terms. So, yeah, we were nervous to part ways with it, but we trusted you, Clark, and I know that you did your due diligence and made sure that everything would work out, so yeah, thank you. And, you know, David is also a lawyer, so he was able to scrutinize the contract, and when he came back to me, I'm like, I don't know, what do you want me to do? I was like, the contract is a contract, I can ask you about it, or I can ask them about it, but at the end of the day, like you were just saying, they probably won't do anything about it, it's just, you either accept it or not. And I did my due diligence, because obviously, I'm friends with you guys, so I didn't want anything to happen to it, and, you know, going on these blog forums on people that ship their cars to these auction houses, or even to graders, you know, they have like, the top tips on how to get it to wherever you need to safely, and, you know, it's like FedEx, overnight, pay whatever it costs, you know, and then, you know, some people even fly and drop it off in person, right? Yeah, Kosa and I were actually debating whether we should pay for your flight, your round trip flight, to go there in person and drop it off. Oh, man, I wish you had decided that. It's a free trip to New York, New Jersey area, you know, drop it off, but, you know, it's funny, because I was really nervous too, so while I was packaging it, I'm like recording everything, and, you know, every angle, you know, just so in case, you know, something happens at FedEx, if it gets lost, or if it gets stolen, I have proof, and, yeah, even looking at insurance, and, you know, it was early on too, like cards being this much, there's not a lot of insurance policies out there, I think there's more now, obviously, because there's more high-end cards out there, and there have been unfortunate cases of cards being stolen, yeah, so it's a real thing, but for the most part, if you do FedEx overnight, it'll get there safely, and I remember, you know, it was a couple hundred bucks, and just tracking it every day too, just like you guys, yeah. Clark, did we ever reimburse you for those costs, or? Yes, David gave me a nice little commission, but yeah, no, it worked out, because when I checked, and they received it, and they signed it, it's kind of like, I think it was a collective sigh of relief, right, it was in their hands, and then it was like a month before it actually goes up on auction, so we had a month to just wait for, right, do you remember that time? I remember the waiting, yeah. And then, do you guys remember the night it went up for auction, or the night the auction was gonna end? So when it was live on the auction, I forgot what the period is, was it, like how long before the auction ends? It's about, I feel like it's just a week, or, no, no, it might have been a lead auction, so it was like a month, yes, about a month, so when it first listed, I think it was listed for what? Was it 15,000? 10,000 to start, yes. 10,000 to start, and there was like no traction, I remember there was like zero traction, I remember being just, oh, this guy's only betting like $15,000, it's worth way more than that, I'm like, oh man, this is a bad decision. But obviously, because this is our first time doing it, but yeah, I just remember being very slow from the get-go. And I think that's standard, right? If you watch the King of Collectibles on Netflix, all the auctions are like, everyone's just like you guys, they're so nervous, like why isn't anyone bidding early on? And all the action happens at the last hour, because everyone wants to outbid everyone and not show their hand, essentially, too early, right? But yeah, so Dave, you tell me what you were thinking during the last night of the auction, as it started to ramp up on the last few hours. Right, so we had a viewing party, the three of us on Zoom, I remember that, from our respective homes, and I remember my wife was there as well, glued to the website, and yeah, it was very exciting. Yeah, in the final hours leading to the, I guess, the cutoff time, whenever that was, we started to really see the escalation of prices, and we got the sense that it was basically down to two people, or two individuals, right? Who were kind of like, you know, trying to outbid each other. And I have a question, if you're a prospective buyer on that auction site, can you set, can you automate the bids in such a way that, you know, if a bid comes through, then you can, oh, you can do that, okay. You can do that on eBay as well, like, you set your upper limit. Right. So, it won't go automatically to your upper limit, but the next highest bidder, if your upper limit's still, like, for example, 200,000, and the guy bids 115, it'll automatically bid 120 for you. Like, whatever the minimal interval is. It'll keep on going to you, up to your max bid. So you could set it up early like that, so you don't have to worry about that part. I see, and yeah, honestly, my memory is kind of hazy, but I do remember, it went past the cutoff time, is that correct? Yeah. What is that period called, where they? Extended bidding. Extended bidding, okay. And that's really when things start to really escalate. People were serious about it. Yes, yes. At the start. And you mentioned that you're watching with your wife, and I don't know if your wife was watching too, Kosa, but even during or even after the final sale, which was $144,000, which I think is the peak price, even now, it's the perfect timing. It's rare that you can say you sell anything on the top, but you guys did. I'm curious about their reaction, in terms of like, how much it sold for. Did they believe it? What was going on? Gertrude wasn't even with me when we did it. I would just shout her, hey, we hit six figures. And she was like, oh yeah? Okay, tell me when it goes like, double that. She knows nothing about baseball cards or anything of value, but yeah. Obviously, at the end, she was excited. She couldn't believe that that's how much money I ended up getting, we ended up getting. But the thing is, though, I don't even remember being able to see the $144,000, because it was different on our side. We only saw. Oh, really? Yeah, don't you remember only seeing the, it was like, we only saw the auction price or something, but there's like a separate, like a secondary, because $144,000 is what it was. Buyer's premium? Buyer's premium. You might be talking about the buyer's premium, right? Yeah, but then for you guys, especially with high-end cards, there's usually a buyer's premium that obviously the buyer pays, which is usually 20% of high-end auction houses. And then there's usually a seller's fee, but then we're able to waive the seller's fee, the fee that you would have had to pay to list. But with such high-end, the auction houses know they'll get a lot of money from the buyer's side, and they want your business. They don't want you to go to a different auction house. So just a tip for people that will have high-end cards, you could probably negotiate the seller's fee to zero, because they will want your high-end card to put in their auction. But how about you? Do you remember what your wife was saying? Yeah, you know what? She was, when I told her that it was going for about $25,000 on eBay, she was all on board, like in terms of selling it then. Yeah. Right? Because I mean, to think of a card worth that much, in her mind, because again, yeah, she's not a hobbyist. She doesn't know much about collectibles. She thought that was an astronomical price. So yeah, she was blown away, of course, on the day of the auction when she saw, and I told her, by the way, this is in US dollars, okay? So you can take out the calculator and figure out what it is in Canadian. So yeah, she was blown away, obviously, and very happy. And shout out to Golden, because the wire transfer went okay. That was the other thing afterwards, like you got your money, right? And so that went through, and like I said, the representative from Golden still keeps in touch with me every once in a while to see if I have any big cards. So yeah, there you go. There's a free ad endorsement for Golden Auctions, who, I don't know if you guys know, they got recently bought out by eBay last year, I think. So now they're working closely with eBay. So yeah, there's the story. I always want to tell our audience that story. People have heard bits and pieces of it, but it's just insane where the story started with the $90 hobby box. I'm happy for you guys. I'm not bitter anymore that you didn't include me. But I got something out of it. I want to wrap up with this, a couple more points, but when I was looking for the comp, like how much it costs now, before the podcast, the Orange Refractor BGS 9.5 with the 10 Auto, I was curious, like it's obviously come down since. And I saw it recently listed on eBay for $50,000. And then I think you, Dave, were saying, or Kose, you're like, oh, is it the same card? And I'm like, no, it's not the same card. And then a couple of days later, I just wanted to check just in case. And sure enough, it's the number 12 out of 25, which is your card, that's listed on eBay for $50,000 right now. Oh, wow. So it's a third of what you sold it for. And that's what it's listed for. So that doesn't mean that seller is going to get 50K. I'm actually, just because I'm watching it, I'm not going to buy it at that price. But when you watch it on eBay, sometimes the seller will give you an offer. And then he came back with $45,000, if I wanted to buy it at that price. But the last comp, I think, was a few months ago, not the 12 of 25, but Orange Refractor, for about 26,000. So that was the last sale. That's what you're looking at in terms of the value of the card right now. So there you go. You sold at the right time. That's crazy. I was saying, like, we should buy it back. Like, honestly, like how great of a story would it be that we bought back our card? This guy's money. At a third of the price that we sold it for. Yes. I think it was a great buy still. Yeah. In my honest opinion. If I had the money, I would say I would buy it. If I had the money too, I would go in on it three ways with you guys to complete the story. You're right. That would be a better story. Hey, hey, should we ask Lloyd if he wants to go in as a quarter partner? I wouldn't be surprised if he just bought it. I can't trust Lloyd right now. Okay. So guys, this is three of us. Hopefully he doesn't listen to this episode. He goes in, negotiates it. Oh guys, it's not listed anymore. So I bought it. Next thing we know, it's at Lloyd's apartment. Just hanging there. On the table, we broke the box. You know what? That would be a poetic ending to this. To this story. Last question for you guys. I had a great time catching up and reminiscing about Five Card Guys and the Wants Soda story, of course. But why did you guys leave me? Let's go back. Why is it really One Card Guy? I'm just too lazy to say, to rebrand everything One Card Guy now. Just, yeah. It's okay. You got to keep the trademark, so. Right. You know what, Clark? Ultimately, you're the heart and soul of the group, right? I mean, you're the most knowledgeable. You're the one who brought us together. And yeah, as Kosa had mentioned earlier, I mean, you're the most, you're the best at execution, especially when it comes to social media. And you're the most persistent. So yeah, it only makes sense that, you know, we would have eventually dropped off and you would have been left alone to kind of, you know, run with it. And you did a great job. Thank you. And to be honest, like, I think if I were still with you, I would have, you know, held you down, if anything. Well, and you know, just with Dave, we're still looking for a Conor McDavid future watch. So you're not completely out of the game. You know, I know we're looking for a nice McDavid rookie auto card. So that's, we have that still. We're looking for a good price with that. But Kosa, I don't even have to ask you. You've probably, you know, started a million things since you left the Swords card. Are you still looking at Swords cards? What are you, what's your interest when it comes to the hobby? Yeah, I haven't, I haven't really looked into Sports cards ever since we left that period. And honestly, like, honestly, I had no idea that it would blow up as fast and as much as it did within like three years after. Yeah. But yeah, I just, I just all credit goes to really you, Clark. I didn't think it would go this far and just really not much, honestly, just not even much that I can contribute to, like I'm just, I just like to be involved in terms of like buying things or coming up with ideas. But, but really at the end of the day, you're the one that executes everything and you do a really good job with this. Thanks Kosa. And like Kosa said, the best way he can contribute is with his cash, but he just did a home reno. So he doesn't have any right now. So when you replenish, you know, let's go in on a big card together. And then hopefully we have another crazy story like the one you guys shared. But yeah, Dave, Kosa, thanks again. I couldn't think of a better way to kick off season five of this podcast. Hard to believe with Hyung and John and kind of like what you're saying, Kosa, to end things off, that the hobby's grown since you guys left, but a lot of changes. And that's why we're able to still do this podcast because there's always issues coming up and always news. So yeah, I'm looking forward to 2025, season five of a lot more guests as well. And again, Dave Kosa, thanks for coming onto the pod. Thanks for having us and happy new year. Yeah, thanks. Hey, thanks for listening to Cards to the Moon. We'd really appreciate you subscribing to our podcast wherever you listen to our podcasts. 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.