Shout-Outs For All Podcast Guests in 2024; Joint Pod With Paul Hickey Discussing 2024 Bowman Draft, Investing In Prospects, Which Cards To Try Selling Immediately After Ripping And Be First To Market

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. Welcome back to another Friday edition of Cards to the Moon, my name is Clark from 5cardguys.com and 5cardguys on Instagram and YouTube. You can also check us out on Facebook as well. This is episode 260 and it happens to be the final Friday episode of 2024. Yes, we're less than a week away now until 2025. I'm doing the intro solo again today because the rest of the episode is a joint pod I recorded earlier with Paul Hickey of the Sports Cards Strategy Show. We'll get to that in just a second, but before we do, I want to take the opportunity to thank some of the guests we've had on this past year. I've said this before and I'll say it again, but one of the best parts of being in this hobby and in particular being a hobby content creator is all about the fellow collectors you get to connect with that share the same passion of collecting sports cards. We're so grateful here on this podcast to be able to keep that going for season four with all of our guests this year who are so gracious with their time to come on and chat about cards, about making hobby content, and just having fun talking about anything sports card related. I just want to take the time to acknowledge all of our guests this year and side note, if you missed any of our guest interviews on Cards to the Moon you can always check them out on Apple Podcasts or on Spotify and in fact if you go to our podcast website page which is at fivecardguys.com slash podcast slash pound guests g-u-e-s-t-s you'll see the full list of interviews we did not just this season but all of our previous three seasons as well. I'll include that link to our web page below. Anyway for season four first shout out to Adrian aka Stock and Trade who was our first guest of 2024. I just love the humor that he brings into the hobby with his content. Thank you to Coach Ko, a fellow Canadian content creator and I'm sure you've seen him around he was just really gracious with his time as well. Chris Begg and Jason Willow they are co-hosts of our sister pod the Apple Taco Podcast where they talk about all things baseball. We'll definitely have them back on the pod. Carlos Diego aka Sluggers55 who's a local dealer here in Toronto and we've done several segments together for the pod and if you haven't seen this high-end collection it's incredible and we love that he's always willing to collaborate on doing card show content together. Jenny Marie, another amazing hobby content creator who's growing like crazy. I think when we interviewed her earlier this year she was close to hitting 3,000 Instagram followers and I just checked she's just surpassed the 5k mark which is awesome. Daryl Chan aka DC another local collector and dealer and a multiple-time guest of our podcast who I'm sure you'll be hearing from again in 2025. Brent Ware aka Deep Value Investor who returned to our pod this year and he's always a wealth of knowledge when it comes to making some really smart plays in the hobby. We always love having him around. Stephanie Garcia aka Mama Breaks. I mean she's everywhere on social media and just killing it in the hobby. We're so grateful she was able to make time to come onto the pod and share everything she's been up to in the hobby. Glenn Suh of Supreme Cards. He's the guy who got me interested in Star Wars cards and if it weren't for this interview earlier this year I definitely wouldn't have my Star Wars Saga Mojo Refractor card that's number 250 which I bought earlier this year and I love it. I have more Star Wars cards on my watch list on ebay so thanks Glenn for getting me into Star Wars cards. Rob Wong who you can find on IG at Rob Wong Collects. He's a sports journalist here in Toronto and it was great connecting with him on the pod and at the recent Sports Card Expo. If you haven't seen his series where he talks to professional MLB players about their sports card collection and their love for the hobby you definitely have to check it out on his page. We also had Denny Cards return to the pod and this year we got to actually meet in person at Fanatics Fest NYC so it was great catching up with him both online and IRL. Aaron aka Tropic Collects who was by far our youngest guest in our show's history. I believe he's 15. I can tell you the future of the hobby is bright with young guys like Aaron around. And of course there's our hobby friend Jared Seto who's always been a big time supporter of Cards to the Moon. We appreciate him coming on to the pod. And last but not least Ezra Levine who if you missed our recent interview with him he was actually our second ever guest on this pod in season one. He returned for season four this time as CEO of Mascot and we love that he's still involved in the hobby and doing great things with Mascot. Oh and of course Paul Hickey who we've been doing a joint pod with the last few months and I love that several people have reached out to both myself and Paul separately sharing how they've been enjoying this particular collaboration. It's one of the things I look forward to continuing in 2025. Speaking of Paul Hickey it's a perfect segue. Like I said at the top of the show here's our last pod recording we did together in 2024. We talked about when we dropped baseball, prospecting, and we discussed when is the most opportune time to flip cards for a potential profit when you're dealing with top prospects. All right without further ado here's the joint pod and I'll talk to you guys again one more time for 2024 on Tuesday. See you then. All right everybody welcoming in now my guy Clark Kim from Cards to the Moon podcast and Five Card Guys on Instagram. Clark is very knowledgeable related to baseball and we've had the biggest release really annually for baseball card people and prospectors Bowman Draft. So Bowman Draft Baseball 2024 obviously just hitting the market in the last couple of weeks and a lot going on with that. So Clark and I are going to focus today's discussion on how to make money on Bowman Draft. Clark first of all how's it going man? How's life? How's collecting and how's the hobby? You know I'm just getting ready for Christmas as we're recording it's just a week out so you know I'm hoping that I'll get some cards from my loved ones so I can rip wax over the holidays. But yeah no everything's kind of we're just talking off air you know it's just getting busier I got to finish off my Christmas list right after this. So yeah it's fun though I love this time of year. Yeah that's great man that's great well it's cool I know a lot of hobbyists that like to get wax for the holidays or for their birthdays or something like that and then kind of treat themselves to to rip and wax and dude I get it I think I think it's fun but I also hate it I hate ripping. Okay well I don't do it so for you Cards to the Moon listeners I apologize for being like the Scrooge ba humbug to ripping wax but look here's the deal man I do it maybe once a year maybe twice a year okay and every time I do it I hate it I don't get anything yes and then I have all these commons and these you know these cards that I don't you know I mean you know I ripped a bone I ripped a box of Bowman draft 2024 because I need to as much as I am on my soapbox of ripping wax is not a sports card strategy I need to check myself every once in a while right sure because maybe it is and especially actually I want to turn things over to you real quick because I select Bowman draft as one of the releases that I consider ripping every year and I and I ripped a box recently of 2024 Bowman draft yeah a hobby box and the reason why is because you know you've got essentially a checklist built around the actual MLB draft and obviously not every draft pick is in it yeah but you've got a checklist built around the MLB draft this is the first Bowman for you know for those guys yeah and the guys who are on the checklist again not everybody and the first Bowman typically is a card that for flippers like me will hold value until at least until the guy gets to the major league so to rip a box I think gives you a better chance ripping this release of getting something valuable and maybe piecing together your money back and still having fun in the process so maybe just kind of from your perspective talk about Bowman draft as a release like am I making a for someone who doesn't rip wax and doesn't like ripping that yeah am I picking a good release to at least to at least test my theory on yeah can I be honest I don't think so because it's good I know definitely like let me know what what's up because I wish Hyung was on this episode because he's my co-host on Cars to the Moon and he's he was a pro baseball player in the minors and and so he kind of has a unique perspective in that sense like the the realities of prospecting and and actually and you mentioned um yeah it might be a good time to pick up prospects and potential rookies and hold their cards until they make it to the leagues the the actual question should be if they make it to the major leagues right because a lot of these guys actually don't end up making it and and that's part of the risk and that's part of the fun for some people to see oh you know I'm gonna root for this guy while he's going through the you know single double triple a minor league system so um it is fun but you know the upside is huge potentially huge because you know some of these guys are studs even as teenagers or um in the early 20s and if you're gonna wait till they actually make it to the big leagues you're already probably looking at paying thousands of dollars for their lower numbered parallel cards right so in a sense when you're ripping like you know like any uh wax product you're hoping to get the hit and and um I'm sure we're going to talk about this in a bit but the ROI is usually miserable right in terms of what you actually hit and the thing with prospecting too is that there's so many guys and on that checklist and and you just don't know which one will actually um make it a and then b um that will actually be really good at that major league level if they do get called up so a lot of ifs that's that's all I'm saying yeah yeah that's good that's great perspective and I think um when you look at like the early sales from this release of singles um you do see you you have like a uh I I say this guy's last name and I know I'm saying it wrong but I just like to have fun with it you you see a Jack Caglianone um Caglione yes Caglione um you see a red lava refractor out of five auto go on a best offer accepted uh on December 16th for 12,500 I saw that I saw you know you see like you talk about you know those kinds of reaching for the for the hits you know you see a Travis Bazzana red refractor uh auto serial number to one out of five uh huge so in a in a buy it now for $13,999.99 which is like a joke when you know when someone lists something with the 999.99 there's no way I'm gonna get this for this card but I'm gonna throw it up there anyway yeah into that same thing with the Bazzana and these are all sales like uh between December 14th through December 16th so the Bazzana one out of ten black refractor auto $10,999 and like so you see um and then there's some Caglionone um other like red refractor uh variation when he's within the Florida uniform now these are out of five no like no auto but they're going for $9,499.00 this is US pricing but um yeah anyway point being it's like I think for the for the new people coming into the hobby who don't really know yet the examples of why we're saying what we're saying basically I think that people get enticed and uh seduced a little bit by these types of sales and they think okay well let me try to win the lottery and the reality is that the chances of hitting these cards are probably in some cases worse than the chances of winning the actual lottery um and so I want to get into how do you how can you actually strategically make money when a release like this comes out and I pulled some data so I have some things to talk about but before I dig into what I like to teach people at knowoffseason.com we have sports card school we have the premium podcast we have sports card rankings at knowoffseason.com and we like to teach people how they can use releases like this to actually strategically make money um so I want to get into some of that and throw some of those ideas past you as well but um how do you so I like that you and Hyung sort of think about this release a fade um because I do as well I do as well I think I think I think when this release comes out, it strikes me as, yes, it's exciting, yes, I want to rip it, but I hate ripping wax, and I need to dial down the level of excitement a little bit, be strategic about this, maybe look at better opportunities. How do you guys think about how to make money on this release? Yeah, I mean, some people are not gonna like to hear this, but as the price of wax just keeps going up, and that's another issue, right? Like, it's, what, I think I checked on David Adams, it was like five, 600 bucks, and they used to be- Yeah, I think I paid 530 or something like that. Right, okay, right on, yeah. Yeah, so, I mean, they used to be 2,300, and now it's, you know, now you're paying double, and you're still hoping for, like, these hits that, you know, it's really hard to hit, right? So, there's more investment in it, and which makes the ROI even that much tougher, but the other option really is breaks, you know? Like, I know people don't like to do it, but if you're really wanting the hits, maybe it's, you know, it's still a gamble, obviously, with breaks as well, but at least you're, you know, going after the players that you want. So, you're picking the KC Royals for Jack Caliglione, right, and the Guardians for Travis Buzana. And, you know, the other thing I'll add, too, with prospecting is, even if you do get these hits, and maybe you'll get into this a bit, but we were talking about it on our podcast, just last week, it's a sell right away. It's like buying a new car, you know? And once it goes off the lot, it starts depreciating very quickly. You know, you're at the peak in terms of price for most of these prospects, because everyone is paying for the potential, not the actual stats or the potential, you know? So, you know, everyone thinks Jack Caliglione's gonna be the next Shohei Otani, because he could pitch and bat, but the likelihood of that happening is probably rare. Like, Shohei is a unicorn in that way, and, you know, it's awesome to see more players be two-way players, and Jack Caliglione definitely has the power and the potential to do it, but, yeah, baseball's a hard game, and I think there's gonna be a lot of adjustments from these young guys, too. So, you know, if you're looking to get one of these top rookies, a lot of the times it's, yeah, you wanna wait. There's always an adjustment period. We call it the adjustment period, right when they get called up, and then kind of going into their second season, then you usually see a dip, and then maybe you pick up singles that way. It's a lot more boring to do it that way, but easier on the wallet usually. I wanna get into that, because I totally agree with you, and that's exactly what we teach people to do at knowoffseason.com. So I wanna get into that, and you and I can have a discussion and kind of hit home for the audience why that's what everybody should be doing, but you brought up a couple of really good things that I wanna talk about first. One is basically like selling these cards right away. Like if you do rip, or if you do buy into breaks, regardless of what you get, you should list them right away and sell them. Because really, the way to try to piece together your profit potentially from this, or at least piece back together what you paid for the box or what you paid for the break, is to try to be first to the market with these cards on eBay. Because historical data, if you were to go back to say 2019, 2020, 2021, 22, 23, which we'll do in a minute, like you'll see that the prices just plummet huge after the initial release. And also like even if you wanna try to be first to the market with a graded version, say at PSA, to try to get a PSA 10 of maybe like a lower level card, like let's say you pull a Caglione Refractor, you wanna be first to the market with that, get it to PSA. You don't necessarily need to do like anything other than a value submission, but when you get it back in those 30 to 50 days, get it listed because typically even your PSA 10 pricing goes down after this release. You'd be first to the market probably in like February with cards like that. So definitely if you're new to this, or if you've been in the hobby for a long time and you're typically someone who holds these cards because you feel like you're more of a collector and you don't necessarily wanna try to move out of these for money and you haven't taken a look at what pricing movements happen on a weekly basis for the last couple of years, I'm telling you to sell these cards now. Because basically like Clark said, they go down as players either don't make it through the majors, there's prospect fatigue, or there's that adjustment period and they just don't play as well even when they do get called up. So I think like you've got sometimes you're lightning in a bottles like your Paul Skeens and your Eli De La Cruz, who obviously Eli wasn't in this release. He was in 2022 Bowman because he's an international prospect. But nevertheless, when a new Bowman release comes out, especially Bowman Draft, you're gonna see pricing plummet after the initial release. So get your singles listed. One of the thing you brought up before we get into the single pricing is buying into breaks. I hear breakers say, well, it makes financial sense to do a PYT, a pick your team break and do multiple of them because it'll increase your chances of getting a particular player or a particular hit for a player more so than buying into their single. Okay, sure, but you're still gambling. As you said, it's still a gamble. So to me, ripping wax and breaking, neither one of those are sports card strategies. They're more of sports card entertainment, which to each his own, it's just not for me. I did rip my box of Bowman Draft and I mentioned I paid, I think around 530 for it. Clark, I might be able to piece together $100 maybe. It's annoying to me I did it because it's something that I do to prove my point and then, oh, maybe I get lucky. The other thing that I wanna talk about before we get into the single pricing, because I think you guys are right, we share a brand on this, you can use this time of year especially to go back and say, okay, there's a new release. Everyone's excited about the new release. Let's go where they ain't, which is what I like to say, and go back in time and look at who are some of the guys that's pricing are down, but that maybe their singles prices are about to rise as this upcoming baseball season gets closer and now we're not gambling, we're just being very strategic on timing the market. But I think I wanna ask you one more question that I think I know the answer to, but I wanna get your perspective. Some people like to buy this release and keep it sealed and then hold it because they think, oh, X, Y, Z prospects are in this release, this is gonna go up in value, sealed, and then I'm gonna flip it. What's your perspective on those kinds of scenarios? How often do you feel like that kind of play works with this release specifically? Yeah, great question and generally, I like that strategy a little bit better than just ripping the box open and hoping for a hit or even breaking because you're gambling, you're still kind of gambling, but you're gambling on more players, you're gambling on the class of that year. And you could have, we already talked about Bizana and Caglione, that's two top prospects. And there's, Hyung mentioned five more that I've never heard of, but they're all young guys, but they could all potentially be really good MLB players. So even if three or four of them hit, then, and one or two of them do really, really well, then that sealed product will definitely increase in price. So it's a strategy for sure in terms of, I don't wanna mix up strategies versus gambling, but it is still a gamble, but less of a gamble, in my opinion, rather than ripping just one hobby box or entering multiple breaks. I agree. And I think it takes more patience doing that because to your point, these things are expensive. They're twice what they used to be a few years ago. The pricing is probably gonna continue to increase. If you're someone like Hyung or my co-host Lefty McKee, and then we have a good friend, one of the guys who runs justbaseball.com, Aram Layton, those guys know the prospects and they go deep into the prospect pool. I could see if you're like that, this could be a fun, this release in general could be a fun release to buy, sealed, and hold because you might think you know more about the deep prospect pool than everybody else, and that could be fun too. But I agree with you, man. It's like, if you really wanna make money doing this stuff and stay in the game, which is, I think, again, I like to talk about making money, but not just for the money. It's really to stay in the game and to keep it enjoyable. Yeah. I think you gotta be buying the singles. So you wanna go back in time with me a little bit and talk about some of the cards I pulled here. I'll bring them up and then we can talk about which ones maybe we think are the best ones to go back and buy out of the guys I pulled up. Okay. All right, so I think generally, now this isn't always something that works when you're looking at all the different sports. Generally, the first thing I do when a new release comes out, whether it's this release for baseball, whether it's, say, prism football, whether it's prism basketball, it could even be like an upper deck hockey release that has young guns in it or something like that. I think that the strategy typically remains the same across all sports for, say, your every person's rookie card release, which would include the RC Shield for football and basketball. It would include the first Bowman. So I think this could potentially be applied to other Bowman releases that have maybe top prospects first on them. Instead of, like Clark and I said, instead of diving in and buying the wax, buying into breaks, and buying the singles of that new release, allow yourself some excitement to go back one year, just first go back one year. And so in this case, we could look at guys like Wyatt Langford, Max Clark, and Paul Skeens. Now, what's interesting about these three guys is that, and now you could include Walker Jenkins, I believe, in that conversation, as well as Skeens in that release. So if you feel strongly about talking about him, we can talk about him. But Clark, Langford, and Skeens are obviously in three completely different positions going into the 2025 baseball season, being that Langford is going into his second year, Clark has not been called up yet, and Skeens is obviously a massive MLB star. And so they're all in different positions, but generally the card data proves what Clark and I have already been talking about, and puts all three of these guys in a pretty decent buying position here towards the end of December. So if we look at Langford, for example, we're gonna look at just his 2023 Bowman Draft chrome refractor first PSA 10. So this is a POP 2490, and when it first came out, first to the market sale was on... Somebody turned it around quick at PSA because on December 21st, so about a year ago, it sold for $175. Its peak sale was at the end of January 2024 for $217. It stayed close to $200 through March, then it began to go down after the baseball season started. During the baseball season, it was an average of about an $81 card, but now it's a $51.55 is the last sale, which was just a couple of days ago. And it's liquid, it sells fairly often, it shouldn't be that hard to find. When you look at, say, Wyatt Langford, being on a Texas Rangers team that won the World Series a couple of seasons ago, being that he was a top five pick a year ago, and you say, okay, now, I think you kind of have to, you have to see the pattern and you have to realize, okay, well, those first sales don't count. They're not gonna reach that level again, like we just talked about. But when you look at the fact that during the baseball season, this thing actually did sell, I didn't tell you this, but in July, it sold for over $100 a few times. In September, late September, it sold for over $100 a few times. This is a $52 card right now. If you can get this card for its most recent average sale price of around $52, do you feel like this is a buy right now? When using the excitement of, hey, Bowman 2024 draft is coming out, I wanna go buy into that. Hold on, nope, nope, that's a loss. Let's use my excitement and my appetite to buy something to go back and actually make money. How do you feel about this Wyatt Langford play? I like Wyatt Langford. Yeah, I mean, every player is a case-by-case kind of thing, but Langford, what I like about him is that he definitely had that top prospect pedigree and he had the hype, which is why you see the initial prices jump. And of course, when you get to the big leagues, it's different. And there was adjustment period for him as well. But you look at his team, the Rangers, hopefully they do better than last year. And it looks like he's gonna be a big part of that team. And so all these things kind of coming together. He's gonna have playing time. He's going into year two, which is fine. And I think 50 bucks seems like a good price. Bryce for once a top prospect, now still a very good rookie player, in my opinion. So if you extrapolate that though, for year 3 and 4, my other co-host on Curse of the Moon, he calls it the lull period, and that's when collectors kind of forget about these top prospects because every year there's new ones, and then your attention is to the next shiny thing. So you've got to almost be aware of that timing as well, because there's this scenario where I can see this Wyatt Langford card, unless he's really performing, in year 3 or 4 of his career, go down lower than 50 if he's kind of forgotten for the next big rookie that's up or being called up. But the timing seems right, if a top rookie or prospect got called up at some point last year, doesn't have a full season ahead of him, and then the prices drop accordingly, I think there is a play where you can get him on the low and do a quick flip in-season for the next season. But in terms of holding longer than that, there's a lot of factors and variables that you have to consider, and then it can make the price go either way. Yeah, I think you make a great point, and the other thing too about a guy like Langford that doesn't apply to Clark, who we'll talk about in a second, is that because Langford was a rookie last year, he's in a bunch of other tops releases with rookie cards, right? So his supply now all of a sudden has expanded, and that actually hurts that Bowman Chrome first prospect refractor, even though that's a great card and it's his first card. Because there's more Wyatt Langford supply, I think you're right, I think there's that shorter runway. My advice to everybody is, if you can get this Wyatt Langford card that we're talking about for that target cost of the most recent comp, and you can get it in an auction, there is probably room on it. It will probably go up as March approaches, but you might want to sell it in March, regardless of where you are on it, because to Clark's point, if this guy doesn't come out and start playing amazingly well, he could get forgotten about in that lull period, and it could go under 50. So we're running it through our already graded formula at nooffseason.com this week, and we're going to probably see it in the rankings there at nooffseason.com, and be able to see, okay, well, what do I need to pay for it, and what's my potential upside compared to the other cards? So the next one, Max Clark, he has not been called up yet, Detroit Tiger top five pick. And I don't know, I think maybe he had a little bit more controversy around him than Langford. But, I mean, the Tigers obviously surprised people last year. Clark's prices are in a similar situation, his same card, the 2023 Bowman Draft Chrome Refractor First PSA 10, it's a pop almost $1,400, so there's less of them than there are Langfords, but it's still super liquid. You can find it. It came out, it's first to the market sales, we're very similar to Langfords. Not as expensive, but just up around between $100 and $125. And then now it is a $46 card in December. So again, we talk about December being like buying season, still got to buy the right card for the right player. But if you can get it for the right price, $46 Max Clark card, probably not going to organically go back up over $100 unless he does something spectacular. But I mean, could it approach say $90 to $100 just based on some hype around him leading up to March? Clark, how do you feel about Max Clark? Yeah, with Max Clark, it's because he hasn't been called up yet. When there starts to become more chatter, more news about Clark being called up, that's probably the best time to sell. And that generally goes, that's generally true of most top prospects and rookies. So he has that advantage over Langford because Langford has obviously been called up already. But with Max Clark, again, that seems like a good price and just hold on until whenever you start hearing that the Detroit Tigers need to have a new outfielder to get things going. And then that's when to sell. And I mean, even look at his teammates, Spencer Torkelson. He's kind of a perfect case in point. If he was a top prospect, then I have like a patch card of his and it's not worth that much right now. Let's look at Spencer Torkelson because he's on my list. I mean, you got to go back to 2020 when he was the number one overall pick. He came out in 2020 Bowman draft. His same card, the chrome refractor first from 2020 in PSA 10 is a $34 card right now. He obviously has not done very well in the major leagues. But at one point, this is a little bit unfair because the sales were in the summer of 2021, which I think the bubble was still popping throughout 2021, it was a $995 card. Wow. That is insane. So there's some five card guys Instagram real. That's coming out next week. But it was even in even in 2023, it was $100 card. And now right now it's a $34 card. So I'm not saying I am not saying go buy this card, by the way, because now Tork has a ridiculous amount of cards out. So you know, they're probably a dime a dozen at this point. But yeah, that's a good I think that proves our point overall, which is like, you know, when this release comes out, yes, it's their first card. Yes, there's a lot of hype around it. But to Young's point that you relayed to the audience earlier, not all these guys make it. And even those who do make it, you know, underperform, we don't do we even want to talk about Jared Kalanick? Do we even want to talk about, you know, some of these other guys that just I mean, Torkelson's they're in the same sentence. It's like they for sure got called up. They didn't do anything. They got sent back down now. It's like, well, there's no OK. So actually, rather than talk about schemes, let's talk about Jackson Holiday, because that kind of happened to him last year. And you brought up something that I think is important that I want everybody to rewind your podcast apps and listen to what Clark said a minute ago. He said when there is chatter of Max Clark potentially being called up, that is probably a good time to sell. And so what we've done a lot of digging into at KnowOffseason.com over the last two years is what's the better selling marker when there's hype and news articles? Maybe the guys in double A, what are their card prices like then versus what are their card prices actually like at the call up? And I think what we've learned is generally you want to make a generalization. It's better to sell when there's chatter and when there's hype. Sometimes guys get called up in September and nobody cares because it's football season. I mean, sorry, I know you're not necessarily an American football guy, but it's football season. Nobody cares. So you get called up in late August, early September. Nobody cares. Maybe you get called up in, you know, May or June and you're playing because there's an injury and then you get a couple of hits or you get a home run now you see. But I think we thought a couple of years ago we thought the call up is the selling marker. It's really not. It's really more of what you said, which is when there's hype, you know, the card typically even if the guy goes and wins rookie of the year, great. It doesn't necessarily reach. The prices don't necessarily reach what they were when there was hype around it, which is interesting. So let's talk about Jackson Holiday because last year there was no more hype around any other prospect than Jackson Holiday. And I pulled his 2022 Bowman draft Sapphire edition Chrome first. And I think the reason I pulled the Sapphire edition is because I also want to make the point that Bowman draft technically, while there's a lot of hype around it, it gets superseded by other releases sometimes that causes it causes the singles to lose value. So when you have someone like in this case, Jackson Holiday come out with, you know, Sapphire edition Chrome first and that gets graded in a PSA 10 that can outsell the refractor. Because now they're putting autos for some guys into the Sapphire release, which can supersede a lot of the other base autos that came out out of Bowman draft. So one thing that I think new people or people that are just trying to make money at this for the first time that have even been in the hobby for a while don't necessarily always realize is each new release that comes out after, especially with the MLB debut patches and stuff that are getting put in pro releases. And those not that everyone's going to get an MLB debut patch, but just the fact that everybody starts to go buy those releases cause the original Bowman draft release to go down. So while this card isn't out of the release that we set out to talk about, it still follows the same pattern. It was a basically like a almost $300 card throughout its entire existence. And now it's $150 card and you know, it dipped at call up basically all the way, all the way through his, I guess, quote unquote rookie season. When we look at Jackson holiday, all of his cards follow this pattern. Even as cards from the 2022 Bowman draft release. Now we're going back two years now. How do you feel about him going into his second year? He's in the 2022 Bowman draft release. Cards like his PSA 10 from the Sapphire edition all follow the pattern of, okay, $150 card used to be a $250 card during this, during his rookie season. Can cards like this get back to where they were for a guy like Jackson holiday? Yeah. I feel like with Jackson holiday, he's kind of my weakness. You know, there's no data I have for him that supports how I feel, my gut feeling, but I feel like he's going to be a stud. And I feel like he is a typical case of really adjusting to MLB. Once again, I'm kind of feel like I'm repeating myself, but you know, he had a really difficult time and, and I think, like his pedigree was like, it's just, everyone was talking about how he's the next stud and, and just the level of expectations, maybe that got to his head as well. You know, he's a young guy and I think his brother might be drafted number one too. So like the holiday family is, you know, they're very talented. Let's just say that. But Jackson holiday, the only thing that bugs me about his cards is that because I'm not the only one that feels that way. There are other people that still believe in Jackson holiday, the it's come down, but I feel like if it was any other player, it would have gone down even more. So the bottom is still one 50 for a guy that was batting under 200 that's, you know it should be less than what it is at now, but I think people still believe in him. So I don't know if that could go either way. I'm conflicted on that because if you have a lot of people still believing in him, there's a chance that it does go up when he starts to actually, you know, hit closer to 250 300 starts to hit a few bombs. But you know, on the other hand, if he doesn't perform this coming year for a very good Baltimore team and there's a lot of good players on that Orioles team to young players. He could get overshadowed as well. He doesn't have that shine that he did have when he was called up and played rookie played as a rookie. So that could be another factor in his star diminishing a little bit if he doesn't perform up to expectations in this coming year. So there's going to be a lot riding on his performance. I still believe in him, but I don't know if I believe in him at the at the where the prices are right now. I would like to see a bit lower for me to, you know, take him off my watch list and actually buy his cards. Yeah, I agree. I think the I think the Langford and the Max Clark, in my mind, they don't have to do as much for their for you to make money on those on those cards that we talked about. Whereas I think because holiday still has a lot of that hype and a lot of those expectations that you talked about. Yeah, I think he will have to do a bit more. And sometimes that looks that looks different, right? It could be for sure a game winning Grand Slam, you know, could could be like one play one. One phenomenal play. Yeah. Maybe at the beginning of the season. It could be just a big April, you know, a big March, April when everyone's hype about baseball and, you know, maybe he bats 325 and has several homers and, you know. But I mean, if he doesn't, you know, now we're talking about it needs to be like a big, long hit streak or a bit, you know, he needs to be make, you know, get hot and make the all star team. So I think that the longer, the longer it takes for a player like him to do something, the more he has to do for you to realize any kind of profit on his cards, even if you go raw to great, because what happens is the PSA 10 upside goes down, it diminishes. So now the next guy I want to talk about is skeins. Skeins is a superstar already, however, you know, I typically caution people against buying into superstars when they're at the height of their popularity. I think one thing skeins card pricing has for it is that technically it's down in December. So I pulled his 2023 Bowman draft base auto is so it's his first chrome auto base auto in PSA 10. It's a pop 658. So it's actually double the pop of the last holiday card we talked about. But it's it's most recent comp is eleven hundred seventy U.S. dollars. It's sold in November for eighteen hundred U.S. dollars. It's sold in September for eighteen hundred U.S. dollars. And it's sold at the all star break, Clark. This is actually my comp. It's I got really lucky. I had. Two raw to grade. They each got PSA 10s and I sold them. I listed them both ending when he started in the all-star game and so 2330 US dollars nice is is one of my two comps and that was on that sold on 718 2024 so yeah, um so this card Expensive. I mean you're gonna pay 1100 US dollars minimum for this card Yeah, even in this sort of quote-unquote down period in December other thing that I want to mention which you guys do a really good job talking about and you and I have talked about Before is like sophomore slump kind of a thing. What do you how do you feel about? Buying into Skeen's cards right now. He's got a lot of cards out I mean like I mean he's printed in every single release now with RC shields ever since you know Ever since he got called up. So what's your take on schemes? Yeah, young and I think might differ a little bit on this because we did talk about it on the pod and and for me I'm still very cautious with pitchers. That's another thing too, you know, and we talked about sophomore slump and It's much more noticeable when you're on the mound and you're slumping because you know you the all the attention is on the pitcher right so and And Injuries, he throws so hard and he's an incredible pitcher, but health is always an issue with pitchers So that's another factor if you ask young I think he thinks he's generational so, you know, he could be and and you know to his point he's Shown every time he's on the mound how dominant he is and that raises questions of whether Even in the hobby our pitchers investable again And I think even you and I talked about this on a previous pod and it's just one Case though, the sample size is minuscule So I'm treading with caution still but I could see how some people might be excited about You know the second year of Paul skeins and yeah But and he already said the other point that I was thinking about so much Paul skeins cards out there now It's just a ton like every time I see an auction ending. It's it's One of his cards are are it's always up for auction. So that's something to consider as well Yeah, and I'm gonna double down on what you just said. I'm gonna go exactly in 100% agreement with you like I would fade if we're talking about Paul skeins cards in general. There's they're probably all gonna follow a similar pattern to this card I would fade this card for sure. I think you're gonna find again. Like I said a similar pattern If you look at data from any skeins card, you're probably gonna see that it's 365 day average is actually less than its most recent comp and the reason why is because And this is an anomaly skeins is kind of an anomaly because usually it's the other way around as we've just kind of had Several case studies of that but it's because skeins had like the perfect storm happen. He got called up He has the girlfriend situation on social media, yeah fanatics is doing stuff with his girlfriend Amplifying that stuff means is like this massive human being who used to hit as well several college days ago and now he's throwing you know into the three figures as you pointed out and you've got Him being the starter in the all-star game and just dominating I think he threw He almost threw a new hit and no hitter or he did throw a no hitter, but it wasn't a complete game I mean he had so like he had the perfect storm happen. Not only did he have the hype? Coming off the college career. Not only did he have like the social media presence with the girlfriend and everything Not only did he have the call-up But he performed at this level that most pitchers will never perform at as long as they're you know, their entire careers They're still striving like ninety nine point nine percent of pitchers will never and have never performed and achieved What he achieved in like his first six months as a pro baseball player Yeah, there's no way that this is gonna happen again I mean like even if even if he does continue to perform that way Isn't it built into his pricing at that point now? I know you guys have talked about show Hey, who's only gone up into the right so maybe schemes like threads the needle and does that as well But to me, it's like the chances of that are so slim because yeah, would it happen on the diamond? Yes Is the hobbies reaction to it going to be the same? I think that's a whole other thing So to me, I would I would probably fade Paul schemes And I mean for that reason I picked show hey Otani over him as you know in The baseball player that I'm that I'm investing in in 2025. Yeah, will I be will I be right on Otani? Well, I still got to buy the right cards. I got to get him for the right price I got to sell them at the right time all those things, but Yeah, I just I'm just with you on schemes. So yeah, maybe we maybe we we need to get young on and have him Counterpoint in his case even more Counterpoint and now I had one thing about schemes too And you know, the reason why he's still in the news was that he was up for awards as well You know, it just extended his timeline in terms of him being in the spotlight even after the season and yeah I mean the expectation is gonna be huge and you know, I thought that was show a but show a kind of Exceeded those expectations. That's why he is where he's at now, right? He's like, oh he's not gonna pitch this year because he had Tommy John and and then that's gonna go down for sure And then he goes there's a 5050 Season like it's got to be like that. Like that's the level of expectation we have for Paul skins right now. Good point. Good point That's exactly right. That is why that is exactly why Shohei continued to rise because like he did the unthinkable again in a completely different way And I mean, of course, I guess I guess we should probably just end this This conversation even though it has nothing to do with Bowman draft With okay. First of all, let's wrap on look. I think the only way to make money on Bowman draft is to go back in time and and buy cards like the Wyatt Langford like the Max Clark It's not always gonna be exactly those cards But I want people to follow that same thought pattern of go back and find a card of a guy That doesn't have to do a lot. Not a whole lot has to happen for the value Maybe it's like Max Clark and there's just call up hype. Maybe it's like Langford where he's already in the bigs There's still a lot of hype around him He is that high draft capital capital, but he hasn't like really had his coming-out party yet and his cards are cheap I would not buy into breaks. I would not buy and rip wax I would not buy sealed wax and hold it you get slaughtered slaughtered and slaughtered on all three of those things And then I Would be you know, I would be very very careful at even trying to be first to the market You can only be first to the market on cards that are either Super low serial numbered which are hard to get anyway Or you can only be first to the market in like a wave and then after that after that wave of like a one-month Period of time it's down. I mean the prices just go down So, yeah, but let's talk about Shohei since we ended with him Okay, I think we hit on this already once when we talked a few weeks ago, but my contention in Sort of the end of 2023 so about a year ago We knew Shohei was gonna sign with a new team We knew Shohei had undergone Tommy John surgery for the second time and he wasn't gonna pitch in 2024 but that he was gonna hit So my contention was when he comes back and pitches in 2025 that there's a likely probability back a year ago. There was a likely probability that that was gonna be the case now I didn't know he was gonna go do this 5050 thing either and that his prices would basically continue to rise But my thought was Wow December of 2024 is gonna be an amazing time to buy into Shohei because then he's gonna be pitching again a few months later What are your thoughts without looking at any of the data? What are your thoughts in terms of just what is it gonna take to move? Shohei's needle now that we know all the context around where he is as a World Series champion and everything like that Yeah, I feel like he's one of those guys that he's accomplished so much It doesn't unless he just falls off the wagon like or he just gets a career-ending injury. I think there's just People are just gonna buy into his cards. He's at that level now. He's kind of proven what he you know Had to prove and I think everything is a little bit everything. It's like gravy, you know, it's like, you know We have another baseball friend and he was saying you know, we thought that him not pitching was gonna impact his prices, but It's as we come to realize that it doesn't matter anymore. Just the way he's you know, just The you know even beyond baseball like there's a lot of fans for Shohei now and just he's become the spokesperson Like he has that level also and that kind of credibility. So And that's what I mean when I say he's kind of this unicorn both on and off the field where everything kind of came together He's done you know exceedingly well, and and I think Going into the next season. It's just I don't know I'm just looking for any card to get into right now, but you know in terms of the pricing itself I think a few weeks ago We talked about one's a good time to actually buy Shohei and if you look at the data and you'll get into it I'm sure but there's always seems to be a dipping point right around November December right and but the the thing with Shohei cards is that it dips but Establishes a new low and doesn't go the following year hasn't gone below that November and the year before that hasn't gone below that November so it keeps going up in Waves and and I think that's kind of the pattern we're seeing right now with Otani cards So yeah, it's you're not gonna see it go down where was November 2022 or even 2023 but If you're gonna buy into his card I would think that around this time is probably the best time and you just hope that he does what he does and then I'll you know I'll keep going up. Yeah, I think that's what I'm gonna do my man I mean look, we're almost at Christmas and New Year's and when we know what the big sporting events are We know that it's you know People start to pay attention to the NBA a little bit more on you know Christmas Day and past Christmas Day Not quite to the extent that they pay attention to college football and pro football and the NFL playoffs but I mean Other than the baseball diehards who are like winter meetings and the hot stuff and all that, right? Generally, it's gonna be a buying pocket for for Shohei Like you said and I like what you said too because like establishing a new floor is Different than typically what happens typically what happens is you can you can buy in on a guy If you're if you're picking the right player and you're looking at the data the right way You can buy in on a guy and you can somewhat expect to see The pattern that happened in the past Repeat itself at least to an extent where it's gonna go back up Up and then it's gonna go down again and then it's gonna go up and then it's gonna go down again throughout the year whereas with Shohei It's it's it might go down again. But if you're saying that Historical data is basically validating that it doesn't ever go down Past where it was then in theory that means hey, let's buy in again And I think I think that the selling strategy needs to be talked about as well with Shohei because to me He's entered this level of like Michael Jordan basically and that's not hyperbole to be like Well, he's the Michael Jordan of baseball what I'm saying specifically is with Michael Jordan cards the way to make money on Michael Jordan cards that I've that I've Experienced is you basically buy in at a low point and then you list it in a in a buy it now And you just wait until somebody buys it whether it takes three weeks or whether it takes three months Because it's a Michael Jordan card. Somebody's gonna buy it and somebody's gonna buy it not any Michael Jordan card everybody But it's gotta be one of the desirable ones same thing with Shohei exactly I think I think that's what I mean when I say he's entered the Michael Jordan level where I think if I'm actually gonna make Profit on Shohei cards what I have to do is first do what you're saying Buy into some of the right cards over the next few weeks Then I need to just list them in buy it now's and just wait for somebody to buy them at the price That would make me profit after the essentially after the eBay fees So I mean look everybody out there in the audience that knows me Do you think I can be patient enough to do that? That's gonna be the challenge But I think as I'm buying the Shohei card, I need to only pay for it and click into that next process of The purchasing decision if I'm gonna commit to holding it until somebody buys it for the price Then I need to sell it for to make money so no, I love that. Yeah, I love that I love especially the Michael Jordan analogy because um, it wasn't that long ago We're at the star rookie the 84 star rookie It just randomly has this run-ups every once in a while and then it comes back down and that's to your point That's when you should probably buy it, but then it's almost inevitable that it's gonna go back up for whatever reason I don't know what the triggers are But when it does that's a great selling point and then and if you want to get back into it Inevitably come back down. It's just kind of this cycle Yeah, I haven't figured out the triggers on the Jordan stuff either. I just know that like if you're willing to be patient enough Someone will buy it for what you have it listed for and it could it could be like hey It could be as finicky with someone like Jordan is like hey Somebody just had money that they wanted to spend and they bought it but it does work because I mean it even works with his 86 Fleer sticker and like I mean and and like It works in different grades to like 86 Sticker PSA 8 and you know, there's all types of like little Michael Jordan things And I feel like Shohei is at the point where you can do you'd probably do that with a lot of his cards I mean if you're going like 2018 tops update PSA 10, you're not gonna have as much upside Yeah, as if you go as if you go with some of his bigger cards But you could still even probably pull it off with some of his his lower tier card I know you're you said you're lazy. You don't like lower tier cards because they're more But there's a play I you know, even I know there's a play there All right, hey man anything else you want to report on for the audience here like any any Purchases you've made things you're looking at buying on your watch list that you want to you want to throw out there What what are you excited about these days? I feel like we already talked a lot about because I had a question for you even before we start recording and you already hint You already mentioned, you know being first to market and I'm more curious about the timing So I I was ripping while you're ripping 2024 Bowman draft I was ripping a lot of 2024 tops Chrome update going after the MLB debut patches, which which obviously I didn't hit any of those cards But I bought a hobby box and I was lucky enough to get one off the tops website So for a couple hundred bucks and then at a local Walmart, I was able to pick up two megaboxes I was in about 350 altogether and that's not bad. That's not bad. And you know The rip was looking really bad like I was getting zero nothing and I think when I was doing the math in my head I was it was like a two three percent return on investment and Then I hit a an le refract or le image variation Card, which is I think last sold for 70 60 70 bucks On eBay just the other day and you know the first to market they're selling for 130 bucks So my question was and we can end off with this but at what point do you you know And this is like a month after Bowman or tops Chrome update came out At what point do you list it just still raw and you know It's still early because you haven't seen any graded cards yet or for a guy like le for you know, decent hits When do you consider you know what? I'm gonna just grade this and then and hopefully I am I'll be part of that wave where I'm first to market for PSA tens Yeah, that's a great question and I think I think it depends on the condition Speed matters a lot Because you know to your point even with the raw sales Maybe it's gone down from like over a hundred now to more like 70 just in a matter of a couple of weeks Yeah, so when you think about grading speed matters the same way I'm I'm more of a greater of cards than I am Seller of raw cards, I think it depends on the condition So if I'm pulling that le and I think it's gonna gem I think that the upside of being first to the market with a PSA 10 of a card like that or or maybe a Skeins like a similar card for skeins whoever you know, maybe the I think it's probably just those guys right but For either of those guys I would I would grade it if I think there's a chance that it could gem I would just do Normal 45 business day turnaround time and I think you you would be in that wave of being first to the market Not literally first to the market but if you're in that first wave and you can maybe ride the first initial comps to be close to 90% or even a hundred and ten you could be lucky and be like a hundred and five or a hundred and ten Percent of that first comp or even 90% of that first comp I think you've got more upside in that play than you do selling it raw if you look at it raw and you're like Ah, there's flaws here and that sort of thing. I think it's probably better to Sell it right away because I don't think a nine is going to give you that upside I would also say for a lesser player and I think this probably goes this is probably one of the bigger mistakes that that I see people make is they get excited about maybe a second tier player out of a new release and The Endorphins in their brain have taken over and Told them somehow that it's a good idea to grade this card Maybe they had it in their heads of like there's gonna be upside in this release for me I'm gonna get one of the top a big card from the top guy and I'm gonna grade it and try to have this you know five figure card or four figure card out of it and Then they get a second tier guy and then they their brains talk themselves into and their hearts talk themselves into oh Well, this guy could be this could be that by the time they grade that card and get it back Nobody cares about that release. Nobody cares about that guy because it's a second tier guy All right, and now they're in a situation where that graded card and there's no comps of it So nobody wants to be the first one to dip their toe in that water and take that risk So I think if it's a second tier guy Selling it raw makes more sense than grading it because you're leaving meat on the bone for the people who maybe See upside in grading it Or maybe just want to participate in buying a single from that new you're you're capitalizing on the hype of that new release Versus trying to create something that's not there Whereas if you got a guy like Ellie or like skeins from that release and it's a card like an image variation or you know Something that's not just the base card. Then I think if it Conditioned dependent. So let me know what you do. It's not Necessarily an easy decision, but it's also not necessarily a life-and-death decision You know what? I mean, like I think for sure you put $20 into grading a card and it's you're probably not gonna get Gonna get raked over the coals for it If you sell it later and it's and it's a 10 and you maybe could have maybe you could have made more net Profits selling it raw, but at the end of the day you still do about how you should have done on it Yeah, I think the real risk obviously is like get anything that's not a 10 these days just it's not gonna sell Well, which sucks. I mean we all hate that but it is what it is. And so I think that's why it's condition dependent No, I appreciate that answer and you already convinced me. It looks pretty good So I think I'm gonna submit it for grading and then you know next time we're on once I get the grade back We'll see how it goes, but I think that that's fun to me. I love the anticipation Yeah, you know, so that's awesome. Good decision, man I hope I hope it gems and I can't wait to hear how it does. No, thanks for the advice. Appreciate that No problem. I mean if there's one thing I'm good at I'll just tell you What I think you should do right or wrong You're wrong, but I'll tell you what I think it'll be based on some kind of experience or Something so it's all good. I know I appreciate your advice, too I mean good good analysis on all these baseball questions baseball is like my third sport as you know So it's good to get good to get your your time Yeah, it's fun definitely Absolutely. Well, thanks to the audience. I mean we've gotten good feedback from each of our audiences on now On these collabs everybody go check out cards to the moon who's Familiar with sports card strategy. And if you're if you're a cards to the moon listener, I promise that There will be some value if you come check out the sports card strategy show definitely check them out Appreciate you Clark. Have a good one, man Hey, thanks for listening to cards to the moon We'd really appreciate you subscribing to our podcast wherever you listen to your podcast And you can also connect with each of us on instagram at five card guys Or you can follow young at integrity sports cards or John at trade you at recess You can also check us out at five card guys calm Thanks again, and hope to connect soon You