ESPN has an article about the latest baseball card mix-up. This one involves Royals minor leaguer Alex Gordon, who apparently shouldn't have appeared on a card at all. Topps discovered the error, but a handful of his cards escaped destruction, and they're currently going for $2,500 apiece.
The ESPN story refers to one of the greatest card foul-ups of all time: Billy Ripken's infamous 1989 card. Poor Billy. His brother breaks Lou Gehrig's record and will be a first ballot Hall of Fame inductee, while Billy's career is remembered primarily for this.
Baseball cards are big business, and people really do seek out these mistake cards as investment opportunities. Still, I personally think the best cards aren't the mistakes, it's the ones like this 1975 Oscar Gamble masterpiece that are really worth their weight in gold. So, I have my doubts about how Gordon's card will fare as an investment. My guess is that if you buy one today, you'll find that in six months it's worth about what your beanie baby collection is worth (although it takes up a lot less space).
But what do I know? After all, I paid $10 for a Jared Wright rookie card shortly after the 1997 World Series.
Tuesday, May 02, 2006
Baseball Cards
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1 comment:
Hi! Yes, Ive heard of the Alex Gordon card too. Just a bunch of freak events at the factory and at research, i think, for that card to end up selling that way. Aside from winning cards like the undeniable Gamble, I think you were also referring to the legendary 1952 Topps set.
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