Am I A Chopped Unc? 🫪 | The Crossover 5.22.26

Josh (@cardboard_chronicles) and Chris (@chris_hoj), the founders of Card Ladder, join forces to bring you the most entertaining and educational sports card discussion on the internet every Friday night.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

We're live. Hello everybody. Welcome to the crossover. Today is Friday, May 22nd. And Brohio says, hey, look, it's another business segment of the Collector's Universe making us wait. Because we are starting late tonight, waiting for game three of the Western Conference Finals to finish up.

SPEAKER_02 0:24

Zing. Zing. Except they we make them wait 30 minutes and not a hundred business days.

SPEAKER_01 0:32

Alright. Zing. Let's get the show on the road since we are starting late and quickly rifle through any mail days we may have. Christina, you're up if you have any.

SPEAKER_05 0:44

Got nothing.

SPEAKER_01 0:46

I have so many mail days from this year. I'm just kind of like randomly choosing ones to show. What I'll show today is the 2025 Prison Black Finite Christian McCaffrey, which completes the nine-card base set prison black finite run for McCaffrey. So fun card. We'll get that slabbed up at the national. Then I face the question of so I think I have three that are in BGS holders, and that will make six in PSA. And then it just becomes a question of do I put them all into PSA or BGS. Do I do I need to make them uniform?

SPEAKER_02 1:22

Do you keep the run going with top scrum super fractors?

SPEAKER_01 1:27

I'm initially against it. So we'll see. Probably not. I would I would consider that a separate run, I think, anyway. But uh alright, let's get to a bunch of questions. And we're gonna keep this thing to 60 minutes because we are late. So we're gonna try to expeditiously fly through a bunch of questions. What's up, Rod and Martinez? Alright. Up first from Cajun Cardboard. There were 300 plus basketball cards, basketball cards, not total cards, in the May Fanatics premiere. Is more cards better or is there a risk? Josh, what do you say?

SPEAKER_02 2:10

Risk for what?

SPEAKER_01 2:13

Risk for what?

SPEAKER_02 2:15

Because if the risk is the price going down, I would say that's a positive.

SPEAKER_03 2:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 2:22

Um, it did seem it was a lot, right? How many are normally in a in a premiere? It's much less, right?

SPEAKER_01 2:27

It's been ticking up. So in 2024, there was usually about 100 total cards in the entire premiere in 2025 that started getting up to 200, 300 by the end of the year. And now this year, this most recent one had 600, but we've been pushing up towards 600 consistently.

SPEAKER_02 2:45

There's just like a lot of new cards, like Panini stuff still is selling, the old top stuff is still selling, and now we have all this new top stuff. There's just a lot of cards. And to your point on we were talking about earlier, there's just a lot of new types of cards tops is creating, you know. Top there's super factor autos, there's super factor base, there's variation, there's now the gold shields.

SPEAKER_01 3:08

Totally. Christina, this ties into something I think you, myself, Joel, Kyle, see every night, which is that there's just a lot more sales across the board. Do you agree with that?

SPEAKER_05 3:24

Yeah, definitely.

SPEAKER_01 3:26

Yeah. Yeah, I think we we just see there's there's increased volume in the premiere, there's increased volume at every tier of sports cards right now. There's just more for sale, there's more people buying. And it's, I think to Brian's bigger question, I think uh a wider supply is going to tend to flatten out prices and hopefully smooth out the growth rate a little bit and not make it get too extreme because there's more stuff to choose from, even if there's more people coming in and there's more money to spend.

SPEAKER_05 3:52

Yeah, and it's just it's not just sports cards. You said more sports cards sales coming in every night, but we're seeing it across the board.

SPEAKER_02 4:01

Totally. Absolutely. Do you think there's more basketball last night because people are trying to sell during the playoffs or something? Gotta be.

SPEAKER_01 4:08

Yeah. I mean, there were some big uh Anthony Edwards cards, Luca cards, SGA cards. There's some jokers in there. Uh of some the a huge, you know, million plus LeBron card, million dollar plus LeBron card. So I think uh probably yeah, the playoff momentum was a factor and people decide. And remember, you have to decide, like, unless you have cards in the vault and you can sort like sort of flash them into the premiere, you have to like make that you have to plan for that a few months ahead, don't you?

SPEAKER_02 4:37

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like I would say the if you see like Ant and these types of players selling, they're hoping to sell when those players and teams were peaking and it didn't work out timing-wise. Yeah, okay.

SPEAKER_05 4:49

Or they were like oh, big Wembies too, a bunch of Wembies. Or they were thinking that they'd still be in the playoffs at this point.

SPEAKER_02 4:58

Right, exactly. It's a lot of planning ahead because like end of April, there wasn't much going on and just like early first round stuff.

SPEAKER_04 5:06

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:08

All right, from cards, Chris. Will these 2025 Topps Chrome football superfractor prices hold up or is it just hype? So this is narrowly focusing to the 2025 Tops Chrome Football Superfractor prices. Now, I don't have any specific sales of that in mind or really have a general sense of what that means. Josh, do you?

SPEAKER_02 5:30

Yes, I have bought a few non-rookie Cooper Cup Black Finites, and I think I buy them in like the 1500 to $2,000 range, and I was watching his uh base superfractor sell the other night, and I was in the running for it, and then it sold for like five grand. So it's it's like yeah, it's like two 2.5x like Black Finite stuff, and it's like his Rams stuff is definitely more popular because he's more of like obviously like a Rams guy, so the Seahawks would bring the price down, I would think, but yeah, it sold for a lot.

SPEAKER_01 6:02

Damn. Where did that that was on eBay?

SPEAKER_02 6:05

Oh yeah, I was like in it, and then I just you know did the last minute thing. It might have been it might have been in the 4Ks. Let me look though. I know it was over four grand.

SPEAKER_01 6:16

That is unbelievable. Wow.

SPEAKER_02 6:20

And I was watching that AJ Green too.

SPEAKER_01 6:24

All right, well, there's a good example of a price.

SPEAKER_02 6:27

Um it's just like way, way more expensive than the end of Panini stuff right now, for sure.

SPEAKER_01 6:33

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So okay, well that so so the so there's an there's a good example. And then the question becomes okay, so like here's another example. Uh Patrick Mahomes 2025 Tops Chrome variation, image variation, yeah, sold for 168,000, the Super Fractor uh PSA 9, uh uh with uh Fanatics Premiere. So that's that's a huge price. And I don't know, how do you do you feel like these are these are selling for more than than uh say like a random black finite would for these guys? Yes, yeah. So then isn't that maybe like the the longer term horizon here? Is that that's probably where a little normal where it will end up flattening out to is like black finite 5600, dude. Oh dude, wow man, that's all that is really strong.

SPEAKER_02 7:35

Yeah, that's like really high because Cooper Cup stuff's not that expensive. That's a lot, right? Um, yeah, it's like it's probably just a lot of fanatics getting the license first year hype. And we I mean we usually see a pretty high price when products first come out, like even when Prism came out, the finites and stuff were going expensive. So there's it's just a whirlwind of factors there timing.

SPEAKER_01 8:03

Yeah, yeah. And it's new, like when the net when the Prism Nebula's first came out, those were really like aggressively pursued and were selling really strong. 5600. Yeah, that's unbelievable for old Cooper Cup.

SPEAKER_05 8:18

All right, it's more expensive than my car.

SPEAKER_01 8:22

That's not saying much. Okay. Uh let's there. Oh, there it is, right there. Cooper Cup, number 271, 5600. Amazing. Okay. Uh up next we have from Jam Collectibles. Please discuss the incredible quote unquote sales of fanatics cards.

SPEAKER_02 8:46

This is like it's uh people are laundering money. Is that what this is?

SPEAKER_01 8:50

Yeah, I think this is in specific reaction to the two million dollar sales last night, probably even more specifically the Josh Allen $1.3 million sale for his unredeemed gold NFL Logoman autograph.

SPEAKER_02 9:08

But I think you had the take that if not for those two sales, then it's a pretty standard premiere.

SPEAKER_01 9:13

Right. Yeah, I think I think so. I I think there was still like some upward price movement on things, but uh, you know, if you do if you if you get rid of those, then yeah, you've got a a more or less a standard a premiere with more cards, but but prices that aren't as eye-poppy.

SPEAKER_02 9:28

People are still paying 200 grand for Shea Gilders napkin patches out of 99.

SPEAKER_01 9:33

Yeah, yeah, the NTPSA 10.

SPEAKER_02 9:36

And the Anthony Edwards, same thing. Good grief. Those patches are awful.

SPEAKER_01 9:40

Right, right. Hey, Ryan Donner, 3918, says my Friday night party routine is eating an entire deep dish pizza, 35-minute nap, and then the crossover. Am I chopped?

SPEAKER_05 9:55

No, am I a chopped unk?

SPEAKER_01 9:58

Oh, am I a chopped unk.

SPEAKER_02 10:00

Well, that might be the that might be the best comment I've ever seen on the crossover. Just so good.

SPEAKER_05 10:07

Start also I also took a nap right before the crossover. Because I was not watching that bullshit game.

SPEAKER_01 10:15

Like I'll issue a ruling right now. If you can house an entire deep dish pizza, you ain't you are not chopped. You you you are thriving.

SPEAKER_02 10:23

Dude, I love housing a pizza.

SPEAKER_01 10:24

But a deep dish? That's tough. That's tough, man. Even in your prime of food munching, that's tough.

SPEAKER_05 10:33

Yeah, that's like a wheel of cheese.

SPEAKER_02 10:36

35 minutes is so specific. I love that. Yeah, you cooked.

SPEAKER_01 10:41

All right. Uh from ITL cards, are you three considering looking into collecting any new players? So we didn't get this question for the first two shows. Oh, and by the way, announcement. We are not gonna have shows next week or the week after. This is the only show for the next three weeks, so enjoy. All right, so ITL cards, anyway. Are you three considering new collecting new players? I've been seeing Christina growing and sharing her otter collection.

SPEAKER_05 11:09

I've been so just to touch on this, I've been slightly collecting otter and Dallas Stars cards since we moved to Dallas. I just never really shared them because the people who I knew who collected hockey made fun of me for collecting a goalie because they were like, no one collects a goalie, Christina, stop being weird. And I was just like, I like they all tried to push me to collect other players on the team. So I dabbled in those players, but I never really felt a calling to it. So yeah, that's and then after the West Coast card show in February, where Jeremy Lee like gave me the green light to collect goalie, like to collect my goalie. I've just been like, fuck yeah, like I don't care. Like, here's my goalie PC guys. But yeah, that's kind of how that goes.

SPEAKER_02 12:10

Uh well, given that I'm collecting like any type of football, it's usually new players are coming in and out uh anyways. So yeah, there's not like one specific person I'm targeting, you know.

SPEAKER_01 12:23

Totally. All right. Uh I'm I'm in the same boat too, actually. Like recently I've been more so looking at card types like the last few months, and and then sort of like uh permitting a wider range of players, which is a slightly different approach. I'm still looking at top scrum super factor sales. So Derek Henry's 2025 Top Scrum Super had a best offer accepted a uh two days ago. What do you think that went for?

SPEAKER_02 12:55

Um like 8,000. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 13:00

I was gonna say 77.

SPEAKER_01 13:01

7500.

SPEAKER_02 13:03

Yeah, I'd be pretty good at I'd be pretty good at guessing players like that right now. Yeah, but that's like that's about what his Black Finites do. So I don't know why cops jumped up so much.

SPEAKER_01 13:13

Yeah, that's a good point.

SPEAKER_05 13:15

I would just like to address the chat comment that uh David wrote. Yes, fuck everyone, collect what you like, right? Right, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:24

Okay, I I see Jonathan Taylor's uh Topps Chrome base Super Fractor sold uh on uh on exactly seven days ago, May 15th. What about that one? Uh best uh best offer.

SPEAKER_02 13:39

Um six grand.

SPEAKER_01 13:42

Four, four grand.

SPEAKER_02 13:44

Cooper cups the goat.

SPEAKER_01 13:46

What about 2025 tops chrome Bobby Wagner in uh Washington Commander's uniform? A thousand bucks. That's an auction, three grand.

SPEAKER_02 13:56

Well, okay, yeah. I mean, so it's like any the any player just gets like a bunch of money, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:02

I guess so. And it seems like the auction platform is uh going higher. Okay, so what about this? JJ McCarthy, uh 2025, Top Scrum Super.

SPEAKER_02 14:11

Dude, that card should be like 500 bucks, but I don't know, like six grand thirty four hundred. Sheesh. Yeah, did you see the tetra McMillan? I know it's the variation, but that one it's a rookie, and that went less than the cup. Wow. Oh, here's a fun one.

SPEAKER_01 14:33

Taysom Hill.

SPEAKER_02 14:35

That that card should be like 500 bucks, too. It ain't, it's a best offer. Two grand. I don't know. 2600. People just like want the super fractors, it seems. They uh it might be just like people think this is like the big set to chase right now because it's the first year back. Who knows?

SPEAKER_01 14:52

Yeah, yeah. I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 14:53

I don't I don't find these sales to be super outlandish, like no, the Henry's reason makes sense. Yeah, 22500 for Taysom Hill. Come on.

SPEAKER_01 15:04

Yeah, yeah. Uh that's yeah.

SPEAKER_05 15:08

He's he's also quarterback.

SPEAKER_01 15:12

Right. Indeed. Uh oh, how about Ricky Pearsall? Best offer.

SPEAKER_05 15:21

Don't forget, he got shot in San Francisco.

SPEAKER_02 15:24

I mean, again, this should be like a $500 card.

SPEAKER_01 15:26

He's there's your cultural premium, the the gunshot wound.

SPEAKER_02 15:32

He needs to wear a dress next time.

SPEAKER_01 15:35

Two grand. A thousand. All right, I'll do one more and then I'll stop. Jared Verse of the Rams, Jared Verse. Three grand, 1750. All right, fun game.

SPEAKER_02 15:48

There's a Jefferson insert superfractor, Justin Jefferson UV 13 gold. Oh yeah. 4,500.

SPEAKER_01 16:00

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 16:01

Dude, AJ Green's rookie superfractor. There's only one, there's not a variation sold for 80,000. Which is crazy.

SPEAKER_01 16:10

I don't have that one. Me too. Okay, let's move on here. So up next, we have sports card aesthetic. For NBA superstars, is winning two rings the new one ring? Given how many greats actually have multiple titles? It seems like all-time greatness really starts at two rings. Or is two rings the new three? Meaning the league is so stacked with talent today, and it's difficult to maintain your team that two is actually quite a bit.

SPEAKER_02 16:46

Does anyone have two lately?

SPEAKER_01 16:49

I don't think there's been a repeat winner for a long time.

SPEAKER_02 16:52

It's like basically Duran Curry.

SPEAKER_01 16:55

Yeah, I think that's right.

SPEAKER_05 16:57

Yeah, but let's talk about the asterisk that will be on this current administration who is pushing forth uh agenda of can't look at him versus they get to play football on the court. This is not gonna end well for the NBA. So I I just like I I see this as them trying to be like, oh, you know, Shay's gonna win a second one. It's like, oh fuck yourself. Like, no one likes to watch this. Like, I don't even believe Oklahoma City fans like to watch this. Like, they're just so duded in their loser mentality of losing Westbrook, Durant, and Harden, like at what could have been their peak prime, that they're just like, we deserve this, therefore, like we're gonna turn a blind eye on all this egregious behavior that's happening up and down the court.

SPEAKER_01 18:04

The NBA, more than any league, I think, right now, has continuously has allows the perception to exist that the winning team are the bad guys, and it's been that way in the NBA for a while. And I've you know, this isn't the venue to investigate why that is, but uh it's an interesting problem that the NBA has. And I would say, like to more specifically answer this question, that uh I I think the I think I think any attempt to reduce a player to a team accolade is failed, is a failed mission from the start. So if we're trying to, you know, kind of compare like what does it mean for a superstar in today's era to win a title versus what did it mean for somebody to do it in the 70s, there's so much context that has nothing to do with any individual player that needs to get applied. You need to think about how many other teams were in the league, you need to think about how important was role playing and how important was having a good bench, how much of a role did the coach play. There's so many factors that go into team success that I just kind of, you know, I don't it would be it would be flailing on my behalf to try and like give star players credit for titles when you know there it's it's a team sport, and I would I would adjust the perspective here. If we're trying to evaluate accolades for individual players, I would stick to individual accomplishments, not team accomplishments. That's my take. What do you say, Josh?

SPEAKER_02 19:49

Yeah, I saw this question and I just thought I'd rather count MVPs, just way easier, especially that we don't have any back-to-back champions. Dude, I just went to ESPN.com and on their main site shows like the box score, but the main video and like imagery is about the shoving match in the third quarter. And the entire broadcast tonight was focused on like talking about flailing and flopping and fouls and whether Shea deserves it or not, or why he flops, and it's like even the NBA just even the NBA can't even like skit on the same page. Like, if you if you guys want these guys to win and you're gonna call these fouls, then like you guys should all be on the same page. Instead, they're like pushing it that they're they know it sucks. It's just so weird, dude.

SPEAKER_05 20:35

Last year, Doris Burke in the playoffs, I think it was the finals, I'm not sure though, literally said online they call Shay the foul merchant because she didn't understand that was a bad thing.

SPEAKER_01 20:50

She didn't mean it as a compliment, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 20:52

Yeah, she meant it as he gets to the line. Yeah, like he knows how to get to the line.

SPEAKER_02 20:57

Yeah, Reggie was like, Well, or was it Crawford? He's like, Yeah, Crawford was like, Well, if he's falling over, isn't that an advantage for the other team? That's actually good. He's doing them a favor. It's like, what?

SPEAKER_01 21:09

It's a lot of gymnastics. It's been tough to listen to NBA commentary for a long time. Yeah, and when was the last time that a serious journalist was employed by one of the major media partners to actively cover a game? You know, it's basically a jobs program now for retired players.

SPEAKER_02 21:25

I know you don't watch the halftime show, but I watch it just because of how much I hate it. Carmelo Anthony is the worst commentator I've ever seen. He is he makes Barkley look like a genius. It's so bad.

SPEAKER_01 21:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 21:38

He's just like, you need to do more of ISO. You need to get the ball. It's like, dude, you all you do is ISO, your whole career is a joke. You never even made it to the you made only you never made it to the finals, and you're giving you're giving advice of like how to get to the finals. It's crazy.

SPEAKER_01 21:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 21:54

So I think that the NBA would be a better product. For the audience, if they stopped hiring ex players and WNBA players that don't actually one, watch all the games, like if that's your job, like do your fucking job, like actually watch the games, and then two, they don't know ball. Like, bring on the paper thinking basketball guy, or like someone who's a little bit more cerebral, please.

SPEAKER_01 22:28

Yeah, it's always bothered me when ex-players who made hundreds of millions of dollars uh over the course of their careers now are taking jobs from people who aspire to and are probably much better than them at covering the sport.

SPEAKER_02 22:44

It's true.

SPEAKER_05 22:45

Plus, like never mind.

SPEAKER_02 22:47

It's a different job, it's a different job. It's not playing basketball, it's commentating on basketball, it's a different job. It should be filled by professionals who do that job. It just, you're right, it makes no sense. And especially there's so many videos on X this year of Shaq just like not knowing teams and players, it's just really bad. Like, he doesn't know their records, he doesn't know who's on the teams, he forgets like that they got traded. He doesn't know anything. He doesn't know all he knows is that like big men should dominate.

SPEAKER_05 23:12

Isn't that like also a skit that's been running for like five years on their own show? Is like Shaq, name five people on this team. Like they can't.

SPEAKER_02 23:21

Well, though that was like that was like end of the bench guys. Now it's like they can't name the six men and stuff, it's it's getting worse. Yeah, and they're getting older and stuff, and they just like and they obviously don't like ESPN as much, you know. They so they're just like actively giving up.

SPEAKER_01 23:38

Yeah. Yeah. And uh just to give this question one last like attempt before moving on, if if this question is like framed in a hobby context, like do the current stars need more titles or less? I think it's all about um you know, deep playoff runs, you know, that's when a lot of people first start paying attention during the season. And so like to the extent that that kind of informs popularity and collectibility and so forth, like yeah, like I I I think a championship today is is uh you know worth less than one 10 years ago when there were many more people watching uh the I think I think the ratings were about twice that what what they are what they 10 years ago the ratings in the finals are about twice what they are today. And they are about three times in the 90s ratings are about three times as large as the ratings are today. So I actually think like in order to create cultural memories and create an imprint from from deep playoff runs, I think you you need you would probably need more titles today to equate to what players did 10 years ago, 20 years ago, 30 years ago.

SPEAKER_02 24:48

Just a thought. Do you know why we were 30 minutes late?

SPEAKER_01 24:52

Why?

SPEAKER_02 24:53

There were 66 free throws in this game. The third quarter had like 30 free throws.

SPEAKER_01 24:58

Well, you know what's funny is that some fan bases, when they see Mark Davis, they say, All right, forget it. It's just gonna be a hack fest, no fouls are gonna be called. Mark Davis's crews do not call fouls, and then they probably called the most fouls of any game uh in the playoffs so far this year. I mean 66 free throws. It felt like that the call the whole second half was just a free throw parade.

SPEAKER_05 25:20

I mean, at this point, it should be like just line up the fucking teams on opposite ends of the the court, put a split screen, and let's just see who can make the most free throws in the allotted time of a game. That'd be more entertaining.

SPEAKER_02 25:37

There was like three, I remember three jumpers that Shea took where I was like, come on, seriously, that's a foul. And like the even like Stefan Castle's just like, dude, what are we even are we even playing basketball right now? What is happening? He it's just the players are like actively giving up on their faces. What it's just a joke, and this whole like up fake and then throw your body and like trim the side of them is just total crap. Nobody like just don't call that ever. Nobody wants that to be a foul.

SPEAKER_01 26:04

It's supposed a that's not supposed to be a foul because it's not a natural shooting motion, and then B, flopping is supposed to be a technical.

SPEAKER_02 26:11

Oh, they haven't called that in three years, dude.

SPEAKER_01 26:13

They could have called 30 tonight. So that's the league wants this. That's that's the only conclusion I can call it.

SPEAKER_02 26:20

The problem, though, dude, is that like now everybody has to do it. Right. The league wants it that's what like but so the league is like keep doing this, refs. We want more. It just doesn't make any sense. They could put an end to this in two seconds, just stop calling them.

SPEAKER_01 26:34

Yeah, if you care about your team winning next year, like if you want your team to win next year, then you're hoping that your coaching staff is watching these playoffs, and then your training camp next year, it's gonna be a bunch of two days. In the first half of the day, you're gonna practice your flopping for three hours, and the second half of the day you're gonna practice fouling with while hiding your hands and not getting called.

SPEAKER_02 26:54

Well, when we had to do it, he was like going to the left, and Hartenstein put his hand in and he had to flail to the side and chuck a horrible jumper, and it's a foul. It's like, dude, this is gross.

SPEAKER_01 27:04

Right, right. So, like, if like if you're rooting for a team and you want to see them win, you're hoping that they're paying attention to how the game is being played and officiated because that you need to hack and you need to flop. That's though that is what's being rewarded. You should all right. Uh, up next we have from Drake's PC. When the market is hot, it can be difficult to acquire cards for your collection. What's up, Drake? It's great to have you back, Drake. Uh, in a market like we are in now, how do you decide which rare cards of the player or players you collect you should pay up for now versus waiting? Are there certain characteristics of rare cards that make them more likely to end up with the flippers versus the collectors? So, this is a market timing question for the type of cards that you like. It speaks to your Cooper Cup uh abstention.

SPEAKER_02 28:01

Yeah, but your answer to this question is all of them. He's like, which ones should you buy? And you're just like, every single one. Every time a one-of-one comes up, I'm buying it.

SPEAKER_01 28:12

Yeah, yeah, but it has to, uh, but you know, the point the other point to this is that like the price has to make sense, right? Like, so for example, you know, as I was scrolling through these top scrum superfactor sales, one of the more ridiculous sales that I saw was um, because I you know, I it's I it's all the sports that are showing up. One of the more ridiculous sales I saw was that Jokic's first Top Scrum Superfractor sold for $97,000. That's a card that I love, but I don't like it even at 20% of that price, right? So, you know, I that's a great example of like, but it's it's even more extreme than the than what Drake's asking. That's an example where like I'm not buying it at this price, and I'm probably and I'm probably never buying it.

SPEAKER_02 28:59

Well, the Wemby out of 50 sold for double that, so but it had an autograph. Oh, okay, got it. Um yeah, it's a good point, but like I guess one of the things we do is just like pivot into something that's not as hot or like exactly hasn't ratioed as much with stuff that people are ignoring, uh, and then picking up those types of 101s, but even even some of that is um, you know, jumping up just as much, or people are like, oh, this is going up, so I'm just gonna hold this, you know.

SPEAKER_01 29:33

Yeah, man. I it's like I try to calibrate my expectations properly. I have to operate within my own budget, and then you know, I can assist the process by trying to discover things and research and find things, and that that's actually been quite fruitful in this uh in this heating up market environment that we're in. But um I I just don't know if uh I don't I the timing thing has always struck me as very difficult to figure out. So I think so kind of Josh to your original comment, it's like rather than trying to time it, if I have a lot of conviction around a card, if I really want a card, then when it comes up, that's kind of when I gotta move.

SPEAKER_02 30:16

So yeah, I think I think Drake is saying difficult to acquire, like he's having a hard time getting people to be reasonable with prices because they're seeing all these you know extravagant sales and they want a piece of that.

SPEAKER_01 30:28

Yeah. Yep. I agree. All right. Uh from cards clown, who are the bigger villains? The high-end set collectors who lock away a player collector's holy grail, or the player super collectors who will break up a master set. Have you ever done the latter? Have you broken up rainbows before?

SPEAKER_02 30:49

Oh, of course. Actually, I've been I've had a couple where they make me buy the whole rainbow and I just want the finite. I bought like 50 Todd Gurley cards once, and I just plucked out the finite and I literally like trashed half of them.

SPEAKER_01 31:03

Right. Right.

SPEAKER_02 31:05

Uh, who's the bigger villain? I mean, a map a set master set collector, get out of here. Yeah, I mean we're gonna collect the whole set of every parallel of every play. I mean, you don't get dibs on every single one.

SPEAKER_05 31:19

Yeah, like you want the black one of one or the superfractor of every player from the set, like right, come on.

SPEAKER_01 31:27

Like you're not sure if either of those are villains, by the way. Are we just gonna take that for granted?

SPEAKER_02 31:31

It's not it's relative, it's relative, right?

SPEAKER_01 31:34

Right.

SPEAKER_05 31:35

But like if I'm collecting the maxi kleba, like, right? Like rainbow, and some asshole is like, no, I want I need the black one of one for my master set. It's like, guy, let me own this, like come make me an offer when it's the last card you need for the set. Like, leave me a like, go get LeBron and Luca and Jokic and Wemby and then come at me, but don't like lock up my player because you think that you're somehow going to put together the entire 300 card set in a one of one. Meanwhile, I'm looking for an out of five and can't find it for the last six years. So definitely they're the worst villain. But I'm also biased because I'm not other side of that.

SPEAKER_01 32:25

All right. Yeah, there's not gonna be a ton of sympathy for like master set collectors here among these among the three of us, I don't think.

SPEAKER_04 32:33

No, all right.

SPEAKER_01 32:34

So there's a really interesting comment in the chat that uh foreshadows a question that comes later, but I think like it's a good time to talk about it now. Uh Jeff Wills says Brady non-playing year one of one for 324,000. That was a top scrum superfractor of his autograph with an autograph that was in a bucks uniform, I believe, that uh sold last night. Why a bucks uniform? I don't know. 324,000. They could, and then he he goes, they could do another superfractor for the next 40 years. It is so stupid buying non-playing years. And then that echoes this question here from Rookie Moonshots, which goes into even more depth on the same topic. It's a really interesting topic. Rookie Moonshot says, I'd love to hear you guys talk about non-playing days cards and whether they are a long-term threat to the bull market. I don't see it as an imminent threat, but if the best card of a retired player can be printed today, then it can just as easily be replaced by a new best card tomorrow. At what point does this cut away the incentive to really try and collect the player's best cards? Also, wouldn't this disincentivize investing in cards? Imagine thinking you had a player's best card, only to realize, oh, nope, Topps made five cards better than this this year alone. Also, from a more hobby or collector-centric focus, non-playing days cards, especially for players who had the majority of their career after 1993, which was the beginning of the Refractor era, they seem to just feed the industry side of this. If new best cards come out all the time, the collector is constantly in a rat race that never ends, and this is exactly what the manufacturers want. Preach. Christina, what do you say?

SPEAKER_05 34:23

I mean, yeah, like like Josh said, like you're preaching to the choir here, but also you asked why was it a Bucks uniform? Obviously, so they could release the Patriots one next year for a bigger price pack.

SPEAKER_03 34:37

Right.

SPEAKER_05 34:38

Because if they released the Patriots one first, that one would have gone for whatever, and then the Bucks one would have been a fraction of that. If they do it this way, where they're building up to the better one, ever all the Brady collectors will be like, Well, if the Bucks one is 325 or 324, whatever it was, then the Patriots one should be like at least 7x that or 6x that because that's how many rings you won with them.

SPEAKER_01 35:07

Like, yeah, totally. Okay. Um, I think uh I think there's two different points of view on this, and I want to isolate them. There's one point of view that says, like, this is problematic for the market as a whole, this is going to depress prices. As Rookie Moonshad says, this could be a threat to the bull market. And then there's a different point of view that's sort of that's that doesn't take the point of view of the whole market, but instead just takes the view of the individual collector, and it just sort of says, you know, suppose that you know, many of the cars or all the cards that that you would love even more are not available. So this is the best alternative available. And the fact that there's you know, it's post-plane days and that there could potentially be more of them to come out later, that all these things exist, that that actually maybe makes it a little more affordable for you as a collector. There is this other side of the coin that says, you know, people want to collect stuff and they want to be able to get cards. And and I don't know, 99% of the of the cards that I want at any given time are not available. So if a new card gets added to the mix that is awesome, then that's a shot to get a cool card, where whereas there's not really many opportunities. What do you think about that, Josh?

SPEAKER_02 36:39

It's interesting, you know, like there's just more options. The thing I'm thinking about though is like in a world where we're not printing trillions of dollars every year, which we are, but in the world that we're not, it is like a zero-sum game of like collectors are moving the money amongst each other, and then the the tops would just be like pulling more and more money out. The more of these cards they print, the more hype they put into the boxes and the breaks, and they just like consume more of that money and take it away from collectors. So that's the part that worries me, and that's like kind of what I'm thinking about with his bull comment, uh bull market comment. Like he's worried about just like tops sort of like overdoing it, and they're kind of showing us their cards that they're willing to make. Like that that Brady is called Tops Chrome Legend. So they could just slap the word legend on it, print Brady cards infinite infinitely. He's probably got a non-auto, he's probably got a variation, etc. And to your point, next year there'll be Patriots versions, and we'll just keep doing this forever. I just I'm you know, I'm a little bit worried that like we're just gonna extract more money from collectors this way, and it on the surface they're gonna pitch it as like, hey, this is great, you guys have more options now.

SPEAKER_01 37:49

Totally. Yeah, I agree. I I think it's definitely uh, you know, it's it's it's definitely a device used to sell products, and it's and it's not a tool that they're gonna put back in their toolkit anytime soon, they're gonna continue to use it. Uh and and all and all theoretically, it's it's it's completely sound. And I agree, it's it's just a it's a it's it's nothing more or less than sort of a supply and demand observation that if we continue to add great cards to the sandbox, the sandbox gets larger and it dilutes the offering. And if the offering gets diluted, not only every season, but every product, uh that that that can certainly deflate prices. Um but uh but you know there there are like there are other sides to this, okay? And so here's one of the ones that I always think about. I personally think that Michael Jordan as an as an example of a player who hasn't had an NBA licensed card since 2009-10. So, however, you know, 16, roughly 16 to 17 years. So, in other words, an entire generation of new collectors have watched box breaks, gone to the local hobby shop, picked up NBA products, and have never seen one of his cards come out of a pack. They've never held one in their hand, they have no experience with it. I think that's actually there's a real chance that that hurts his market because he is now irrelevant to an entire generation of collectors, and he probably will be can it you know that will only compound as things go forward. And the alternative would be okay, what if he was in all these products and he did get a flood of cards and he continued to you know have more and more cards come out from this era, the trade-off would be, but he would still be highly visible, and there would still be uh he would see he would be kept front and center in the mind of the collector today. So I think like if you put if you were to pull Tom Brady out of all products going forward, I think I think there there was a there's a penalty that the market pays for that too, because you pull the player out of the collecting zeitgeist. Christina, what do you think about that idea?

SPEAKER_05 40:11

I I just want to preface it with what you're talking about are collectors opening new releases because there's still wax from Jordan's playing years where they could pull like his card or win it in a break. Like there's definitely like he's still relevant if you're opening like I I guess it's vintage now product. Um I think that you're you're definitely onto something and it's a tight rope that has to be walked by manufacturers and collectors. One thing you have to think about as a collector is setting parameters on what you collect. Like that we do this for Jordan, we only collect playing days cards as a as the like main of our PC. Like sometimes we'll dabble if like you know, if if there's something really cool that comes out or like uh has been released after playing years, but um, but yeah, I I just I think it the manufacturer's job is to make money, okay, guys? Like like they're gonna do whatever they can for the best interest of themselves, they're not thinking like is this sustainable for the market as a whole? We saw in the 80s how that played out with Ken Griffey Jr. cards, like they're not they it's not their responsibility, like should it be? Probably, but they don't care. We live in a capitalistic society, so you're the one who has to take the responsibility of uh am I gonna bid on a non-playing year's card? Am I going to buy this product where like this is the chase? Like, or do I let my dollars speak for themselves and don't participate in this product because I'm not a fan of what they're doing?

SPEAKER_01 42:01

Yeah. So to that point, uh, and this is the point I think Rookie Moonshots was making, and I think this is the point that Jeff was making. It's incumbent upon the collector to build a sandbox that makes sense for themselves and to uh put the uh put the boundaries around what their collecting interests are that sort of have been thought through theoretically. And if enough collectors sort of apply that strategic line of thought, there's probably, you know, like plain days is a is a fine boundary and probably you know it's a good starting place, it's it's one that can work, but there's also people who only look at rookie cards, and it's the same theory, it's just shrinking the sandbox to be something even smaller. Or somebody could say, I'll do, you know, uh of uh X amount of post-career releases, and then I'll stop. You know, it's it it's it's it's incumbent upon each collector to build their sandbox as they see fit. Josh, do you have a final thought on this topic? It's a great topic.

SPEAKER_02 43:09

I'm looking at the top's Chrome basketball product breakdown, and Cooper Flag has 25 superfractors. There's like 10 inserts, there's the base set, there's the autograph ones, the rookie ones. 25. I'm just counting them. There's like foil fractor superfractors, there's like a bunch of one-on-ones.

SPEAKER_01 43:37

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 43:38

Um, and then the boxes are twelve hundred dollars a piece, and if you pull a Victor Wemanyama out of 50, you get $200,000 potentially if you get a PSA 10. So there's like it's just a frenzy of of math going on of like me trying to pull this card and doing the break math, breaker math, and then it's just like I'm not seeing a lot. Lot of incentives for long-term collecting with these number breakdowns. That's it's just sort of the reality of it. Frozen fractors. I forgot that one's a 26.

SPEAKER_01 44:13

All right. Uh let's go on to the next question here from Neil's Sportscards, who says, I have heard a lot of talk about Otani being the best and the safest player to collect long term.

SPEAKER_02 44:26

Not from the show.

SPEAKER_01 44:27

No, his market is up 506% in the last two years on Card Ladder's player index. 506%. Or a 6x. Also, Wemby is the now is now getting a lot of hype, and there is talk about his all-time greatness potential. Two questions. One, how should collectors who do not collect these players feel when they see so much of the hobby energy and resources moving towards these players that they do not collect? Two, is this an overall positive or a negative for a collector who does not collect these players? Should we all rejoice that generational that generational athletes and talk of all-time greatness brings more interest and collectors into our space?

SPEAKER_05 45:16

Okay. Should you rejoice? Like, okay, first question How should you feel? You should feel blessed, like that you're not in this rat race that other people are jumping into because they think that or someone told them that this is a safe, amazing player to collect. Like you had an original thought. Congratulations. You should be proud of yourself. Uh, you didn't just go with the crowd. And then, two, is this overall positive? Yeah, because you don't collect him. So who cares what other people are spending their money on? Let them go spend money on a like, let them go fight over a player you don't collect, and you just go pick up the cards that you want. Like, I I just I don't see it. What what's the other question? The other side here.

SPEAKER_01 46:08

Well, the other side, I think, is like, oh man, like I was there was so much hobby momentum for this other guy. I bought a bunch of his cards, I was very bullish on it, and now all of a sudden the energy is somewhere else. And I feel like, you know, there's uh there's there all the excitement that I sort of got from being a part of of something that had that felt like it had real momentum is now gone. It's it's left this area and it's gone over to this other one, and I kind of feel like I'm stuck over here on an island all of a sudden.

SPEAKER_02 46:35

Yeah. This feels more of like a psychology question, you know, like you should be my I guess I don't know if this is advice or whatever, but this is how I treat it. The more someone gets excited about something, the more I want to do the opposite of that thing. So it's almost like I know that probably the three of us would agree, like we get more enjoyment out of doing the opposite of whatever this stuff is. The more Otani, the more Pokemon, the more we just love going and finding a completely different lane and just enjoying that. It's it's just like uh finding your own like individual space instead of just following the crowd. I mean, following the crowd is is boring. The second one is this an overall positive or negative positive or a negative for someone who does not collect these. Should we rejoice that they're bringing in? I just I've been convinced that the more people come in does not necessarily mean it's better. And in the case right now, I feel like it's just way too much. Like I would much prefer a down market right now. We it's been a really long bull run. I'd love to see some prices take huge hits. I could buy some more cards, I'd have more fun. People leaving saying the space is overrated. I'd go back to that, please. Treat us like NFTs at this rate.

SPEAKER_01 47:47

Yeah, totally, totally great perspectives there. I'm I want to nitpick one little tiny like non non like core part of this comment, which is I I I see a lot of collapsing discussions about Wemby and Otani as if it's the same discussion. And it is it is not. It is and I'm rooting for Wemby right now, and I like Wemby, and I think he is a spectacle to watch. I think he's a special player, and I think he's got a real chance to be something incredibly special. Something, something historic, something all time. I think that he has a real potential to do that. Otani already is that. Otani is already four MVPs deep. Do you know how many players in MLB history have four or more regular season MVPs? Yeah, it's just two. It's Otani and it's Barry Bonds. And I don't know anything about baseball, and I know that. And there was a big cluster of three, right? Like Otani was in that group uh last year. Judge jumped up and joined that group after last year. Three has a lot of great players. Albert Puholz, Mike Trout, um Aaron Judge is in that group, but you can go back. There's lots of that's like there's lots of all-time great players in that group of three. Otani leapt up to four, and he is a huge favorite to get five, and he is leading the MLB in war at this time. So Otani is like staring down a real shot at getting five MVPs. What odds would I need to give you to bet in the affirmative that Victor Wembanyama would get five MVPs? Now, granted, it's different in baseball. Baseball gives out two MVPs every year. It's a watered down that award is worth half of what it's worth in the other sports.

SPEAKER_05 49:49

But what I would say five.

SPEAKER_01 49:52

What odds would I need to give you to bet in the affirmative that Wembenyama would get three? Which is like I say three in the NFL is probably the equivalent of five in baseball, given that they give out twice as many in baseball. How well like if if I would you take that bet if I gave you even money? So you would put a thousand dollars, and then if Wem No.

SPEAKER_02 50:12

No, so I would Curry doesn't have three MVPs.

SPEAKER_01 50:16

So what if I gave you plus two fifty? So no fifty, plus five hundred.

SPEAKER_02 50:26

No, I think the over-under is like one point eight. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 50:30

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 50:32

Go ahead. Did you did you want to?

SPEAKER_05 50:33

Well, I was just gonna say, like, the NBA MVP award is has been bullshit for three of the last like six years. So like it it there was a pity award and then two flopping awards that like if you look at the stats, just don't make sense, all three of those. So I would just like to point out that like getting it in the NBA means that you're probably getting it from the NBA.

SPEAKER_01 51:05

Right, fair. Definitely some issues with NBA awards voting, which they seem to come around every generation. There's always a blip. Uh, and I think we're in that moment right now. But notwithstanding that, the point isn't the MVP as a specific. The point is the MVP is being used as a proxy for the idea that somebody is if somebody defines stands out and defines himself as the best player for an ex for a season, and then really for an extended season. And so look, I it's a tight rope to walk because I'm very excited about Wembanyama, and I see the potential that other people see, and it's just such a fun spectacle to watch. It's quite unlike anything I've seen before. It's really fun, and I hope it goes on for a long time and is very successful. But to you know, think that uh Wembanyama is ready to hitch a ride on the Otani rocket ship, that Otani rocket ship is already soaring past Pluto. That thing left orbit a long time ago. Wemby is still in our atmosphere. He left Earth, but he's still in our atmosphere. So big, big difference between those two. And I know like Neil, I'm sorry, I know you didn't like, you're just like observing, you're not making that comment, but I I used your question as a as a vehicle to get off my take, and I hope you don't mind that I did that. So great question, Neil. I think this is something that a lot of people are struggling with, this sort of idea that, like, man, all the energy is somewhere else all of a sudden. And do you do you really want to keep chasing the action? Like Josh, that's where I go. It's like, do you want to just chase the next trend or do you want to stay in your lane and wait for things to come back around? Boom-erang.

SPEAKER_02 52:46

The crazy thing about the Wemmy, and I I uh can empathize now with MJ people, where it's like, you know, a couple good games from LeBron earlier in his career, Kobe, and it's like, dude, it's been two games. I've been watching MJ for 15 years do this to everybody, every year, non-stop. And now you guys do it twice, and all of a sudden he's the next GOAT. It's similar now where it's like, dude, I've watched LeBron play like hundreds of playoff games, dozens where he's like having these insane games, the Pistons game, like all these games, and then this guy has one good playoff game, and now all of a sudden he's the next whatever Duncan, and he's the next Hakeem. It's like, dude, chill.

SPEAKER_01 53:24

Right. Right. Yeah, and then like the one of the like the interesting residuals of that is all of a sudden people are talking about Hakeem. All of a sudden, like people are like, Oh wait, yeah, like we're so impressed. Like, dude, how many career blocks does Hakeem have? How many championships did he win? Yeah, what did what did he oh he played like this too? Like he he was like really agile at the position and taking people off the dribble at over seven feet tall. Yeah, and and people are talking about Kareem. Like Kareem is suddenly being discussed again for the first time in a long time. Yeah, that's one of the fun parts of that. That that's like a second order effect of the of interest concentrating on a guy like Otani is that all of a sudden people are talking about Babe Ruth all the time, or uh interest concentrating on Wemby, and all of a sudden people are talking about Hakeem and Kareem.

SPEAKER_02 54:15

So and people are like already, you know, a lot of people are worried about Wemby's health and like because of his size, but Kareem was a similar build, very tall. He played 20 years. So, like, let's see what happens in 10 years. Wemby, can you keep this up? You know, because there's guys that have already done it.

SPEAKER_01 54:33

Definitely. All right. Uh, from the Razor Hater, this is a hypothetical, totally shifting gears here. The national, so suppose that this happened. The National Trading Card Museum project gets green lit. The founders are sensible, professional, and funded. If you were offered a paid position on a board that will curate cards, write museum plaques, and create exhibition themes, would you take that job? One of the trade-offs would be sacrificing a large chunk of your personal card collecting and research time in favor of learning and studying other types of cards, including sport and non-sport, that are or might be important to the overall history of cards and to the museum itself. And bonus points, what city should this museum be built in? Christina. Would you do this?

SPEAKER_05 55:24

I would.

SPEAKER_01 55:25

Yeah, you would. I knew you would. What city should this be in, by the way?

SPEAKER_05 55:28

I studied anthropology and like I worked in a museum that identifying uh uh like a collection. So uh like in undergrad. So this this like sounds like a dream. Like I would be able to like help start and kick off the museum and curate it. Like, yes, sign me up 100%. Um, what city this is interesting because I I think that it's so like usually like the cities that these places are chosen to go into have some kind of relevance to the industry, like the NBA Hall of Fame, like um etc. I would probably say that it should be on the national mall, though. I think maybe in DC. I would hate to live in DC though.

SPEAKER_01 56:30

DC, interesting choice. All right. Josh, would you take this job?

SPEAKER_02 56:35

No, this is a Christina job. I I want to zag on this so hard, but it does sound pretty cool.

SPEAKER_01 56:41

Zag, what would be the zag if you were to the zag?

SPEAKER_02 56:44

The zag is that like we're not art and we don't want museums. We want to keep our cards and stuffy boxes in our houses, and we don't want to we don't want to like donate cards to some museum. You know, remember like the the take of like, I want people to come over and like have all my cards on a wall and stuff. This is like the zag against that.

SPEAKER_01 57:01

I love that zag.

SPEAKER_05 57:03

The thing about that though is if it's actually done right and it sounds like this hypothetical racer hater is creating it right, right? You wouldn't be donating your cards, you would more like put them on lend probably for showcases or for certain like timed exhibits.

SPEAKER_01 57:23

Well, the point here is that like you can't you don't have the time anymore.

SPEAKER_05 57:26

Yeah, yeah. Personally, I understand that, but I meant like Josh was like, Oh, who's gonna donate their cards to go into the trading card museum? I would then put it like back to him and be like, you would probably just do timed exhibits where you curate the 1890 like tobacco cards at exhibit, and then like you go to them and you say, Okay, this is going to be an exhibit that's going to run for two years. Like, here's the insurance policy, like your cards will be here, like, etc.

SPEAKER_01 58:01

Yeah. Uh there's there's like a fund topic here too, which is like, yeah, this is kind of the fund problem where it's like, yeah, it'd be cool to have a bunch of money and buy a bunch of cool cards, and then what happens, you know, or like it'd be cool to curate an awesome museum and like identify historically important cards, but then you're done, and like you just kind of helped this entity build a sweet collection, and it's like, no, I would rather deploy my time and effort to build my own museum. Why can't I build a museum? Why can't I have my cake and eat it too here?

SPEAKER_05 58:39

Again, if you guys are looking at it the wrong way, like you're thinking about it like an art museum like the Louvre. Like, there's no new art museum that's happening today because all of the good art has already been purchased privately or is owned publicly through a museum like entity, like France owns the Mona Lisa kind of a thing. The way that this would have to be set up would be as exhibits that you're showcasing, so like they have to be timed and then collector-owned pieces. Like to to go ahead and purchase that, like you're no, there's no way, even if it's funded, like it's not possible.

SPEAKER_02 59:22

What if this museum was like done the wrong way and someone had like a bunch of Paul George green mosaic cards at the entrance, and you're just like, what the heck is this?

SPEAKER_05 59:32

This is just like a bunch of random cards, and that's why I would risk and that's why I would take the job because I'd be like, they're gonna fuck it up. Like, I've seen the people that some people in this industry trust to do stuff and they think no things, I'd be like, no, give me the job.

SPEAKER_02 59:50

Because you know how like some people that get all sentimental with like, oh, when I was a kid, I always wanted the 84, you know, Nolan Ryan base card. And it's like, that's gonna be this museum, it's just a bunch of sentimental stuff that whoever put it together decided was going here.

SPEAKER_05 1:00:04

Yeah, again, which is why I would take the job because I'd be like, that's not going in there.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:11

This question is isolating some specific things, it's kind of asking, do you care more about just sort of the process of finding out things and researching things and calling them forth? Or how or you know, how big or other, in other words, how big of a role does ownership play? Like, how important is actually owning the cards? How important is actually having ownership rights to that thing, to its market upside potential, to the flex rights that come with it, etc. That's kind of what I think this question is is zooming in on. And it's making me realize that I I really care about the ownership aspect quite a bit.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:56

Yeah. And you almost said deploy capital. You were like this close to saying it. I definitely said deploy. You said deploy, and then you were like, I can't say capital because he's gonna you're gonna make fun of me, so I can't say that one.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:09

Oh okay, very good. All right. Uh Krammon, one or two more here. 90s b-ball card says Beckett and PSA have made noteworthy announcements last week. In prior years, we may see these types of updates announced at or just prior to the national, especially, for example, Beckett. Do you think there will be more news to come as we get closer to the national, to the hobby Super Bowl? What's left to announce? What's left to do?

SPEAKER_05 1:01:42

What's left to announce? I don't know what's left to announce, but I don't think I think in prior years, and like this may sound silly because we've had it for a while now. In prior years, you needed somewhere where everyone's attention was focused on the hobby in order to make an impact and get people to hear about your announcement. Now with social media, and like everything, like we don't need that, like it doesn't have to be around the time where everyone's thinking sports cards or everyone's thinking cards, it could just be a Tuesday.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:20

Great point. And then there's actually a lot of risk built in, which I think Jake was kind of getting at with this question. There's risk built into like dropping a big announcement at the national, which is that if it goes poorly or it isn't properly conveyed, it can virally spread on the show floor very quickly.

SPEAKER_05 1:02:41

We saw that at Mint.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:43

Yes, yes, the 9-5 debacle.

SPEAKER_05 1:02:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:47

And I have like a little bit of uh business advice for all you companies looking to drop your big news at the national. I think that's a an easy way to get to get like a cringe-worthy moment of like you're trying to take the spotlight away from what the national is, which is like all of us getting together, buying cards, trading cards, selling cards, having fun, and then you're trying to make it about some new vault or something. I just that's like a little tidbit of advice. Just take a backseat to the hobby for a week, just let it happen. Because we're all here in person, we don't need your like articles that come out on Instagram.

SPEAKER_05 1:03:26

Read the room. That's what I would say.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:29

Like it's you just cook, yeah. Dude, uh, we are literally like here, we're gonna help you charge your phones, you come take a break, do your thing. We're not gonna announce anything, get in your way. We're gonna optimize the app so that it works well for you, and it's let's just get out of your way. That's uh that's my mindset. Yeah, you should not know we exist, you should just use the app.

SPEAKER_05 1:03:52

Seriously, that's why we are charging station candy dispensary and swag giveaway location. Like, because why do you need to come see us? There are really fucking cool cars on this floor. Go look at cards, that's why we're all here. That's what we want to do, dude. I'm trying to staff the booth so the three of us can go look at cards like the entire show.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:17

Like, shout out to Mo in the chat, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 1:04:21

And Ruben.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:23

Shout out Ruben. All right, uh, let's just do we have time to do if to squeeze a few more in here?

SPEAKER_05 1:04:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:32

Or should we call a quiz? Josh? I think that few more. Okay, all right.

SPEAKER_05 1:04:37

I think the one that's addressed to you should be.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:41

Well, this is from the great David Spinrad, also known as Rated Rabbi, who's been putting out some excellent YouTube content lately. He says, Hi, Chris, I have a collector question. I've been collecting 2020 Obsidian football supernovas in one of ones or out of fives since May 2021. After five years of building this 20-card insert set, I've got 11 one-of-ones and seven out of fives. So he's over halfway to the one-of-one set. I still need Brady and Herbert. I sense I've hit a wall in my chase, and I'm in search of more atypical ways to pursue these cards, and I'm hoping for your insight and expertise, as well as that of Josh, Christina, and the audience regarding how to creatively unearth low pop, low demand, relatively obscure cards. Anybody have any advice for the rated rabbi?

SPEAKER_02 1:05:37

Well, five years, 11 101s. This guy is is the question earlier where he's buying the whole he's locking up a set. He's been all that.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:53

I don't know if Christina should give advice on this. She's been trying to get a card for almost f six years now to with no success. Maybe you tell what you would do and then just do the opposite and maybe that'll get them close.

SPEAKER_05 1:06:06

I've made a nuisance of myself to manufacturers, auction houses, marketplaces, and collectors to the point where everyone tells me that yes, the card was made, yes, it made it into packs, and no, they do not have it. Um, or they like mock me about it when I'm look like mention any other card I'm looking for. They're like, don't forget the neon green. So I I mean, make a nuisance of yourself.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:38

Good. Okay. So certainly can't hurt to put it put it out there. Josh, five years. Five years, man. Like I was thinking the other day about like how long it took me to get some key cards that I had been looking for, and like it can't it max outed around like one to two years. I think if you get to like five years, like you're pushing the the limit of when when you should maybe adjust expectations.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:05

Well, given that the two players that he mentioned were Brady and Herbert, is this a financial limit or a finding of the card limit? Because Brady is gonna be expensive. But I don't know this, yeah, I don't know this guy's situation, so I'm assuming he's not able to find these is the biggest problem. But the fact that he has 11 101s and only seven of the out of fives, I take this as a W. This guy's finding the harder, he's finding the more rare ones. He's got 11. Take the W.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:33

Yeah, 11 out of 20. Uh that ain't bad.

SPEAKER_05 1:07:36

For one of one sets, that's plus so like he says he has 11 101s and seven fives. So like he's looking for one of ones or fives. So he has you know what?

SPEAKER_01 1:07:49

I finally figured out this question. What he's saying is he has 18 of the 20. He just needs Brady or Herbert.

SPEAKER_05 1:07:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:56

And Herbert. Those are just those are actually the last two. And he would have to be.

SPEAKER_05 1:07:59

Is my microphone on? Can you hear me right now?

SPEAKER_01 1:08:02

Like, I just'm so glad I figured that out.

unknown 1:08:06

Smart.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:08

There he is. He says, can't find them. Still trying to turn those out of fives into one of ones. Okay, so the out of five is the placeholder for the one of one.

SPEAKER_05 1:08:15

Yeah, it might be bounty time.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:17

Bounty time, or you know, it's tough, man. It's tough, especially like 2020 is an interesting era of cards because there are definitely people who came in who were collecting stuff for 2020, 2019, 2021, and then they might have left the hobby. They might be sitting in somebody's shoebox who like is on a pause from collecting. It's a it's a weird era, it's a very, very strange era.

SPEAKER_05 1:08:44

Yeah, because May 2021, like the world was still closed down, like it was just starting to open at that point.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:50

These are cool looking cards, by the way.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:52

Yeah, yeah. I've seen a few posts he's made over the years with them, and I always liked them.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:57

The one-on-one is the electric etch finite. Yeah, yeah, they're cool. There's die cuts too.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:03

Yeah, it's a it's a great looking set. So I don't know, man. Like uh there's no reason not to stay the course because what's the worst that happens? You find them eventually.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:15

Just keep those searches up, you know. Don't just yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:18

Yep, keep the searches coming. And uh, you know, the other thing too is like and this will always haunt you. Are they still in boxes? Maybe, maybe here's here's another question. Like, just sort of related to like, are they still in boxes? Have you do you have any historical record of any of the nine one of ones that you haven't found yet? Do you have any historical record of them ever servicing? Not necessarily that you know where they are now, not necessarily that you've seen them on an Instagram page, but like is there even a sales history of it, or is it in any of the population reports? Right.

SPEAKER_05 1:09:51

Also, I would suggest it's gonna sound weird, a Bing search, image search. Because like Bing, I don't know what is like how they saved and classified their images, but like I found when doing card research that the Bing search engine has really good images from like random places of cards that I can't find pictures of on Google or whatever search engine. So um I would look there because someone might have posted it on Instagram and tagged it correctly, and Fing classified that so you could find it.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:29

Great pro tip there for the late listeners. Yeah. Uh you uh hit up that new profiles feature on card ladder, it's a new tab on the left, and that's a great tool for you to start finding whether or not stuff is in pop reports. Do you agree with that, Josh?

SPEAKER_02 1:10:46

I was just about to do that. 2020 Obsidian. I've been using this a lot lately. Supernova. How do I do this? Uh electric etch black.

SPEAKER_05 1:11:02

So he says that the bra a bunch of the one-on-one's have sold, including the Brady.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:07

Well, then you know they're out there. That's a yeah, that's a glimmer of hope. So Brady's been graded.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:13

It's with PSA.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:14

Okay.

unknown 1:11:15

Nice.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:16

McCaffrey's been graded, Burrow, C D Lamb, Judy.

SPEAKER_05 1:11:20

Uh, there's he's saying yeah, Burrow, Tua, Brady, and Rogers, he knows have sold.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:28

18 have been graded. Well, Burrow's in here twice, Brady's in here okay twice.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:34

Crossovers or whatever, probably.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:36

Well, I can see the Brady in a BGS85. Like, that's the other thing. When you click on those profiles on that new tab, a bunch of them will like have images pull up from sales. Like, it connects the sales, so you can actually see them. And the I have a picture of the Burrow in a BGS slab. So it's possible that PSA just like logged them and they don't have sales of them. And because I'm finding a bunch of sales of these in BGS.

SPEAKER_05 1:12:01

I would also uh recommend that you get the photo from us and then go do a reverse Google image or uh Bing image search because again, like from the image, they might pop up like on Instagram or like that someone posted in 2022 or something.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:25

Brendan Ryan says, or it could be in a storage locker that was paid in full for 20 years in advance.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:32

Dude, that's the thing about 101s, dude. It could be anywhere.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:37

Yeah, but but this is great, this is a breakthrough, I think, to know that uh so David knows that the the Rogers Brady 2 and Burrow are out there somewhere. And stay the course. That's such a that's so that's so that's so much better than like not knowing if they've ever even surfaced. I think that's such an improvement.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:58

Brady to a burrow, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:01

And just like you know, it's a it's a trying to find a needle in a haystack, but uh just ask everybody, you know.

SPEAKER_05 1:13:09

Like in a collector account like Vault, I guess.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:12

Maybe check. I'll check right freaking now.

SPEAKER_05 1:13:18

See, this is why you gotta you gotta make a nuisance of yourself about it because sometimes people are like, Oh, I've seen that card.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:24

That's what he did, and he's he's he's made it a topic here that thousands of people will hear.

SPEAKER_05 1:13:29

So you're welcome.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:33

That's cool, yeah. You know, for for many of us, I think, in the hobby, especially with those of us who are a little more introverted or you know, just kind of have a lone wolf tendency. Like we don't always love to ask, you know, we want to just put our heads down and figure it out for ourselves, but sometimes asking is just it's so much more efficient, just put it out there.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:56

So all right, that's the most I've ever looked at that set.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:00

Nice. All right, great question to end on. There's a lot of good questions left that we didn't get to. We'll do it next week. Don't hold your breath for that. Um but uh yes, all right, so time for us to pick a title. Okay, Christina, you are up.

SPEAKER_05 1:14:23

I am ready. First year hype. More expensive than my car. Am I a chopped unk? Practice your flopping for three hours. A frenzy of math. Following the crowd is boring. When Binyama is ready to hitch a ride on the Otani rocket ship, are they still in boxes?

SPEAKER_04 1:14:58

Mmm.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:00

Unk, right? Yeah, I just love the A. It's just so good. And Christina had to jump in and be like, it says a chopped. It's just so good.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:09

It really does, yeah. It it indeed.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:11

The A makes it a different sentence.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:14

It's like, I'm not the unk. He's not asking me the unk. He's saying, Am I the chopped unk?

SPEAKER_05 1:15:20

Yeah, am I a chopped unk? Not like my chopped, comma unk.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:25

Like fair. Yeah. That's it. Am I a chopped unk? I can't wait to see what the thumbnail for that is.

SPEAKER_05 1:15:32

We spent fish pizza and a nap somehow.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:36

Dude, we spent like hours going over the term chopped at that Ontario show. We know way too much about that term. Yes, we do.

SPEAKER_05 1:15:44

It could be like good and bad, though, can't it?

SPEAKER_02 1:15:48

It's just bad.

SPEAKER_05 1:15:49

Oh, oh, this was when you were talking with what's his face. I was not privy to these conversations.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:55

Told me so much about the term chopped and all these other phrases. And I was like, Am I unk? And then he was like, You're kind of unk. It's like, geez.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:03

Dude, they they're in the NBA, like, if you're like not a rookie, you're unk, I think. So it's like 23. Yeah, Wemby's unknown is first. Wemby's like virgin on Unk for sure.

SPEAKER_05 1:16:16

But like Unk also can uh maybe that's what I mean. Like Unk can be like like a a position of like authority. Like you did it, Unk. Like you're like, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:32

Chopped can only be bad.

SPEAKER_05 1:16:33

Okay. It's okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:36

Unk is unk can almost be a term of respect if it's used.

SPEAKER_05 1:16:40

Yeah, yeah, that's what I mean. Respect, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:16:42

The chopped, there's no saving that.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:45

No, you're just chopped. And I I don't even think it's like just your looks. I think it's like you can use chop for many things.

SPEAKER_05 1:16:53

Well, I think that's what he was saying, right? Like, I ate a deep dish pizza, took a 35-minute nap, then opened up card la uh opened up crossover. Like, am I chopped unk?

SPEAKER_01 1:17:02

Well, the funny thing about that is like you're a chopped unk when you can no longer do that.

SPEAKER_05 1:17:08

There you go.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:10

Dude, all right. Houston a pizza and then watching the crossover is that's elite status.

SPEAKER_05 1:17:15

Don't forget the nap in between. Like, I also, like I said, took a nap instead of watching the game, and it was glorious.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:22

Dude, he should have taken a nap while watching this show. That's easier.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:26

He's probably sleeping right now. He hasn't said anything since he said that.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:29

He played food coma. Dude, he ate a wheel of cheese. This dude is sleeping.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:33

Seriously.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:35

And if he's calling himself Ug, he's probably like, you know, not super young. He's not staying up late. Right.

SPEAKER_01 1:17:42

Well, see you in three weeks, Ug.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:45

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