1969 Lew Alcinder Topps PSA 9
 

Last night PWCC auctioned off a 1969 Lew Alcinder (R) in PSA 9. The population for this card is 18. According to the SMR price guide, the card was worth $17,500.
The card sold for over $73,000. Is there something going on regarding Abdul-Jabbar's (previously called Alcinder) cards that I have missed?

SMR means nothing for most high end cards...

That May Be True
 

But according to that same SMR guide that lists recent sales of cards from that set, this same card in PSA 9 sold for $13,320 in 2015. Going up $60k in one year is just mind boggling.

When you get to the basically the highest grade of a card, its sort of like art. i not familiar with the POP of this card but generally when you are talking about a a rookie card of an elite player back in the day, there could always be a huge jump from psa X to the highest PSA level for that card.... 5-15X times in price between those levels etc...if you told me a PSA 7 went up 10k that i would be shocked..

Call it market manipulator or whathave you. At the National Alcindor PSA 7s were trading between 4-5K. Continued march upward of 200 most significant culturally iconic players. Alcindor/Jabbar is one of them

Happy Hunting

One Alcindor (from a Chinese seller) was marked at an ASK of $4k.

Where do you get "trading between 4-5k"?

This has been seen lately in cards across the board for the top examples. Why these tremendous increases in prices has been happening has been discussed, but no one seems to know for sure why it's happening. There haven't been a lot of recorded sales according to VCP website, the Alcindor rookie cards that sold in PSA 9 prior to that one were:

4/10/15 Greg Bussineau $13,320.00
2/12/15 eBay $12,209.00
8/24/14 Memory Lane $9,062.88
8/23/13 eBay $6,300.00
8/12/13 eBay $8,766.66
8/8/13 eBay $8,300.00

PSA 7 Alcindor rookies have dropped to the $2k area recently.

I think the recent price increases on high-grade cards has been a little ridiculous. Yet, other vintage basketball cards that are far more rare are in general decline. A Scott's Mikan sold on Ebay for $2000 last night. 1986 PSA 9 Jordan Fleer cards are $4500 - even though there are nearly 2500 of those in existence. Yet an Ashland/Aetna Oil set went unsold in the SCP Auction. There is clearly a shift of interest.

It is kind of tough to compare basketball with other sports in terms of performance of vintage cards. In all fairness, before the Topps era began in 1969, the game was so different, the league was so new, and there were so few vintage sets of national reach, that I can understand why a collector might not be interested in a card from an obscure chip or gas set.

I do agree that the pricing on the 86 Jordan is insane as compared with the 1969 Alcindor. I mean, when you have thousands of examples grading near mint and up, I don't see the point of going there. I'd much rather have a near mint Alcindor RC than a near mint Jordan RC. Though, frankly, neither card is rare, so I personally wouldn't even bother collecting them in marquee grades. I'd rather have a nice midgrade and a big wad of cash. Personally I am content with my vg 1969 set that cost me all of $200 or so.

Well said... My loyalty has always been towards older cards. Why buy anything for your collection that you can buy any day for the rest of your life. Make it unique.