The Future of the Hobby

[soxfanray]

Not just putting this name out there cause I'm a Bear fan lol but I think Urlacher will sustain good value. He also has the advantage of not having as many autos since it was still somewhat fresh in 2000.

[pwaldo]

Well current card values i think everyones covered. My worry for the future of the hobby is whether or not there will be one in 20+ years.

People have been saying the hobby is going to die since after 1991. As long as sports remain popular than sports cards and sports autographs should remain popular as well.

[meandsharon11]

I think the hobby has already answered most of the op questions. Majority of cards hold little value except rookies and high end elite stars. Its already there. The hobby has already started to regress yet topps and panini keep flooding the market devaluing everything more and more. The future of the hobby is happening now. There are no new gimmicks to use. In 5 years cards will go back into bycicle spokes like they use to. Exceot now it will be shiny refractors. Jersey cards will be pulled apart to make an nfl jersey quilt. Some may laugh but I have seen this. The hobby will regress more and more. The companies will finally start cutting product lines. The product that is left will be half what it is now and twice as expensive. This needs to happen. Once it gets to this point prints will be worth more per print like they were in the late 90s to mid 2000s. This will slowly bring people back into the hobby and the cycle will start again.

[RG3NFL]

I think the hobby has already answered most of the op questions. Majority of cards hold little value except rookies and high end elite stars. Its already there. The hobby has already started to regress yet topps and panini keep flooding the market devaluing everything more and more. The future of the hobby is happening now. There are no new gimmicks to use. In 5 years cards will go back into bycicle spokes like they use to. Exceot now it will be shiny refractors. Jersey cards will be pulled apart to make an nfl jersey quilt. Some may laugh but I have seen this. The hobby will regress more and more. The companies will finally start cutting product lines. The product that is left will be half what it is now and twice as expensive. This needs to happen. Once it gets to this point prints will be worth more per print like they were in the late 90s to mid 2000s. This will slowly bring people back into the hobby and the cycle will start again.

scary thought..

[meandsharon11]

not scary if you consider the alternative. the hobby keeps going the way it has been and it colapses under its own weight and they shut down. that would REALLY make cards worth something lol. somewhere somehow the world gets better from chaos

[xpucksx]

Well current card values i think everyones covered. My worry for the future of the hobby is whether or not there will be one in 20+ years. Right now most collectors started collecting when we were kids and we could walk into a store and buy packs of cards that held the possibility for pulling the best, hottest cards of the year. Now kids can't do that. the most sought after, valuable cards come from packs that cost $300+ and that is causing ALOT of kids to not care about cards. Then you add in computers, video games and other hobbies and there may not be much of a market for cards once the kids born before 2005 ( or whenever the first "high-end" sets were released) start getting old and dying off.
Greed turn cards from a mostly kids only hobby to a more adult hobby and then that greed brought us these "high-end" sets and that has removed almost all chance for kids to have a chance at pulling anything but what most would consider crap or second tier cards. I know when I first started collecting part of the thrill besides pulling my favorite players was also the chance to pull the most sought after and valuable card/s of the year. When I bought a pack I had just as much of a chance at pulling the top rookies best card as the 40 year old guy next to me at the store. I had the same chance of pulling the most desired inserts and hitting the 1 in 1000 pack auto as the adults.
Now kids can buy packs and even boxes but when they can only afford stuff like Score and Topps and at best Chrome and Contenders, while the most sought after cards are in NT and 5-Star it completely takes alot of the thrill out of it for kids. Even the base cards in the high-end sets are alot nicer than those the kids can get of their favorite players in score.

Finally rookie cards aren't what tey once were either. Way back in the day a player had 1 maybe 2 cards their rookie year. Then it became 5 and maybe 10. Now, well most of the cards produced in a players rookie year aren;t ever "true" rookies and the fact we have a term like "true" to describe a rookie is bad enough. So on top of not having a chance to get the best cards, kids are also confused at heck. A kids opens a pack and pulls a card that has a rookies picture they think they got that players rookie card but no it could be an insert or a parallel and then depending on what company it may not even be a licensed product so even the base wont count as a true rookie.
The hobby is not what it used to be and becoming less and less interesting and esirable for kids. Eventually that decreasing interest is gonna lead from a decreased market to a non-existent market. Maybe once that happens all the big money hungry comapnies will leave and we will go back to 1 company producing basic cards for the very few people interested and they will have isane odds at pulling something like an auto or jersey/patch card.
Unless the companies abandon the high-end crap and go back to the basics I don;t see a long-tern future for the hobby. Kids are the future of this hobby and while some here may have their kids interested in it, its far less than it was when I was a kid and eventually the decreasing numbers WILL hit a point to where its next to noone interested in this hobby. Maybe not in the next 2 years but 50-100 years from now, unless things change drastically, I don't see the hobby making it that far.

pretty much sums up my fears about the longevity of the hobby. I got out in the early 90's due to lack of funds, and even at that time I thought there were becoming too many cards...market getting diluted. I step back in now, and I already feel like I am drowning! I have learned a lot from the folks on this forum to steer me in the right direction, so I am thankful for that, but I definitely could not imagine any of my students getting into this hobby the way I did. Though it also seems like kids have more money these days. Hell some of my students make more than I do with their allownaces

[dvlosky]

Overall value of cards will not hold with the massive dilution. If you are a specific die-hard collector (such as a team collector or player collector) then I guess value doesn't matter a whole lot. For selling purposes only the current "hot" rookies will be able to sell (its been that way for awhile) but even then that same rookie card you paid $500 for you probably wont event be able to get $250 for it unless he had some unbelievable year.

Personally I have stop buying wax. It is a lot of fun to bust but to me there is no point. There are so many memorabilia, auto, and low #ed cards these days that it really doesn't mean much to get one unless it is one of those "hot rookies". Also for memorabilia, these days all they are is event worn, so the player puts it on for a second then takes it off. Boom there you go the card company can say he wore it. I think it would be cool for a game used set to come out with game worn jerseys and the picture of the player wearing the exact jersey that the piece of GU came form. I think they did this a few years back with "Piece of the Game" and other sets.

Or how about #ed cards actually be a different card? Meaning a different picture other than the base card. I know they kind of do this with SP's but with a lot of base 1/1's (crazy that I can say that now) its just the same base card but with a 1/1 stamp on it. Make it truly 1/1 no one else has that card with that picture.

[eliteco3]

There is already a cycle in place with 'Rookies' each and every year. Running backs create the most hysteria before fading into oblivion because of the short life span of the position. I will start in 2003 and name some running backs who have fizzled both in the hobby and there career.

2003 - Larry Johnson, had a couple nice seasons. His hobby was incredible in early 2006. Contenders sold for 420 at one time. You can not pick it up for 10 bucks.
Onterrio Smith, Domanick Davis, Justin Fargas
Willis Mcgahee - still plays and has had a nice career. Nonetheless, he holds little hobby value.
2004 - Kevin Jones, Julius Jones, Chris Perry. Tatum Bell
Steven Jackson - Topped 10,000 yards and has more left in the tank. Only 29 years old, nonetheless, his hobby is very low currently.
2005 - Frank Gore - nearing 10,000 yards but, hobby has been slumping for some time.
Sproles - fantastic player. holds the all time yards from scrimmage record. Cards are low.
benson, ronnie brown, and cadillac - All at one time were worth absurd levels. Now can be had for little to nothing. Also, Marion barber.
2006 - Maroney. Bush - Cards have decreased by 80% or more.
Jones Drew - steady hobby. he needs a few more good seasons. Deangelo williams - still has a little value. Lendale white isworth nothing.
2007 - Pretty solid in terms of Peterson being here. For how dominant Lynch is, his hobby is fairly low
2008 - Interesting class, Forte, Charles, Rice, CJ, Mcfadden, Jonathan Stewart, Mendenhall. All have seen decreases and could fade into oblivion in the future.
2009 - Lesean - has a little bit of value.
Beanie - little value. Knowshon - no value.
2010 - Jahvid Best, low value. Mathews - injury prone and cards have fallen.
Spiller - had a nice season but needs many more to sustain
2011 - Leshore, Ryan Williams - very low value. Ingram has dropped because of low production.
2012 - We see Doug Martin showing flashes. David Wilson had some nice highlights.
Trent only averaged 3.5 but his cards have held steady.

This could be the topic of another discussion but, I wanted to bring up the topic of Running Backs and there ever decreasing values. At times, they will decrease over time even when they had very successful careers. It seems to be a position that people collect at the moment, not in the long term.

[eliteco3]

People have been saying the hobby is going to die since after 1991. As long as sports remain popular than sports cards and sports autographs should remain popular as well.

I would agree with this statement. To compare, look at all the 8X10 photo autos with COA's and Auto footballs. They flood the market for every player every year but still have some value. As long as there are fans who have some money to spend, the hobby will be alive.

[TheNati#22]

eliteco, I was thinking the same thing about runningbacks, look at jamal lewis for example he had a 2,000 yard season and a solid career but you can pick his contenders up for $10 on ebay.