What kind of baseball card collector are you?

[Balticfox]

What kind of baseball card collector are you? Do you collect only the players from a certain team or specific stars/rookies from any particular set? Or do you try to acquire every single card from any set you start collecting?

[raulus]

Hi Balticfox:

Looks like you're relatively new around here. So welcome to the site.

You raise some good questions, and I'm sure that you'll find a lot of different approaches to how people collect, as we all have our own ideas around what gets us excited about collecting.

But if you're looking to help people to open up and be generous about sharing, maybe you could start off the conversation by sharing your personal approach to collecting?

Since I see that you have a poll, you might also consider whether some of us use more than one of these approaches. My guess is that most of us could check multiple boxes. Under the current format, it looks like only a single selection is permitted for each respondent.

[Eric72]

• I'm building a set I fully expect to complete (1956 Topps)
• I'm building a set I expect to never complete (T206)
• I get stars and rookies from other sets (picked up a Mantle, Mays, and Spahn this past weekend and I was looking for a Frank Robinson rookie)
• I get cards of players from my favorite team (the Phillies)
• I get cards of my favorite player (Steve Carlton)

Sometimes, I get cards 'cause they look cool (this weekend, I also picked up a '61 Wes Covington)


So, my vote is "all of the above, and more."

[bnorth]

After around 40 years of collecting I think I have tried it all at one time or another. Still mainly a Wade Boggs and error card collector but have a little bit of everything and everyone.

[Balticfox]

Originally Posted by raulus

But if you're looking to help people to open up and be generous about sharing, maybe you could start off the conversation by sharing your personal approach to collecting?

My plan was to do so after a day or two so as not to appear "judgemental" and thus colour other responses.

Originally Posted by raulus

Since I see that you have a poll, you might also consider whether some of us use more than one of these approaches. My guess is that most of us could check multiple boxes. Under the current format, it looks like only a single selection is permitted for each respondent.

I considered ticking off the "Allow Multiple Votes" option but I thought I'd covered all the options individually. I failed to consider that some collectors might approach collecting cards from different sets in different ways.

In the past few years I've actually been adding these options to polls I start:

6. All of the above.
7. None of the above.
8. I don't understand. Could you repeat the question?

I shouldn't have left them off I guess.

[deweyinthehall]

I principally go for Topps base sets - right now have 1966-2001 - and all inserts, variations, send-aways, traded sets, wrappers (no boxes), etc. By this time next year, I expect I'll have 1965-2002.

Also collect 4 individual players - Jim Rice, Dwight Evans, Tim Wakefield and Jamie Quirk.

[JollyElm]

I am both ALL of the stated options at the same time and NONE of the stated options at the same time.

[jl4jc2001]

I am a Topps Set Collector. I build multiple sets of the same year also.

[Zach Wheat]

As Nicolo suggested, many of us can check multiple boxes. I am mainly a set collector (with variations), but also collect sheets.

[Zach Wheat]

Originally Posted by Balticfox

What kind of baseball card collector are you? Do you collect only the players from a certain team or specific stars/rookies from any particular set? Or do you try to acquire every single card from any set you start collecting?

Good question, and welcome to the forum. The collective knowledge from the members is astounding.

[irv]

Originally Posted by Balticfox

What kind of baseball card collector are you? Do you collect only the players from a certain team or specific stars/rookies from any particular set? Or do you try to acquire every single card from any set you start collecting?

I collect 52 Topps in hopes of completing my set but all other cards are just stars/rookies here and there from baseball and hockey, and both include vintage and modern.

I have no desire to collect/complete sets.

[lrush]

I collect my favorite team but mainly vintage HOFers & vintage rookies. Also have 27 player runs.

[steve B]

I collect pretty much everything.

But I have rarely focused on anything, so for example, I'm still a few cards short on the 76 set, I might actually work on finishing it for 2026.

Usually when I go to a show if there's something in particular I want I don't find it, but do find other stuff.

[jchcollins]

My card collecting from when I was kid slightly predates my Cub-fandom, so as a result I tend to collect everything (where possible) and not just my team. Though I do plenty of that too. I digress...

I collect singles and stars traditionally - probably first and foremost, but as I have gotten back into the hobby as an adult, I have become interested in certain other vintage sets and other players. I don't have a ton of rules when I see something that catches my eye, other than the fact I don't do a ton of prewar. I love how prewar cards look and the history of those players and sets, but for my collecting dollar - the truth anymore is most of those cards have passed my budget by in comparison to what I can still get on the postwar side for the same amount - that I still want to get. My postwar wantlist still shows no sign of ending in terms of stuff I still would like to acquire, so I don't see that model changing significantly anytime soon.

[Section103]

Im a little bit of 1 and a little bit of 2 (primarily), but I think 2 comes closest to my current habits.

[Balticfox]

If I start on a set, I go after all the cards. Given the huge size of Baseball card sets and the nosebleed prices some of the star cards fetch, I must invariably do a large amount of prioritizing by favourites when it comes to the stars. Truthfully though unmarked Checklists are at least as high a priority for me as are most stars.

The vintage Baseball card sets upon which I've started are these:

1954 Topps
1955 Topps
1957 Topps
1958 Topps
1959 Topps
1960 Topps
1961 Topps
1962 Topps
1962 Post Cereal
1962 Canadian Post Cereal
1963 Topps
1965 Topps

The only set I'm even close to completing though is the 1962 Canadian Post Cereal.

I also go after the wrappers including variants from any set I'm collecting. I got the idea to collect wrappers from a glossy page picturing a bunch of Topps Baseball wrappers in an early 1980's Sport Americana Baseball Card Price Guide by Dr. James Beckett.

Moreover I've been collecting Non-Sport cards at least as long as I've been collecting Baseball cards. And wrappers have been avidly pursued by many Non-Sport card collectors since the 1970's anyway. In fact the longest standing and best respected Non-Sport card magazine is called The Wrapper!

I still remember mentioning that I had a complete set of Civil War News cards to a collector I met at Comic Heaven on Keewatin Street in Toronto back in 1982 or so. He immediately asked me whether I had a wrapper. And just by coincidence I happened to be in the same shop a year or two later when the same fellow was exulting about scoring a Civil War News wrapper which he was now going home to put with his set! (I have both the one cent and five cent Civil War News wrappers myself now.) Here though are some of my Baseball card wrappers from the 1950's:

1957



1958



1959



I also remember mentioning the CFL wrappers I had while I was talking on the phone to another avid CFL collector in Vancouver back in 1995 or so. I could almost see the penny drop in his mind right across the continent! And yes, within a few weeks he was negotiating to purchase my duplicate CFL wrappers.

Of course I like unfolded display boxes too. Whether I can find let alone afford any of the Baseball ones is another question.

[todeen]

I collected everything baseball when I was much younger. As time has gone by, I've become more nostalgic for players of the 90s, namely Barry Larkin and Ken Griffey Jr. They were my favorites then, and remain so now. I dabble in modern Reds, but I get bored quickly. I never get bored of those two. I am on this board to dabble in vintage and pre-war, and to gain knowledge from extremely knowledgeable peers.

I buy cards and memorabilia. It's so much better than cards only. I'm showing my Barry Larkin collection right now in the modern card thread.

Sent from my SM-S926U using Tapatalk

[maniac_73]

After 35 years of collecting I dont have a focus I just collect cards I think are cool