Future values?....

[thetruthisoutthere]

Originally Posted by Runscott

If Cobb prices can't come close to Ruth, how can we expect Mantle and Williams to?

+1

[Klrdds]

Maybe the only one to come close to Ruth could be Gehrig . But yet Gehrig never transcended baseball as Ruth did.

[packs]

Cobb never had the celebrity that Ruth had and is a poor comparison. Yes, Ruth was an all world talent like Cobb, but his autograph is not expensive solely because of how well he played baseball. I would say Mantle and DiMaggio shared a similar spotlight in public consciousness in comparison to Ruth, though of course Ruth is always king.

When people talk about the greatest active player, Mike Trout's name is usually brought up. When people talk about how great a player Trout is, the man they typically compare him to is Mickey Mantle, not Ty Cobb.

I think in the long run Mantle outpaces DiMaggio but I think both players will see their memorabilia increasingly rise as time goes on and they may be some of only a handful of players who are immune to time and shifting generations.

[tazdmb]

This doesn't pertain as much to certain players as it does to future values in general. I (was) a member of Autographs 101 on Facebook and they had over 20,000 members as well as other autograph social media sights with thousands of members each. Every one of them wants a Mantle as bad as a Mike Trout (granted the average age is these members is probably around 20). They want to show off that they have all the autographs of the current superstars.

Bottom line, kids/young adults are still collecting baseball autographs today in probably a bigger proportion than they did when I was a kid. I am hoping/banking that a 1% of these kids will grow up, become wealthy and then want to go after the HOFers of past generations. Not just the Mantles/Mays but also the Bottomleys and Wagners.

My guess is that Trout signed more autographs last year than Wagner signed in a lifetime. Supply (excluding forgeries) isn't growing for deceased HOFers, I am hoping that the Demand will.

[Runscott]

Originally Posted by packs

Cobb never had the celebrity that Ruth had and is a poor comparison.

Okay, well that'll shut me up - you've still got the touch.

[packs]

Do you disagree? It's not a critique, just what I think.

[dgo71]

I don't see why any player would "catch up" to another. I would think as time moves on, values for everyone would increase proportionally. But it'd still be Ruth > Cobb > Mantle, etc. I don't think Mantle would jump exponentially and not see a similar increase in Ruth's value. What would, 20+ years after Mantle signed his last autograph, predicate such a drastic spike in his value that wouldn't also effect the value of Ruth?

EDIT: Or is the question simply, in a vacuum, will a Mantle signed baseball ever command $15K (or whatever a nice Ruth currently sells for)? If that's the question, it would depend on the direction the hobby goes in over the next 60 years or so. Who can say? Personally I'd like to think in 2080 there will be some young collector dreaming of owning a Mantle the way people today dream of owning a Ruth.

[Kco]

I’ve been collecting Mantle and DiMaggio for years now (10+), and I can find nice, clean examples of both for roughly the same amount or slightly less now than I was in 2008. I don’t ever see either of their prices jumping too drastically. I just picked up two very clean DiMaggio and Mantle balls last week. Both full LOAs. I paid $375 on Joe and $450 on Mantle.