The Dangers of "Prospecting" and its Impact on Vintage

[abothebear]

I have recently looked into prospecting a little bit, but hyper-focused on my fan interest, and not more than $20. What I have been wondering about is where is the sweet spot? You have 1/1s/3/5s and the like that are way too expensive to take a risk on buying. And even so, there are, for any given prospect, 20 different RC that come in those low-number versions. And step that up to the 20 / 50 / 99, level, and their 20 different issues, Then there are the 300 - 1000 numbered versions, and then the unnumbered but quantifiably less (like the unnumbered auto versions). Where is that prospecting sweet spot of low-risk entry point but still a chance for return? For instance, I see that you can find RCs of prospects that hit 8 years ago for under $200. What were these cards being sold for eight years ago? $200 doesn't seem like a return in value based on what people are paying for prospects right now. If you pay $200 for a 1/50 card and the prospect turns into a near immediate all-star, will the value even go up? Are people prospecting in hopes they'll b HOFers 25 years from now? Because that doesn't make sense. I'd like to get a card of a young pitcher in my team's system. I have good reason to believe he'll be a fun sensation of sorts. Yet pitchers are terrible investments, especially now that they don't even pitch 5 innings. There may never be another pitcher to be elected to the HOF once this nearly retiring generation is through. But let's suppose he does hit, and in 5 years is a top 3 pitcher in the mlb, and has a trajectory that could spell HOF. What cards would I want to have prospected on that would be paying off? Would the 1/300s, which I could get for $20 right now be anything?

I'm not looking for answers (unless you have some), just pointing out another layer to the prospecting game. The risk/reward is so out of whack that it is a wonder the market functions the way it does. But maybe there is a sweet spot where it can make a little bit of sense, especially if you have a fan investment of the player too. But I'm not sure where that sweet spot is.