Theft at The National | Raw selling better than Graded | Grading Landscape

I didn't even set my mic up yet. Oh, geez. This is what happens when you take a week off. I hope, I hope it's still set up. Here I am sitting here. Hold on. I'm gonna introduce us. I hope it's going. Welcome back to the Hobby Chop podcast. This is the podcast for the people. I am Big Ken. He is it zip. Did you miss me? I did, man. I was watching your. The national recaps, and then you said you got robbed and then you didn't come back. So I was. I was hoping nothing extra bad happened because it went from rock. You got. You guys got robbed, and then you didn't come back on the recap. So I was worried. It's. It's tiring out there. I bet you I sound better right now. I just turned this mic on. I can't believe I was sitting here talking to you the whole time and I didn't have my mic going. Yu-Gi-Oh I mean, it's tiring. I. I did that last year. I got. Well, last year I got coveted too, but I was three days in, three episodes in, and I'm like, like, all of a sudden you get to Saturday, and Saturday is like the last night, and so many things are going on and, and, And I have to apologize. Look, I got my. My bigger than cardboard shirt on. I was supposed to do an interview Saturday, Saturday night on the. On the Loop, on their. On their Live. So bigger than cardboard. I was going in there and we had. We had dinner plans. Actually, I'm sorry, that was Friday night. We had dinner plans. And when we set up the plans, they said, oh, it's nine o'. Clock. And I said, okay. So I told Corey, bigger than cardboard. And hey, I got plenty of time. He says, don't worry, we're going live at seven. So I'm there at like quarter to seven. And they have technical difficulties. They can't get the cameras and the mics to work together. So then it's like 7:30, quarter to eight. He goes, I think we got it. Like 15 more minutes. We're gonna go and like five minutes to eight. I get a message saying, heading over, I'll see you in a few minutes for. At Gibson's. And I'm like, wait a minute. I'm scrolling back through. I'm like, this, this dinner's at 9. You know, like it's 9 Eastern Time, 8 o'. Clock. And I'm like, oh, God. So I had. I had to bail on Corey. I Goldin stay. I had to take Off. But so I figured I'm gonna wear a shirt tonight one-of-one Give him a little. Give him a little air time on his shirt. But, Yu-Gi-Oh come Saturday, bro. I mean, just so tired. There's so much going on, and it's like, oh, and then I gotta keep. You know, it's me and Carmine doing these. These things, and. And we weren't exactly together on Saturday night, too. So I remember coming back to the room and just thinking to myself, I am literally gonna collapse. There's no way I could do an episode. So we're gonna. My regular episode on Sunday. Carmine's coming back on, and we're gonna recap day four and five and. Awesome. And put it to bed. Awesome. But we got some hot, spicy topics to talk about tonight, all straight out of the national. How excited are you? I'm excited. I. I know I called you and I was like, I assume you have all the topics for this week, considering you were at the mecca of sports cards for a week, so. And that. That you did. Yep. And, you know, the other thing about being a dealer there is you don't ever leave your table. I mean, you're just going to the bathroom and coming back. You just don't. Especially at our table, there's only two people, you know, there's only two people allowed at the table. There's two people at the table, and one person leaves. You're leaving one. One person all alone, you know, in a sea of people, and you can't do that. So. Yu-Gi-Oh I mean, a lot happening at the national, of course, the last two years, you know, I wasn't set up as a dealer. I was walking around, I was doing all those things, and I kind of missed some of that this year, you know, Are you seeing all. All the people messaging and the different groups going here from free things here, getting this, signing up for that, going to get that. And I'm like, I'm here. I'm right here. I'm right here at this table. That's. That's the only place I'm going. Yu-Gi-Oh I. I just. I. So I'll say this. I saw a bunch of content from the national, from my. From being at home, and I'd say It was pretty 50. 50 of dang. I wish I was there. And Yu-Gi-Oh I feel like I'm not missing out on that. On. On much because of this or that. Like, really, I feel like it was kind of here or there for me. Yu-Gi-Oh I did, though. And you told me. Sounds like I missed out on a bunch of listeners who were asking where I was and that I would have loved to be there for. To. To meet people. Right. Like, the people part of it. That would have been really cool. But first topic. Not missing out on that. Ken, without further ado, what's the first topic? Oh, here. We got a video ready for the video. Oh, Yu-Gi-Oh we have a video. So there's some theft here at the National. You see the arrow. I'm sure everybody's seen this video. Yu-Gi-Oh But. But the point I want to make, too. Who's watching? There is nobody. There's four showcases there, and not. And not one person even behind that. That table. Like, who is watching that table? I don't know, man. And watch. I mean. I mean, they. There's all these people standing around. Then he lifts the case up. He's looking, looking. He's looking. It's almost like he's looking to ask somebody, can I look at this card right now? He opens it up and takes the card out. Nobody is phased. There's a guy walking right behind him, unfazed that this guy opened up a case and reached in. Yu-Gi-Oh And the kid's like, no, it's not ours. I'm not. We. We can't do this. And the old man's like, get out of here. Start walking. Yu-Gi-Oh Like, what is going on? What was it that you said? Oh, my gosh. It was a couple months ago, and we were talking about, like, you're bringing someone to Target because you could only buy a few. I don't want to, Grandpa. Damn it, Grandma, shut up and buy it. Well, the worst part about that is the parental supervision. Is there like. Like, it looked like a grandfather to me that. That dude did not look like that kid's father. I mean, if you ask me, it looked like a grandfather. Yu-Gi-Oh And you know what? Like, I wonder. You think that would have happened if it was just the kid there? Probably not. No. Probably not, because I'm. I'm. Of course, the. The old man would have blamed everything on the kid if he got caught. Right? I mean, we got. I talked about this. I got stuff stolen out of my. Out of my. Out of my case. That is it. The cardboard collaborative. I'm tired of this, grandpa. Well, that's too damn bad. That's exact. That's exactly. Dude, that is exactly how I see that moment. Like, man, I feel bad for that kid. I really do feel bad for that kid. Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh And you know what? With all these videos and all the people out there, someone's going to figure out who it is, they're going to be caught and, and it's going to be, you know, it's going to turn into something bigger. But you know, it's disappointing that it was rampant this year. I mean I, maybe it is every year and we don't hear about it, but every so many people posting videos up, people walking around with, with you know, stuff on their phone saying if you see these cards I'm at booth, whatever, someone stole them from me. I, I have to say I'm really good. Like I worked in a prison. I'm pretty observant of everything going around. You know, I'm security minded. I was sitting at this table, I got cards stolen from me. But I could almost guarantee not why I was sitting at that table. You know, I got to go up and you got to go, I got to go to the bathroom. Right. Got to walk away. And I think that was probably prime time for somebody to, to, to dig into the box and, and grab cards out because I had my cases in front of me that were locked and why weren't those cases locked? I mean what were those people thinking with all four fifteen thousand dollar mahomes just sitting in there. God knows what else was in the case if that was just one card in the case of just not being locked and but you know what? Like absolutely, like the dealer should have like hindsight's 20 20. The dealer should have been on top of it. Probably should add your cases locked but no one should just walk up and steal like also. So it's, it's hand in hand. And to actually, to your point, a slight disagreeance. I, I hear about theft every single year from the national. I, there's always stories about it. I think the difference is it happened to you. And there was like this Zebra viral video of the grandfather and the kid. So it feels, it feels way more real. Especially for you because it happened to you firsthand. Yu-Gi-Oh and, and I could really, I mean I could complain. I felt bad, I felt, felt violated. Right. Someone comes and takes stuff. But in my mind too, the boxes that I had these cards in were wnba, right. I locked up all the football and the basketball I had all locked up. These were WNBA cards that were stolen and, and some football singles up front, you know, that were, you know, for. And now Carmine had some stolen too. So in his, his, his raw, I'm calling them singles. I got to go back to the raw. The raw and the one touches his were his, you know, probably up over a hundred dollars on that. I, Yu-Gi-Oh on the Football cards. The raw stuff that I put out there, you know, it was $50 and under. So I, you know, I lost probably, you know, eight or ten of those cards. You know, probably had 300 of them. Lost eight or ten of the cards over the course of the five days, which is to, you know, I guess to be ex. Expected. But as far as the WNBA stuff goes, I. I never felt that people would have been, you know, like, steal. Like grabbing that. I didn't think, well, would be something people would be stealing. I hear you, but let me give you a counterpoint. Think about that WNBA Facebook group. It's the most vile place on earth. All right, so you put that in a perspective, and maybe there's that, but. Or there's just some. Some lonely dudes, desperate dudes that need their grubby hands on some WNBA cards. Yu-Gi-Oh I don't know. I. I was trying, as Mike. As Mike G. Geo would say, some perverts trying to get those WNBA cards. You know what I mean? Perverts are donkeys. Yu-Gi-Oh but that was. That was certainly sad to get stuff stolen and to, you know, have so many people around you have. Have stuff stolen too. And. And, you know, when I. When I watch that video, and that's the reason I put the video up, I mean, there are people walking by, why this dude's opening the case up and not even thinking. And I guess. I guess if we act like we're. We know what we're doing. Yu-Gi-Oh we're. We're. You're just confident about it. No one's gonna question you. Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh So. And also, I was curious about this too. I had a question about this. It's like. So you said, out of the 300 cards, you said you lost 8 to 10 of just those football ones. And you're like, well, that's to be expected. So I was gonna ask you, like, should that be, like, factored in is like, it's a cost to do in business. It's like. It's like. That sounds. It sounds icky, right? That sounds terrible. It's like, expect to be stolen from at the National. It's like. That's awful. Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh And I. The cards I deliberately. I put in there were deliberately all under $50. You know, I wasn't putting anything out. You know, that was more expensive than that. And what I noticed, too, and I don't know if there's other dealers, you know, listening and listening to this, but what I noticed, too, was. And what Carmine and I noticed that people kept pushing the boxes backwards. So we had the, we had two, two row boxes that were, you know, right up against each other, right up against the front of the table. And people kept pushing the boxes back and taking cards out and pulling, putting them in front of the boxes. And, and, and, and I know this was almost a tactic that those, those cards weren't going back into, you know, they were pulling them out. It looks like they were like comping the cards and stuff and whatever, but not all the cards were going back in the boxes. And a lot of times I would, like, make it really known that I know there's some cards there and I'm like hanging over the table looking to see what they have, and they're, you know. Oh, oh, Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh And like, pick these things up. And, and a couple times I said, could you pick the cards up? And I kept sliding the boxes. And I don't know if that's just something that as people are digging through, the boxes are moving or that's a tactic to slide those boxes back to kind of hide what they're doing in front of the boxes. You know that. I mean, I think, I think those could both be true. Yu-Gi-Oh I think. Right. And what, I think for you, what you could do, if that's like a strategy you want to do to maximize your table space next time, is what if you gave them like, I don't know, like, like a little container. If you're like, like a make your stack container. And so they had a place to put those cards that they wanted to maybe hold on to, and then they could keep it up and put them in this thing. I've never seen anyone do that. But you saying that. I'm just thinking like, I mean, this is like a, this is like a note thing, right? But like for stickies. But like if you have a little container, it's like as they're making their stack, they could put it in a little side box. Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh Something that's like, I'm gonna show up at a hammer and a nail. I'm gonna nail the boxes to them one-of-one moving. But that's what happens when, when, when it's so busy, when you, when you're at a show that's just so busy and those, those aisles upstairs where those tables were so close together. I mean, people were on top of people up there in that room. So. Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh So let me. I want to ask you. And it's a good transition. So you said the singles were. Sorry. See, I'M using your words now. The raw, the raw car, the raw singles were selling better than your slabs. Yep. What's. What do you think the reasoning for that is? I, I think it's. I think it becomes more negotiable. Maybe not. Negotiable is not the word I'm looking for. But on a graded, on a graded card, you can, you can look up all the last sales, whether you're on card ladder or alt or ebay and all that stuff. And, and you can do that on the raw cards as well. But I think the, the pricing becomes more regimented on the graded cards. Right. Versus looking up the slabs. And I think, I think the people buying, I mean, looking up the, the raw cards, and I think what's happening is, I think. And it was a similar to me, I went out and I bought, you know, almost 300 of these cards. And, you know, they were all discounted, you know, so I was buying, you know, five or six at a time. And I was sharing every week, oh, look, I Beckett up these six or these eight and I was filling boxes up, but I was buying them all lower end stuff. Most of them I was buying, you know, under $20 each, which now, you know, I could easily put 50 or $60 on that card. Right. And sell it probably for 40 to $50 right in there. And I think being similar to the people who are buying them, a lot of them, if the cards were nice, if there were RPAs, if they're autos, if they were numbered similar, they were able to say, oh, I'm gonna buy this card at $40 or whatever, and can quickly flip that card at 50 or 50. So they were, I think they were able to quick, you know, flip those cards quicker. And without grading being open for such a long period of time, people don't have the question, why is that not graded? Right. So a lot of times people came up, a few people would be like, oh, how come you didn't grade this card? I'm like, who's grading it? There's just nowhere to grade it, you know, I mean, BGS is the only place, and I'm not using them right now. So if I can't send the psa, why am I grading cards? Well, that's a whole nother question that I could give a long philosophical answer to. But, Yu-Gi-Oh I think selling raw cards, I think it's easier to sell them sometimes because you can sell a lot of opportunity. You can sell upside for grading. You could sell the fact that it's just a Quick flip. People could then buy it because it's not graded. I know that's, like, counterintuitive to what I just said, but, like, you have all these slants and perspectives that you can put on to buying. Like, when you buy a slab, it's a slab. Like, there's. It is what it is, right? It's. Yep. And the pricing. The pricing on the graded, right, are. Are. It's very regimented. You know, if it's selling at 80, it may. It may have one high, one low, but everything is right around the $80. But when you get to the raw cards, right, you start looking. I mean, one console is sell as low as 20, and one can sell as high as 80, right? And now there's. There's a big swing in the middle. So, of course, as a buyer, I want to go in at. You know, and buy it at the low end, right? But now I'm sitting at the national, and people are like, Well, I see 20. I'm like, we're. We're already done. The conversation's already over. You know, I've got an 80 price on it. You see a $20 sale from January. You know, we're not even in the same place. And people were saying, oh, Yu-Gi-Oh I see that. But now I see this sale and that sale, and the sales are all over the place on the Raw, and. And I think it helped, like, the people coming, it's the same as every show. They're coming to buy the car to sell to somebody else. You know, there's very, you know what's going on. Every person that shows up at the table, that there's very few collectors that are showing up. And I. Trust me, I met a lot of collectors this past weekend that said, this is the card I've been looking for. I'm so excited to get it right. And I know it's going home and going in their PC, but for the mo, I had people showing up to my table saying, Yu-Gi-Oh how am I gonna make money? Like, if you could sell this to me at 50, I could sell it at 65, and I could make 15. I'm like, no, no, that's my job. I do that. Not you. This is my job. I'm the one with the table here, right? And it's like, all. All week, it was just people coming up. They were buying those cars. They were running to the trade nights. They were running to other labels. They're buying a card at 90. Because there's a. There's a place over there that says, they'll pay 100%, but they're really only paying 94. But they bought it at 91 and they'll take the 3% and you know, take a few bucks and keep moving. And this is literally what was happening. That just sounds so exhausting to have to do non stop for five days in a row. Sounds exhausting. Like you probably, you probably had the same conversation like at least 20 times a day. At least. Probably way more than that. Yu-Gi-Oh you're right. But I'm gonna tell you, the raw cards sold better. There wasn't as much. Every time it came time to sell a, a graded card, there was lots of conversation going on with that, you know, everybody, I mean the margins. I'm gonna tell you. I, I did a deal with a guy, right, that I told him we, we were going back and forth and he said, he said he wanted, he wanted two cards and he, and he, one was a Downtown. I'm trying to remember what it was. It was, it was the lamar Jackson Downtown PSA 9, whatever it is, 2024, 2025. The last three or four sold at 400, right? They sold that 400. And I had another car that I had more room in for whatever it was. It was a hundred and something dollars. I, I, I'm not going to be able to do the math right now. But anyways, it came down to it and he was like, our, our price came to 490, his price came to 495. And I said, and he was at 395 on the, on the Lamar Jackson. And I said, and he was at 495. So let's just make it for $5. Make an even 500. Can't do it. Wait, what? For $5 you're gonna let this deal go away for $5? He says, I can't do it. He goes, my margins are tight, I have to be at 495. I said, so it's easier for you to pull out all the singles and, or the fives and the tens and the twenties than it is to give me five 100 bills. I said, because I have no change, I'll do the deal. I have no change, you figure it out. And he sat there for a couple minutes pulling and Howard, Howard, you're, I saw you in the chat. You were sitting. Oh, was that, was that what? Oh no. You know, he was pulling to change out and he was, and I'm not, I'm absolutely knocking this guy and I know I'm probably going to get heat in the chat. But for $5, it was. That $5 was very important to this gentleman. Right. Way more important than that five dollar. What five dollars was to me. But he went through, and it took him a couple minutes to get the hundreds out. The twenties, the tens. Right. Or the ten and the five. And I'm like, this is what I was saying. He had a whole stack of hundreds. Wouldn't have been easier to give me five 100 bills and move on to the next sale. Right. Than standing here fumbling with your money the whole time. He agreed with me, but he also said that $5 is very important to me. Oh, cardboard collaborative. If your margins can't handle $5, then you should find a different hobby. Maybe that. Or find a different business plan in the hobby. Because I would argue if you're confident enough to work off that thin margins, you probably know what you're, you have to know what you're doing. Like, like, or you're just really stupid. But, like, I would hope you know what you're doing where it's that thin and you're like, I'm making money at this. Right? Like, Goldin be me, Ken. Could not be me. I would, I, I would. That would feel like a total waste of my time. Yu-Gi-Oh But I talked to somebody else too that said to me, who, Who I was trying to buy something, and they said the same thing every time. Every time. I said, what do you got on this? Can you do that? They would add five or ten dollars to every single sale. And I said, what, what is it about adding 5 and 10? And then he said to me, if I get $5 out of every single sale at the end of the day, that puts a few hundred more dollars in my Beckett At the end of the day, it's not about the $5 for one sale. It's about the $5 for 20 sales, right? Or, or 40 sales or something like that, which I completely don't believe in. Like, if we can get, if we can get a deal done quicker and not start going around about a $5 or $8 or $10 on a deal, like, let's get the deal done and we both move on to doing something different, right? I, I, I, this whole, you know, I gotta beat you down, I gotta one-of-one $5 or $10. I, I said no. I came home with cards that I clearly could have sold, and people are like, I would be like, oh, I could do 430. And they're like, 420. I said, no. You asked me what my best was I said it was $430. I. 425. No, 430. You asked me what my best was, and I told you if you wanted to negotiate, you shouldn't ask me what my best was. You said, what is the best you can do on this card? I said, $430. I didn't say 425. I didn't say 420. I said 430. And they're like, I can only do 425. I said, well, I guess we're not getting a deal done. You know, move along. Like, I'm done. I, I can't have these conversations all day long with people trying to one-of-one for $5. Yu-Gi-Oh that sounds awful. Or you could. I actually, I had a good example about the raw cards thing. So I bought a card while you were at National. I bought a Franklin Arias First Orange Zebra Auto. The highest sale of that card was it was a PSA9 version that did 1300. I paid 1500 for a raw. And there was an auction that was at like, 1250 when I paid fit or 1300 when I paid 1500. And he had got called up. So I knew that 13, like me and the seller both knew that it was higher than that I paid for. I, I took that chance on that. This is what I mean by raw having upside. Right? I took the chance at that 1500. And he's like, he's like the next. That night, after I paid him, he sent me a picture of the auction. It was at 1800 after I. We had agreed on 1500, which was the private sale, which was the newest, highest sale of that card ever, at least that we knew of by sales data or our deal private. And that card ended at $2,000 and 25. Like 20. 25. That's what I ended up. All that to say that the variables and the variance in raw cards and certain raw cards has that upside that, like, I don't know. I, I, I like that upside. And then the ability to multiply it with grading that you just can't do that with a slab. I feel like, not that a slab can't go up or down. It sure can. It's just like something about the quickness. Like, I could have got that card and probably snap sold it for 1900. You know what I mean? But it's at Beckett now, which you would say, why even send it there? But I sent it there. You, you really wanted an 8. 5 on that card. That's why. That's right. I watched everybody's Reveals this. And I, I only saw. I think. I think trike his. His PSA 10 on the. And the 101 that he pulled. And I think I may. Maybe I saw one other PSA 10, but the rest, everything came back eights, nines, BGs, eight fives, nines, nine, fives. Right. I think people got. People got hammered at grading, at everybody. I know. People don't know what they're doing. Yu-Gi-Oh people do not know what they're doing. I'll stand by that. But I. I have to say, there's got to be some people who know what they're doing. They're still getting hammered at. At. At. At grading. Goldin be me, Ken. Could not be me. Not a confidence thing. Not a cocky thing, just a. I've done it enough times. So once people send like 3,000 cards in a year, they'll understand. Like, it. It's. It's. It's literally just like you put 10,000 hours into something and you're an expert at it. Right. You have to do the work. It's like with Trike and the Superfractor, people can aim to it. As always, an influencer. Oh, this. Oh, that. Or maybe. Maybe it was the biggest card that was in the product. So Fanatics and tops are like, let's white glove this. Let's not let it go through a. Like a, you know, the car. You ever seen the cards being produced and they're just sent like on a conveyor belt Zebra fast jumping. Maybe they're like, hey, let's handle. Let's hand pack this Cooper flag 1 of 1 auto. Instead of it being trike, being a influencer, maybe it's, hey, let's sp. Let's take special care of the biggest card in our product. Maybe that's it. Maybe I'm. Maybe I'm crazy for that. That conspiracy. That takes care of the Zebra Maybe we just put a redemption in instead and then we'll just send them card in. I love that because that's. I'm. That's what they do for the. I'm pretty sure that's what they do for the debut patches. No. I watched a guy pull the debut Bash today. Well, some of the. The skins was a. The skins was a redemption. Was it? Oh, maybe. Maybe the better ones are redemptions. Yu-Gi-Oh I don't know, because I know they. They pride themselves on the white glove service on those. I just remember hearing that. So maybe it's the higher. I have no idea, though. Yu-Gi-Oh But at least they always know where the card is. Right. I mean, if you put it in a random box and you send it out, that. That box could go sit on somebody's shelf and never get opened. Right. And then the card. That patch is gone. If the only patch, that one is gone. But if they have it in their vault. Right. They know where the patch is. Maybe the redemption's gone, but the patch is still there. Yu-Gi-Oh I prefer that they're all redemptions. Honestly. I. I think that would be right. Wouldn't that be better? And they don't. They. They like could send it out to. You know how they do like. Like the sealed cards, like in top scroll on black or whatever. They sent those out like sealed. That would feel better, wouldn't it? Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh At least they would have been trying to protect it. one-of-one mas. So what's the long term plan on grading lower end cards? Right now? None. There is. There. There is no plan on. You know, unless you want to overspend on. On grading lower end cards. Addicted to my stuff. Eric Young. Didn't BGs close their standard tiers today? Yesterday? Yep. They closed their lower and you know, they immediately came back saying they'll be opening up in September. Yu-Gi-Oh But it's. We'll see it if it happens. Addiction to dreams grading lower end cards is probably over with the special with. Especially if the lower tiers never come back. 100%. Yu-Gi-Oh Howard was agreeing with me. He was there. Cardboard collaborative. If your margins can't handle $5, then you should find a different hobby. Spike's back spikes. We have. We haven't seen him in a few episodes. Glad to have you back, sir. Addiction to Dreams within $10 should be a done deal. I agree. Bromisto. What is up? Sports cards. The hobby sounds like modern day. And scene from Better off Dead. I want my $2. Cardboard collaborative. Nothing better than a week of national. But after four or five days, I've reached my limit of the last comp was. And. And. And he hit a big card. He had a big 101. Paige Becker's 101 out there. I saw that. If anyone deserves that, man, it's him. He. He's been in that. So that's. That's awesome. Yu-Gi-Oh John Dorch. What's up, fellas? Happy to have you back. We haven't seen you in a while either. My boy Craig. What is up, kid? Big kid. I got. I got my Trinity Rodman sitting right here. I sold the show. Hey, I bought from you, but I got my trinities here and Homer. Sports cars. My Man. Jonathan, is it 2027 national yet? I got in late. Were you able to get your stolen cards back? No, those are, those are long gone. Oh, Yu-Gi-Oh Cardboard Collaborate says, can't believe the poll. Last box. On his way out of the national, he buys a box, goes back, rips it, pulls the 101 Paige Beckers. Oh, did. Were you with him when he ripped it? No, no, no. But I think I was the first person he messaged. Pretty insane, man. All right, what's next? We are talking table violations. Table by. This is going to be short but sweet. You know, first year back, I mean, I'm following all the rules and, and message after message after email after post saying you get two dealer badges at an eight foot table. Only those two people are allowed behind the table, you know, and all this stuff. And a lot of people call and say, hey, Ken, can I come hang at your table? Maybe we can hang behind the table. And everybody. I said, no, we can't. I mean, I'm following the rules. I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing. We get out there, we show up, and those tables had had minimum four people behind every table that was, that was up there. And you know, it's funny because during, you know, the dealer setup time, there's only a couple of people at every table. I'm like, all right, look, everybody's following the rules. And then as soon as the VIP doors open, boom. Next thing you know, there's people everywhere behind all these tables. So I did hear, you know, at the end that there was, you know, a lot of people going to be losing their tables next year for having. And I'm not even talking about the eight foot tables. I just, I think boost as well that over and over I hear people talking about people are going to lose their tables next year for table violations. So it's going to be interesting to see if that happens and how it happens and. And what it looks like when it happens, because you got to put somebody else at that table. Now you're bringing somebody else in and giving them, giving them priority one. Right? So now the priorities will, you know, battles that'll create a new waiting list on top of that. Yep. All the logistics of running a big card show. The money going through that place, kid. Yu-Gi-Oh I can't even imagine. So, all right. VIP lounges, attendees with cases. So you told me about this and I also heard this from Sports Card CEO podcast. They were like, I don't know why, what they, what they had alluded to. It's like, you don't even need to buy a table at the National. You could just spend 250 for a VIP badge and then go set your cards up in the lounge. And I asked, and I said that to you and asked you, and you were like, Yu-Gi-Oh that's what people are doing. I brought, I brought a case for somebody. I drove, I brought a case for somebody to put in that VIP lounge setup. But let me, let me tell you something. Yes, it, it, it is in cardboard collaborative and, and Howard saying the same thing. Chaos 100%. When, when I, I'm going on Instagram and influencers are all screaming, oh, I can't get any deals done. Everybody's overpriced. The only deals I can get done are in the VIP lounge. Those are the only people selling below comps and blah, blah, right? And then next thing you know, there's your. The VIP room is overrun because the influencers are telling everybody, don't buy from people on the Fleer Go to the VIP room. There's better deals happening in that room. Right? You know, I, I didn't really get a chance to walk around, so I can't say if people were at 130 or 150 or whatever. I know I, I had my stuff priced probably 1015 over some things maybe may were maybe a little bit more over, but that was based on random comps that were all over a comp at 480 and a comp at 390 and 410, and I put a card at 500 because I'm basing it off the 480. Com. But you know what? If you came to me and said, hey, can you do any better than that? Let's talk like we can negotiate. Because I know there's some low sales, I'm willing to do that, but I'm not going to go out and base it on a low sale to begin with. So I really don't know, like what people stuff. But when you got these influencers telling everybody, don't, don't. You can't buy anything on the Fleer You got to go to the VIP room or trade nights if you want to buy anything. I mean, I don't know, I just think that that's wrong. And some of these people are wearing the, you know, the, the, the, the media badges that the national is giving them, and then basically they're just, you know, slapping them in the face, saying, telling people, you don't come by here on the Fleer go up there and buy in the, Buy in the VIP room instead. Yu-Gi-Oh well, there's that. And then I think about it as like, so the national is going to be cracking down on table violations, but not just letting people willy nilly grab a literal showcase and throwing it up in the VIP lounge when they're losing money on not charging them for a table in a showcase space. Like, that's crazy to me. And like, not that I'm pro or anti card show by any means, but like, if I was a dealer, like, I'd be pissed. I'd be very upset because how dare someone not pay this fee I paid for my table and they could just throw a case out in the, in the VIP lounge where I, I think that was like Howard said to me, ken, it's like we show up at the restaurant and we, we right, right, right at the front doors. We set up a little food stand. Exactly though. Exactly. And we start selling appetizers before the people walk through the door. Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh It's ridiculous. And like, I, I mean, I don't have any issue with the people doing it because it's like more power to you. If they're, if you're playing within the rules and they're allowing you to do that, then great. But like, as a dealer, I wouldn't like that. Yu-Gi-Oh I think that, that, that's definitely going to be addressed next year. I don't, I think they're going to tell people you can't come walking in here with a case. Yu-Gi-Oh the case part's crazy, but also you enabled it because you brought someone a case, so. Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh but, but there was a lot of people talk too strongly about it. No, no, no. I mean, it's because I know, I was there the last few years. I, I, I think a lot of this started, a lot of this VIP room stuff started in Cleveland and, and I could go back, I would tell you, I remember doing a recap on that and saying like, I was tired and I went downstairs to sit in the VIP room and I saw people had cards out on the table like a trade night. I'm like, Yu-Gi-Oh it's brilliant idea. I did the same thing and I started selling cards and you know, out of my case there. Right. So this is something that, you know, has been ramping up. But I think, one, they're going to address it and two, there's a lot of people complaining that, hey, like, I paid for the VIP pass so I have a place to go sit down and relax and maybe have a drink or, or eat something. But every time they went to The VIP room, there were no tables available, no seats available. There were just cases and cards all over the place. It was a whole other card show going on inside that room. Yu-Gi-Oh And if I had, I, I say all that, say if I had a VIP badge, I probably would have been doing the same thing. Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh 100. But like all, all power to the people doing it. But like, kind of shame on the national for not for like picking and choosing what they want to police, I guess, Like. Yu-Gi-Oh And it's like that all the time. It's kind of ridiculous to police people behind your table, but not people setting up shop for free. Am I missing something? No, it's 100. Absolutely. We'll wait to see what, what gets said last year. Well, I mean, the 2023, we had our own trade nights. We, We. You. You went to that trade night. It was amazing. It was so much fun. Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh it was so much fun. And I heard that they re. I heard allegedly, they read from sports car nonsense that they reached out to the hotels to ask them to not, like, allow trade nights. Not, not only. Not allowed trade nights, but shut every room down. Every room in any of those hotels are all locked down. They're all locked out. Like, like, so the. You can't rent a room. You can't get a hotel room. They're. They're all locked out through. Here's, here's not a hot take. Someone's gonna zag from the national and have an entire location as trade night location. Like, someone's just not going to be affiliated with the national and they're just gonna buy out a building and just have trade night there. Yu-Gi-Oh well, so national will be like, oh, you can't come to the National. And they'll be like, who cares? Yu-Gi-Oh so. So SOCO Expo did a. Did. Did their own after dark trade night, but it was, I think, like 10 or 15 minutes away from. Yu-Gi-Oh I, I, it. I know. Cardboard Collaborative. I don't know if you went or if anybody here went to, to the SOCO trade night if it was any good. I saw videos. It didn't look like many people at all went there. Yu-Gi-Oh some. Well, do you think that has a connotation of that? It's all soccer at the soccer trade night or. No. Well, well, this year. This year they did it a little different. They had a huge Pokemon show. They had a soccer show, and then they did the after dark trade night that included not only sports cards, but I know I saw somebody getting haircuts. They were given haircuts in there and everything? Well, what if someone. What if someone calls up one of the hotels and is like, look, you're gonna get deals on hotel rooms, or we're gonna sell you out every single night like the. The best, like alcohol, liquor sales you've ever had all year for five nights in a row. Yu-Gi-Oh It's like you. You decide, and people will still pay for your hotel room. Like, what, are people not gonna buy the hotel rooms because the national doesn't cut him a check for. Or a deal for their group? I don't know. It just. I. I feel like I must be missing something to it, but I don't know. So Cardboard Collaborative said he went one night. It was good. He sold the bunch. It was a lot of soccer, but there was a variety of stuff. Spike says what happens when they're. When they're theft at a trade night with no security? Someone gonna get hurt? Well, that or people are gonna say someone's gonna get hurt, and then no one's gonna do anything about it. So. Yu-Gi-Oh I mean, well, it'll just. We'll see what they address. Like, they're going to address what they feel is important to them to address. Right. I mean, that's really. With the national, whether it's the trade night, whether it's the VIP room. I mean, I can tell you that the first night for trade night, they gave out way too many wristbands. There were. There was just lines and lines and lines. People waiting hours to get in, get in there, to. To the. To that. And then the. The. The second night, they were giving out wristbands, but people said. And I went there the second night. It was still a pretty crowded room, but wasn't too bad. The third night, thanks to my guy Clutch Howard, who got me a band for the third night, they. They sold out. Like, they only gave so many bands out then that was it. Not sold out, but they just ran out. There was only so many bands. So Saturday night's trade night was very comfortable. You could walk around. The room wasn't overcrowded. You had a place to sit and things like that. Yu-Gi-Oh I will say to that. 2023 national. My. My favorite part of that was that trade night. By far, It. It was so much fun, like. And it was also really fun being at that hotel. That venue was fun. And it was crazy Beckett man. Like, you Goldin You had. I was. I remember when I left, I was stepping over. People like to get out. It was crazy. Yu-Gi-Oh Vintage card collector asked as a dealer was able to book my hotel. No, they only have so many rooms and the, when you, when you're picking your tables for next year, they start with the highest priorities and, and from what I understand before they even get down to the, the, the 15s or the tens and priorities that those rooms are already gone. You're, most people are on their own for those hotel rooms but I know they release rooms afterwards because I ended up at the Lowe's Hotel which is another hotel that is down. So I've just put it upon myself now just to every, every Monday I'm putting it on my, my repeat calendar to go on and check all the hotels to see if they've released any rooms to, to, to, to reserve Cardboard Collaborative says the national needs to have a company sponsor other trade nights at the surrounding hotels while the main trade night is going on. There's enough demand to have multiple trade nights and the problem was if you stayed at any of those hotels, my hotel, there's huge signs in the lobby saying you can't trade memorabilia. There's none of this. So they, you know, you can't be set up for trade nights. So I know Howard's hotel I think was the Weston was like out of control with a trade night. I know people were there until, till like three or four in the morning doing that. That and the, possibly the Hilton too. I mean now they're, there's, they're putting signs up that you can't do it in the hotel lobbies. So a couple hotels still had trade nights like they weren't prohibited. Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh Yu-Gi-Oh yep, that's good. So last topic for tonight, kind of a biggie, just grading landscape. So you, you had said you don't think there's any, any possibility of grading low end in the future. It's not grading low end. I just don't think PSA is going to ever come back with bullshit bulk or anything low. I think PSA has figured out that even at their standard level there it works for them now Collectors Universe, you know, owns all three now, right? Sgc, PSA and bgs. And I think what we're probably going to see in BGS is probably the lower end stuff that they're, they're BGS will probably be taking in lower end stuff to grade, but I just don't feel think PSA knowing, you know, the value of, of having their car, you know, a card graded by PSA increases the value so much more than BGS and that they're, they're not going to sell it for cheap anymore. I mean their product is, we're, we're, we're as hobbyists in the hobby, right? We're saying that if it says PSA on that it, we're raising the value of, of the, you know, of that card and we're saying it's worth more than if it's in a BGS slab or an SGC slab. So knowing that, why would PSA go back and sell their, their, you know, sell it, sell themselves short and go back to 15 or $20. Right. I think they're going to stay at a standard 79 or whatever. They're at $70. And if you've got a nice card that's worth sending it at that, then send it in and we'll grade it. But besides that, and this is just my thought, I don' else but just, just my thought, being around this for long enough, I just really think that bgs, that SGC is going to do most of the, anything old, the, the vintage stuff and I think BGS is going to be the modern low end grading company. Just my thoughts, I think my counter to that would be. So you have say you're managing hotels, we'll just stay on the hotel topic. And you, you're managing three Four Seasons, like nice higher end hotels, more expensive for the rooms, better clientele, yada, yada yada. Then you have a Fleer of 30 Zebra Eights and you're like, this is just ridiculous. There's way too much demand. They're too rowdy. God knows what's coming in and out of these rooms. So you're like, let's just get rid of the Zebra Eights and we'll just focus on these three Four Seasons. Well, those Zebra Eights bring an income too. Maybe it's not at the same rate as those Four Seasons hotels. However, that's a lot of like, that's a lot of money that you're just leaving. And before you go, oh well, it's, it's under collector's universe. Yes it is. But to your point, if I, if I can't, you have you very experienced in cards. Your opinion is, well, if I have these lower end cards and I can't send them to psa, I'm just not grading anymore. How many other people have that mindset? So it's like they're, they're not going to sgc, they're not going to Beckett. So if a bunch of people have that mindset and they're not grading their lower end elsewhere, they're not just increasing Their revenue, they're there. There's this whole gap missing. All these cards are not getting submitted. Right. They're not Getting submitted for 17.95 or whatever it is at Beckett, regardless that they shut down because people have this mindset, if it's not psa, why am I even submitting it? Yu-Gi-Oh right. Like that's. So my whole thing is. Because it's not as a quality of business at the lower tier. There's so much money that's being missed out because of it. And as a business, if you're going to scale and grow and scale and grow, you should be able to accommodate. Accommodate that eventually. And also, we talk about this all the time. The majority of the hobby is not dealing in the submitting at regular. That's not. That's not the majority of the hobby. Right. So, like, I'll take. I'll take the unpopular opinion and keep stacking my. My bulk stuff submission whenever it comes back. Just keep letting it grow and be patient. Did you see PSA announced their new location? Was it in Texas? Plano, Texas. You know it's in Plano, Texas, right? Yes, I know. I've sent multiple packages to Plano, Texas in the last week. That's their new grading location. Interesting. Yu-Gi-Oh interesting. Well, see how that goes. So Addiction to. Addiction to Dreams says, does this leave an opening for TAG to scale their Yu-Gi-Oh operation and become more respected in sport? I mean, I. I think it. It creates an opening to any company who can, you know, not only. Not only keep up with what people are sending, but start taking a share of the market. I don't know how. Provide a service that's not being offered literally nothing more or less. Yu-Gi-Oh And from what. What I heard and if maybe any. I know I asked you and you said you. You're like, what are you talking about NBA? The Mike Baker authentication or whatever it is that they do. Like the. The diamond stickers that like, basically tell you how good your PSA or bgs, whatever grade is. I guess they're slabbing cards too. Mike Baker, with his background, if I'm not. He used to be like one of the founding, like head graders or he was big at PSA way back in the day and then went off as his own thing and started mba. That sounds like something that at least could give a grading company direct, like, lineage from PSA as. Like, hey, this is actually a standard that's valid and reliable. That might. That may be something of interest. I don't know. Maybe. Maybe anyone knows that. I looked at a Couple of slabs. They don't look too bad. But I don't know, I don't mind being patient and also I've just really like, with all this going on, I, I've only been buying like a handful of players. So, you know, it is what it is. But again, I mean, when the grading shut down, I mean, you shifted, right? You said I started buying more cards, but I, I can't. You're buying more cards, but you're buying higher, higher end cards. That's makes sense to send at that, that which is, which is right. Perfect, right? I mean like if you, if you don't have cards, like, why, and in here, like I, I, I, in my mind, I think to myself, if you can't be sending these lower end cards in, in bulk submission, why are we ripping wax, right? Why are we ripping? Why are we, why are we opening up, you know, Prizm or this and we're getting, you know, we're looking for the Refractor or the silvers of, you know, quarterbacks and stuff like that, because they're not worth sending in. So what, why, why would we be? Why would I, I mean, this is what I'm saying in my mind. It's a whole thing. What, why not let everybody else do the ripping? Let me go out like you said, let me go out and buy the higher end cards, right? And, and, and send those in and grade at. Because now I've got a card that's 500, it makes sense to send it to at a 70 grading, right? Ken, welcome to my business model. Well, no, well, this is what I'm saying. You're the one, you're, you're the one telling me that we're gonna go back, we're gonna go back to bulk and that you've got stacks of cars to send to bulk. But I don't, I don't, I hear, all I hear you saying is I'm just buying higher end cars to send at, at a higher level. And I think most people are doing that, right? Why are we messing around with the smaller stuff? Although, you know, like, you know, if you've got a B business and you can hit singles all day long and make money, I mean, what if it one-of-one broke? Why fix it? But now it's broke right now, now we've, now we've got to look for triples and home runs on every card. So Yu-Gi-Oh it's because like, like the, so to answer that for me is like when I'm buying collections, there's both of that in there. So, like, I'm able to make my money off of the big cards and then the cards that are lower end or bas. I don't want to say lower. I mean, they are lower end. But like, the cards that I don't want to send in at regular, since we're just, let's just talk PSA to simplify it. The cards, I don't want to send in that regular if I'm into them for nothing. What's it hurt? What's it hurt to hold on to them? I, I could take them out at any time and sell them to anyone. What's it hurt if I'm, if I'm buying out these collections and then I can send off the higher end and make these great margins on grading the higher end. Right. Because like, I thought you, I thought you were gonna say I send them ticket assignment and just collect my money because they're all for free anyways. I, I, I do that all the time too. I did not expect you to look on the Fleer and say, what does it hurt that I just leave them all stacked up here on the Fleer Yu-Gi-Oh it's fun. I wasn't expecting that. Well, I mean, but I pick and choose though, right? Like, like I have like a hundred Michael Jordans just sitting over here that, you know, hopefully Bolt comes back one day and I'll, It'll be great. Yu-Gi-Oh it'll be great, man. But also too, it's like, okay, so like, I'm holding on to that stuff. It's Michael Jordan that's pretty safe. Like, unless he does some, some stuff. But like, not to be morbid, if he died, it would go up. Like, like, like what? Like you're holding these certain people. Or at least I'm holding these certain people because I think Bulk will come back at some point. And I think the people who are able to do that may be rewarded if, you know, the patience is a virtue. Yu-Gi-Oh Or worse comes to worse, you know, I'll just sell all the Jordan Ohtani and Kobe Mahomes and Messi that I have in my case over here, and I'll be okay. E. Like, either way, I just, I view it as a, I can't lose doing that. I don't know what you think about that. I also get it goes against efficiency, but I think with the run up on the slab pricing with these, like, like, because I think when all, when Bulk opens up, of course it's going to get flooded again. What do you think's going to flood it, though? Pokemon Flag Pokemon, like all the new rookies, all that stuff. And, and those, those slabs will then, you know, like just. It'll be crazy hot, like high at first and then it will come down. You think Jordan, you think Jordan will get over saturated? You think Kobe will get over saturated? I. I don't know. I don't. I'll tell. I'll take. There's enough people still buying them up. So. Yu-Gi-Oh and it's. It's like the hottest flip out there. And I knew that I did the same thing with, with Jordan, LeBron, Kobe and Otani's and I did that at the national too every time one came to my table. And I, if I could buy it, I would buy it and then just re. Put it back in my case and sell them right off. I mean I bought a ton of. If they had any of those names on them, I Tribute them in that. Sophie Cunningham and Olivia Miles. Right. Those, any of those names. I just. You came to my table and you had that. Yes, I'm buying it. Whatever you're selling it for, I'm buying it. And then I'm dropping it right back in my case because I know it was going to sell right away. Yep. And so Spike goes. He's always been mj, but why price spike now? It's a great question. When there's a, when there's a heat up in the market, people are going to gravitate towards the ghost. I mean that, that happened in the COVID bubble too. Gravitate towards the goats. So like I look at it as you have a whole market that's going up and then the, the people who want to dig deeper or play smarter. And I play that in quotes. They. They look towards the, the, the blue chip assets in cards, which I don't. I think it's objectively Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant, Tom Brady, Tom Brady, Otani, like I. And then like high end vintage. Like, like you know, like everyone knows what it is. So like that's, that's the stuff. So then it's like if, if we talk about the hobbies grown and there's more people in it. So like all you need for a card to go insane on an auction is two people. Well, what if you have 50 people wanting the same card now? Like, like we say mj, but why is there a price spike now? How about Tom Brady? I said this last time. I'll keep saying it. How about Tom Brady's Bowman Chrome? That card is like over 30000 now, which is crazy to me. Spike says Modern Players are not collectible. No, they're definitely collectible. I collect Jason Tatum. But there's going to be way more people, I think, who want to collect and invest at the same time. And when you do that, it. Let's talk about Jordan. It's really easy to like to collect Jordan, enjoy collecting Jordan. And you can also easily, in your mind, justify that as well. This is an investment. Look what it's done over the last five years, Donruss, whatever. Right. If you have like these stock guys or whatever looking at it like a chart like that, it crosses a lot of areas. I don't know what you think, Ken. Am I making sense? Like. No, you're making Absolute sense. And I think there's more people coming into the hobby too. That is buying. That's. That's why I don't buy these cards too. There's more people that I know that have changed up what they're doing and say, oh, I'm just buying 90s inserts now. I'm just. That's all I'm doing. Well, I'm just dealing with now. So. So many people made this big change over the last year that whether they were new to the hobby or they were doing something, one thing. And now they're like just on 90s inserts. Whether it was better reminding them more of their childhood or for whatever reason, I don't know. But here's. Look, I'm point. And I'm one of those guys over the last few months that I was buying up all those cards too. Anytime somebody would come with a Jordan, a Coke. Why? Because it's like liquid gold. Right? I mean, it's just. It's like printing money. Just give it to me, let me buy it and I'm gonna. Whatever I paid for it, I'm gonna add to it. I'm going to drop it in my case and somebody's going to come right along and buy it. Right. So it's. And they'll probably go resell it and, and, and make their own money off of it. Make more money on it. Yu-Gi-Oh So it's. Yu-Gi-Oh it's social media hype. Maybe. I kind of disagree with that. Yu-Gi-Oh No, and I. I'll say this really quick. If it was social media hype, then everyone would have jumped on what Chris Hoage did before he did it. Imagine this. Imagine a market that's so smart and so social media Hyper Yet Chris Hoage went out there and bought up all these Michael Jordan one of ones cheaper than all these 90s inserts. Going crazy. We're talking Jordan one of ones, right? Explain that to me. If there's social media hype, is it just like, how do you miss the most? It's the. I was talking to him about this. It's the most obvious thing. We talk about one of Ones being the, like the, the ultimate of. Of it's the only copy and no one was even like giving it the time of day. How ins. Ken, how is, how insane is that? It's just like such an oversight. Yu-Gi-Oh but people may think too, I just can't afford it. If it's a one of one of Jordan, I probably can't afford it. So I'm, I'm not even going to think about it. It's like me, it's like me saying, oh, I, Yu-Gi-Oh like a Bowman Chrome Tom Brady. But is there a one on one Tom Brady? I'd rather go buy that. Well, of course I'd rather own that, but can I afford it in my mind? No, I can't afford it. I'd have to invest all my hobby money into one card. I'd be sitting here with one card on the wall and then you go see what, what it is compared to the inserts and you're like, oh, but Yu-Gi-Oh no, I, like that's what I'm saying. Like, I don't know, 90s inserts, thousands of people all at the same time. Yep. And that's really what it is. And there's, there's just not. So if you mean social media hype by herd mentality, I can get behind that. But the, the what he did, it's a heist, man. And if, if people and, and I, and like I give him credit for that. It's a freaking heist. You like Cajun cardboard made that great hierarchy of Michael Jordan's and didn't include the one on ones on it. They weren't on there. That's like, and he's so, like, he's so knowledgeable in the Jordans. It's just, it's crazy, man. Just people, people doing the extra research and doing it and it's no shot of him. I love Cajun cardboard's content. It's excellent. It's just like think that's just awesome, man. It's just like that's the sort of thing like I don't have the pockets to obviously do that. But like I keep trying to see inefficiencies in the market where I can make the plays and do that. So. And I've been trying to do that And I think I've been doing okay. All right, kid, we're over an hour. All right. Great episode. I, like I said, I'll be back Sunday with Carmine. We're going to, you know, day four and five at the National. We'll, and we'll, we'll put that, we'll put that to bed as well. And we will be back next week. All right. Brand new episode sounds good. And if, if any listeners are out there and you have an ebay account, go, go watch my Joe Swar Gonzalez 2025 Bowman Chrome Draft Superfractor Achromatic. One of one auto that recently got shilled up to 6200 and then didn't get paid for. So let's all, let's all see what it goes for this time and see if it gets sold. Let's all watch. Let's all watch together. Let's see if someone makes a mega bid or not. We'll see. All right, I want to thank everyone for watching. Thank everyone for listening. Please, like, if you have not already subscribed, please subscribe below. And like I said, we'll be back next week with a brand new episode. Zip. Have a good night. Have a good night.