Who are the most "over-valued" players

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by rats60

Not always. In the early days of the hobby, they were equal. Even in the 80s, there was a small, ~10%, premium for Mantle. In some years, for example 1953 Topps, Mays was more. The premium started in the mid-eighties when New York dealers bought up Mantle cards and drove the prices up. Until the recent spike in Mays cards with the death of Aaron, the gap just kept expanding for ~35 years.

If stories are to be believed, a lot of the value of the 1952 Topps Mantle was due to Woody Gelman hoarding them. So, saying Mickey Mantle is "over-valued" really doesn't have anything to do with his ability, but due to dealers driving prices up to escalated levels.

Why in your view did the gap keep expanding? There are too many Mantle cards, I would think, for anyone to buy up enough cards to meaningfully influence prices long term.

[rats60]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

Why in your view did the gap keep expanding? There are too many Mantle cards, I would think, for anyone to buy up enough cards to meaningfully influence prices long term.

Fear of missing out. New collectors look at the price guide and they see Mantle priced higher than others, so they want his cards. When prices are low, it is easy to buy something up, then demand takes over.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by rats60

Fear of missing out. New collectors look at the price guide and they see Mantle priced higher than others, so they want his cards. When prices are low, it is easy to buy something up, then demand takes over.

Interesting theory. For most goods and services I would think supply and demand dictate price, not that the price itself influences demand, but with baseball cards, who knows.

[Balticfox]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

For most goods and services I would think supply and demand dictate price, not that the price itself influences demand, but with baseball cards, who knows.

Yes, that's what you'd expect for goods and services alright. It's textbook economics.

But there's an investor/speculator crowd which believes that "the trend is your friend" and accordingly extrapolates past price changes on into the future. So increases in price can actually spur demand which is how price bubbles are created. Price bubbles like any other do of course eventually burst.