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I don’t see the side where the hobby benefits from someone that can make $20 Billion business offers buys a basketball card for $13MM. Not only that, he has already come out and stated publicly that his card is just another asset class to add to his bitcoin, gold bars, S&P 500 portfolio, etc. A hobby benefits when hobbyists thrive, is that happening in any way here? In the big picture, I see it as just another nail in the coffin to hobbyists who are priced out of the market already and just seeing things becoming more and more hopeless.

Anyone think this was an astute purchase by someone who is going to treasure this beauty for the rest of their life? He already says it will never come up for sale again during his lifetime. Apparently, he already owns a number of other basketball cards. Want to bet these didn’t come from 2020-21 Goldin Auctions?

People like this used to buy mansions, private jets, yachts, etc. with their fortunes but have now begun to invade our hobby. Us long time hobbyists always knew that if people like Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, etc. ever started going after sports cards, we would never be able to compete. But, it never happened on a large scale until COVID. I’m afraid that the hobby has changed forever as has society as a whole. I’m starting to believe that it is never going back to the way it was either. Maybe I’m late to the party here but am still holding out hope that rational individuals will once again prevail over the “gotta have it now” mentality.

One more thing, us long time hobbyists who have been subscribing to Sports Collectors Digest since the 70’s and 80’s will note that every issue’s “Highest Recent Sales” will present 90-95% modern sports cards with the only exception typically being the 52T Mantle because you can’t publish a sports card story without one of those being mentioned. Pretty obvious who is running the hobby today and that’s where all of the irrational spending starts with.