Should New Collectors Ignore Us? + Question Everything in the Hobby + Who Decides Which Cards Matter?

Should the next generation of collectors want the same cards we do? Chris McGill brings a fascinating question to the panel: when new collectors enter the hobby, should they buy into the hierarchy of cards, players and grails that previous generations have established, or should they use their fresh perspective to discover entirely new collecting lanes? Jeremy, David Chase, Joe Poirot and Joshua Adams dig into what that means in a hobby where many of the cards longtime collectors grew up chasing have become extraordinarily expensive. Are newcomers really best served spending huge amounts of money chasing the same Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, Mickey Mantle and other established grails everyone already knows? Or are there overlooked players, sets, inserts, eras and cards sitting right in front of us simply because the existing hobby establishment hasn't decided they matter yet? The panel discusses herd mentality, questioning conventional hobby wisdom, the importance of understanding why certain cards became iconic and the difference between teaching someone WHAT to collect and teaching them HOW to think about collecting. Jeremy argues that your approach may ultimately depend on where you fall on the Hobby Spectrum. Someone primarily interested in making money may be better served understanding and participating in established markets, while a collector has considerably more freedom to explore, experiment and build something completely unique. The conversation also explores whether the collecting experience many longtime hobbyists enjoyed growing up can even be recreated today. Packs are different. Prices are different. Information is everywhere. Market data is instantaneous. And newcomers arrive in a hobby with far more infrastructure, money and established narratives than previous generations ever encountered. So maybe the goal isn't to recreate the old hobby. Maybe it's helping the next generation find its own. Subscribe to Sports Cards Live on YouTube and wherever you listen to podcasts. Take the Hobby Spectrum Assessment and discover where you fit in the hobby at thehobbyspectrum.com. Search auctions across the hobby with AuctionWire.ai. Research the market with Card Ladder. Use promo code SCL. And check out Pops & Comps, available now on Amazon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices