The hobby’s most iconic card under $15k?
 

In follow-up to my weekend “would you sell 80% of your collection to purchase an ‘52 Topps Mantle” I wanted to start a 2nd post here with a spin-off question.

As background, I considered the possibility of selling 80% of my personal collection to fund the acquisition of a 1952 Topps Mantle (low grade).

In the end, after doing the math (literally), I would have to sell too deep and would have to sell cards that I enjoy too much. Instead, I categorized my collection into 3 segments:

- would never sell
- might sell
- yes, would sell… easy to replace someday and/or not a huge connection to the card

So… I have opted to focus only on my “yes, would sell” cards and have decided to drop my aim just a bit from ‘52 Topps Mantle and am back for more advice!

I estimate I’ll end up with a budget of about $15k and would love to add an exciting new, iconic card to my collection. See below for some of my early considerations. Thoughts on these options? Other options?

Thanks again, Net54 community. I enjoy and value your thoughts!

Jeff

I’d love to own any of those cards, but if I have 15k to drop I’m probably looking for a decent green Cobb as my first choice. That said, I solely collect t206 so I’m obviously partial to that set. Good luck…..I’m sure you’ll end up with something epic…

For me it would be either of the 51 Bowman cards. Personally not a fan of any of the other cards. Best of luck on your choice.

I'd give the nod to the 1952 Topps Jackie Robinson, with honorable mention to the t206 Green Ty Cobb Portrait.

I’ll be selling this Topps 54 Hank Aaron soon for around 15k. If your interested shoot me a pm.

All great choices and you cannot go wrong with any of them.

With that said a Goudey Ruth is the card I would choose (especially the Red)

Thx but I already have a 54 Aaron... good luck with your sale!

t206 Cobb Portrait (red or green) or 1933 Goudey Babe Ruth (#53 or #144). I would say those are equivalent and you really need one of each eventually. Look for the highest grade with best eye appeal you can find with your 15k.

I don't like to zero in on one card as it may not come up for sale. By having multiple options, you should be able to knock one off your want list in a short time frame.

Speaking generally, I'd pick a 51 Mays over any of the others you listed here. I think Mays is still a relatively undervalued player, and I think the 51 Mays is a great looking card. But personally I'd look for one with better eye appeal than the one you shared. I'd rather have one with worse centering or softer corners, if it meant avoiding the print lines running right through his face.

My next choice would be either Ruth, since he's the most famous player of all time and is probably the safest investment.

Fun thread.

I see we're plugging a few cards here...

This may be a little over $15k, but...it'll be the highest graded Green Cobb offered in REA's upcoming Spring (Premier) Catalog Auction.

The best looking 33 Goudey Ruth. 3s and 4s have dropped/will drop to that price. Good luck!

Obviously grade factors in but a Red Cobb in a PSA 4 strikes me as pretty iconic :D

This and it isn't even debateable. :rolleyes:

Agree !

People always seem to never want to let go of their non oddball mainstream regular issue Goudey Ruth’s and Topps/or Bowman Mantles....
Next is Jackie Cobb and Mays..those seem to be the top 5 most wanted and least easy to pry out of collectors hands players cards.

You can get MOST iconic cards for less than 15K. I think at that price all that you're excluded from is the 52 mantle (maybe not even excluded if you can find a real beater), the T206 Wagner, and Baltimore News Ruth.

I'm pretty sure 99% of all other iconic cards are attainable in collector grade condition for less than 15K.

Those are all great options IMO! Of those, I''d choose the yellow Ruth.

Not on your list, but I have always loved the '41 Playball Joe D. A nice 6 should be about $15k.

I bought this one a few months back. Gotta love NM looking cards that have some paper-loss on the reverse!

My opinion
 

In priority order:

1) Goudey Ruth #144
2) T206 Green Cobb
3) Goudey Ruth #53
4) 1951 Bowman Mantle
5) 1952 Topps Jackie
6) 1951 Bowman Mays

The cards at whatever grade level should have strong centering and eye appeal.

Thanks Howard… thankfully, I already have the full body Ruth in my collection. I’m curious why you recommended Yellow Ruth over Red Ruth… rarity?

#1. Ruth, no question, not even close. In my opinion even better than that 52 Mantle.

#2. Mantle true rookie (51)

#3. Mays Rookie

All three of these are more more interesting and rare than a 52 Mantle in my opinion.

Regarding selling a bunch of cards to fund a big card. I have done that on two different occasions, each time picking up a card in the 12-17k range. Never regretted it.

In the ballpark of $15.k each, if T206 is your thing:

T206 Cobb Red - PSA 5
T206 Mathewson Portrait - PSA 6
T206 Walter Johnson Portrait - PSA 6
T206 Cy Young Portrait - PSA 6

Highly desirable beauties !

Hopefully Stevie Wonder didnt grade yours. Sheesh!

I'd have to side with the yellow Ruth. Rarity does tend to make it a bit more costly than the other 3.

Not sure you could touch a 25 Exhibit Gehrig or get a decent 14 CJ Cobb or Jackson at those prices?

I actually considered a 1915 CJ Cobb but for my budget, the quality of recent sales just isn’t great.

But I’d LOVE to add that to this mix of options

Get another Ruth. The red and green are perfectly acceptable and equally iconic IMO. My second and third choices would be a T206 Cobb Portrait and a 51B Mantle.

52T Jackie. His best looking card hands down, also his rarest mainstream issue. Also I think it has the most upside potential.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Source? Pop report has between 900-1200 of each. I've never heard one is more rare. Yellow has a pop of even higher than red.

I like the 1933 goudey ruth #181 the best

I've read this in many publications and assumed it to be true. I'm sure there are different takes. However, I searched and found the first source I that I came across(Justcollect.com) to say this....."The Yellow Ruth (#53) has proven to be the most elusive of the bunch, followed closely by the Red Ruth (#149) that portrays the slugger in the exact same pose".

I certainly don't claim to be the expert here, but have always thought that to be the case. Maybe this is outdated or different compared to more current information.

I have always heard that that was so as well, although I never thought much about it.

Pops for Yellow amd red are 900, green 1k, batting pose 1200.


I'm betting none are more scare. I like 181, but I'm in the minority

I presume the other 3 are genuinely more scarce than the batting pose.

There should be differences in the print runs between different series; it's unlikely every series had the same print run. This may or may not produce a significant difference.

#144 is a double print on the sheet and should be found twice as often as the other cards within its series. This would include the red Ruth. Interesting that the POP reports suggest a difference but not a roughly 2X difference. The other 3 Ruth's appear to be printed normally.

15K budget...hear me out.

Imagine being the sole collector waking up every morning to 30,000+ 1988 Fleer Sammy Stewart cards greeting you everyday. Just something to consider.

I believe the most iconic vintage card, and the one with the most potential future upside, that can be found for under 15k (15 koruna, which is Czech currency, and thus roughly equivalent to 68 cents), is the below example Irvin Wilhelm T205 Piedmont, as it still has the chance of someday, as the result of advances in baseball card paper loss identification technology, of being proven to be the rare "suffe ed" variation.

Brian

Brian, I don't know what you are doing/have done for a career, but if it isn't comedy, you have missed your calling! :D

response
 

Graded population wise it is about equal to the red. In my experience, it is higher demand than the red.

I'd go with the Ruth #53, but you can't go wrong with either of the '51 Bowmans if you want an iconic rookie card.

I have heard the same...

Nice card Mike. I would go with a green Cobby or the Goudey Ruth. Can never have too Cobbies

Can't you just see Sammy rolling up in his Trans Am in the high school parking lots?

Interesting people still allowing multiples of the same card in low mid grade in the same auction.

Imo nothing as iconic as the 52 mantle. Better cards of better players, sure. But topps is still around and for all intents and purposes, this was their first issue. Like the first Corvette, not the best, but the first

Save up, wait for the crash...buy the mantle with cash.



It might not be a 90% but look for the right card when people need to sell. Not like you need a mantle today...thankfully. grossly overpriced IMO. More than enough to go around, people are just flipping week to week, auction to auction passing to the greater fool, or someone who both sold and bought the inflated pricing. I love it and glad I cashed in. My psa a, auto 6 signed 52 mantle did over 100k . No regrets on that on3

Zach Wheat- thanks!

1949 Bowman Robinson, Doby and Paige. Score the first three great NL stars into the majors. Maybe get a Campy if you have a few bucks left. FWIW, I think the recognition of these early NL pioneer MLB players is only going to go up as time passes. The 1952 T Robinson also is a great choice. It is one of his nicest cards.

1933 Delong. gehrig

Ruth
 

Fun thread Jeff, Thank you for starting this. All of your choices are very iconic cards within the hobby.

I would go with the Goudey Ruth #149 as my first choice and Cobb Red Portrait in like 4.5-5 range for my second choice. The Green Cobb Portrait would be an excellent choice as well, but I would want one with high eye appeal in the lower 2 grade that 15K would afford you and you will certainly get that with the 4.5 or 5 on the Red portrait. Good Luck! I hope you share whatever it is you decide.

Update on my plan… and a question for this smart group!

My adult son is my trusted advisor and partner in fun on this journey and he LOVES the 51 Bowman Mantle (logic, I already have the iconic Cobb Portait Cobb and the full body ‘33 Goudey Ruth. Solid logic!)

Here is my question - totally boring but important. Since I’ll probably need to liquidate ~$15k or so of my current collection to build funds to buy the Mantle, for tax and capital gains issues, is it worth trying to find a Mantle seller who might consider at least a partial trade?

That could lower my capital gains risk on the sale of my current cards, right?

(Sorry, told you it was boring🤣)

Jeff

Yep, pretty boring. So I guess I'll bore you to tears.

I'm not sure what you mean by "capital gains risk". But if you're trying to imply that a trade means you don't have to pay tax on your capital gains when you trade your cards in for other cards, then sadly you're wrong, at least under current law.

Having said that, prior to 2018, you would have been right! But under the last round of tax reform, like kind exchanges (i.e. trades) are now only nontaxable events for real estate assets. Every other asset is no longer eligible for like kind exchanges. For the perennially jaded, be my guest in assuming that our former president wanted to protect tax benefits for his preferred asset class, while eliminating that benefit for every other asset class to find some revenue to offset tax cuts in other areas.

All of which is a long way of saying that even if you trade one baseball card for another, you have to recognize a gain on the card you gave up if it has increased in value between when you acquired it and when you traded it. Along these lines, if you bought a card in 2013 for $5, and then today you trade it for a card that today is worth $100, then it sounds like you have a capital gain for $95.

I will concede that if by "capital gains risk", you mean to suggest that since there's no cash involved in your trade, the likelihood of anyone noticing or catching you is lower, then I suppose there's some chance that you might be right. But as a tax professional, I would never encourage anyone to flout the law simply based on the premise that the likelihood of discovery is low.

Or as Mark Twain once said: "We ought never do wrong when anyone is looking". Or when we've mused about it on a public chat board.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gb6vvAG3xfo