New high for a molitor/trammell psa 10
 

I wonder how hi it will get? is it still collecting or a rich man obsession.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/130868361634...torefresh=true

Collecting
 

It can be either or both. It is up to the individual collector

So true! If you want to get one that's reasonably nice it's possible for under $20 and often under $10.

But if you simply must have one that someone else thinks is nearly perfect then yes it looks like it'll cost more than 5800. (An hour and a half left too)

Steve B

That's the dumbest thing I've ever seen. Most collectors and dealers "might" go a couple hundred for a late 70s psa 10. Ruth goudeys hardly demand that much even. But molitor-trammel? Good players, yes. I loved watching them when I was growing up, but they weren't "that" great. Looks like that ebay auction may have had some obvious dirty deeds goin on. Just my opinion.

Sent from my LS670 using Tapatalk 2

Wow, I don't get it. Good for the person who wants it that bad. I agree with above, and think of the damage one could do with $6k worth to spend on cards.

I guess its the chase of the PSA Registry... or simply to say I own a "10"... to each his own.... I'd be curious to see if it will hold its value down the line.....

Ricky Y

As somebody that grew up a Brewers fan, one having seen Paul Molitor play in person many times, I have to respectfully disagree. Molitor was one of the best players of his generation.

Between 1978 and 1987, his prime years, Paul missed nearly 500 games due to injuries. Think about where his career numbers would have ended up had he not missed them. Hell, he got 2,116 hits after age 30, hitting .316, scoring 1,106 runs.

He's a member of MLB's All-Time team for a reason. He's one of four players in the history of baseball with a .300 average, 3,000 hits and 500 stolen bases, and the only player from the modern era to do it (the others, Ty Cobb, Honus Wagner and Eddie Collins were all retired by 1930). Molitor played 21 seasons, and averaged 200 hits per 162 games played. That's better than Pete Rose and Ted Williams, and equal to Rod Carew and Roberto Clemente.

As for the card, I don't think that's obscene. If they can afford to get that card, and it makes them happy, more power to them. I know if I were rich, I'd lead a pretty modest lifestyle. But baseball cards would be my weakness.

I agree they're probably doing so for registry reasons. Or, maybe the buyer is a Molitor super collector, and he wants that one crown jewel for his collection. Hell, if I could afford a 1975 Topps Robin Yount PSA 10, I'd click "buy it now" so fast I might ruin my keyboard. :D

I think most of us on this site cannot understand the amount of money spent on this card. The card is rather modern and I wonder how many other PSA 10's are out there, but not submitted to PSA yet. But, I also cannot understand the amount of money being spent on certain Mike Trout or Bryce Harper cards either.

For any who are wondering, there are 13 PSA 10's of this card floating around. Not that scarce.

Even within PSA 10's, there will be ones with greater eye appeal. It comes down to the buyer. If I were a hardcore Molitor collector, and saw that card, I'd have gone after it. Of course, it would have priced itself out of my range pretty quickly...

The current underbidder has 15 bid retractions in the last 6 months. Am I wrong or does that seem like a lot? I'm always wary of bidding against someone with that type of track record.

Maybe the person that won it is a Tiger and Alan Trammell fun!

That is certainly a lot to me. I have been an ebayer since Jan. of 1999 and I have exactly "0" bid retractions.

Same, I've never retracted a bid. Not a one.

I have one bid retraction since 98. Bid on a projector then realized the shipping was insanely high.


Steve B

Tram monitor Rookie
 

Part of the reason that the price for a PSA 10 went so high was because of the printers thumb print smudge that ruined this card. I am sure thus accounts for at least some of the rarity for a 10

Retractions
 

Several years ago, before I began sniping all my ebay auctions, I had put in a fairly high max bid on an item and later got an out bid notice. Then I got a high bidder notice. When I looked, someone ( one bidder) had bid in increments until they passed me and then withdrew their last bid, leaving me high at my max. So I retracted the bid and became a permanent sniper :)

Recently, I was bidding on an expensive Mantle, when the seller suddenly added to the listing something to the effect of, "The card measures correctly to me, but I can't guarantee it has not been trimmed." I immediately retracted my bid.

I pretty much do the sniping thing myself now. It's just not worth obligating yourself to an auction (potentially freezing large amounts of cash if it's a high dollar item) when you might not even get the card you're bidding on. Example: I found a really nice 2011 Bowman Chrome Bryce Harper base auto on the Bay night before last, auction format. A beautiful, gradable card. Perfectly centered with a clean surface, and sharp edges and corners. I knew how high the auction could reach, as that's one of the hottest cards in the hobby right now, and cards graded by Beckett with a 9.5 overall rating and 10 auto command a premium. Well, I sent the owner a preemptive offer to buy the card. They smartly declined. With nearly 5 full days left, the auction is up to $252.49, and it will eventually pass my $350 offer.

Luckily, I found a seller in Canada with a Beckett graded one, 9.5/10 with all 9.5 subs, and I was able to get it at a great price (and not much higher than my bid to the other seller). If I had put a bid in of $350, or $375 on the first auction, those funds would have basically been frozen until the auction's end, and I couldn't have bought the graded version (unless I wanted potentially both a raw and a graded card). And I didn't feel like blowing $800 on two of the same cards. :p

I've seen that happen a few times in auctions I've been watching, Al, and that's one of the things I just hate about Ebay.

Based on some of the incredible pieces in your collection, I can only imagine how big of an issue that could be with you.

I quibbled with some of the people who were excited about this auction on the psa boards. The way it was explained to me is that there's whales(which we all know there are) and then there's people investing, those interested in completing a registry, etc.

My takeaway is that there's a subset of very deep pocketed collectors that vie for show pieces and them there's another set of collectors investing by attempting to corner markets and usin non expendable funds to do so(ie treating it as a true investment).

I'm still not quite sure what to make of things, but investing in miniscule markets seems to be risky business.

Another problem with paying an insane price for this card is that there can only be more of them, not less. With the result you can be sure there are some being worked on right now.

Where is that? I'm just not seeing any big problems like that.

Steve B

It's at the bottom of the card near the middle. Often called a smudge. It appears in probably 90-95% of the Molitors I have seen. It goes from around the "K" in ROOKIE to the "O" in SHORTSTOPS. Here is an example.

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-WiHNZ2XjmZ...T++IMG_NEW.jpg

So true!

Ah, that one. I think I misread your post to mean that the 10 had the smudge. Rereading it I don't know how I read it that way.

It's interesting that it's on so many of them. I'll have to check mine and see if it's there.

Steve B

Wow! I always loved Molitor and knowing that he made the 3k hit club makes him very special in my book, but I never knew some of the stats that you posted...I have a whole new respect for him now. I had no idea he stole 500 bags during his career, I just thought he was a very solid hitter. Thanks for posting this info!

Ya, a lot of people don't know Molly is 9th all time in hits with 3,319. Imagine if he'd played those 500 games he missed due to injury. That's 3 full seasons in his prime. To age 30, he averaged 193 hits per 162 games played. That's 579 more hits, which would give him 3,898. Now, he's knocking on 4,000 hits.

There's no guarantee he would have played as long if he'd not been hurt early, but I watched him in his first few years in the majors, and even when he was playing, a lot of the time he was dinged up. When he was healthy, he was one of the most dynamic players in the game.

Molitor also had the 7th longest hitting streak in MLB history at 39 games (5th longest since 1900). He was a 7 time All Star (Brewer players didn't get voted in to the All Star game a lot back then. Hell, his Brewer teammate Robin Yount, also a Hall of Famer, was only voted to the All Star game three times, if you can believe that. He wasn't even voted to the game in 1989, when he was the American League MVP!

Yount and Molitor had 4,736 hits as teammates. I don't know where that ranks them all-time as a duo, but they're up there.