Sports Card Collecting Is Booming But Also Looks Different In 2023

Sports card collecting has been around for decades. People have long searched for cards of their favorite players and teams. Card companies have gotten more creative over the years adding autographs, jersey pieces, and limited-run cards to entice collectors. The business is booming right now and has a very different feel in the year 2023.

Sports Card Collecting: Pandemic Boom

The hobby took off in 2020 when everyone was stuck at home. People began to clean out their attics or basements and came across their old sports cards. With nothing else to do, people launched back into the hobby with gusto. In February 2021, eBay reported that sports card sales in 2020 increased on the site by 142 percent over 2019, with more than 4 million cards sold. Whether it was out of sheer boredom or a rediscovery of a past hobby that reminded people of a better time, people dove in head first.

People with more disposable cash decided to try and collect the rarest of cards. Money was no object so prices on some cards skyrocketed. Recently, a Panini National Treasures Basketball rookie card of Luka Doncic sold for a whopping $4.6 million. Other cards have seen similar prices which have led to a lot of people seeing it not only as fun but a money-making opportunity.

2018 National Treasures Luka Doncic Rookie NBA Logoman Patch Auto 1-of-1 trading card
PWCC MARKETPLACE

Trying To Turn A Profit

Especially during the pandemic, people were looking for ways to make money from home. Sports cards became a popular market to try and get in. After all, the aforementioned Doncic card would be life-changing money. People lined up outside of their local retail stores to grab packs to rip hoping for the card that would change their life forever. Many “collectors” weren’t even in it for the fun, simply for the money. This comes with its own set of issues.

“There’s always an irrationality in collecting,” said Jeff Katz, a collector, author, and former mayor of Cooperstown, N.Y., home of the Baseball Hall of Fame. “But the irrationality in the last year and a half is a money chase, not a card chase.”

Trying to simply chase money usually never works especially in sports card collecting. Ask any serious collector the ratio of how many packs they have ripped versus the number of high-profit cards pulled. It’s probably not great. However, the joy for collectors is ripping packs, seeing what cards you do get, and having fun. Some of my favorite cards in my collection are not valuable but are from my favorite team or player. Trying to simply chase money is a fool’s errand yet there are so many people doing it.

Taking Out The Fun

I want to hit this point a little further. Trying to simply turn a profit sucks any kind of fun or joy out of the hobby. This is not to say that you cannot make money doing the hobby. I myself have some cards in my collection that I am trying to sell. However, there is a difference between selling as part of the hobby and selling with the intention of making a profit. Television personality Keith Olbermann puts it this way.

“That allows you for a significant expense to pretend that you own a very valuable card,” he said. “But you don’t. And if it’s sold, you will get that percentage of the profit, and you will not be able to pretend you own any of the card. I’m not sure what the appeal is.”

If the card is simply a cash source, it loses meaning.

The NSCC, or National, presents an opportunity for new companies to shine. But who isn’t on the show floor is just as notable. COURTESY NSCC

True Collectors

I’ve been very down on the recent state of sports card collecting so far but there are also a lot of people that do it for the love of the hobby. Through Twitter, Instagram, and Discord, card collectors have been able to build communities where buying, selling, and trading can be done. People can show off their pulls to a group of people that will actually appreciate it. On the flip side, collectors can share in the misery of pulling nothing out of a promising box. It really is a fun community to be a part of.

Sports card shows have also become very popular as a way to bring fans together and do rips in front of a live audience and show off their collections. Being able to see cards in person before buying also helps quell any concerns about the condition of the card or if it arrives in good condition through the mail. Hobbies are all about the community and businesses are doing everything they can to cultivate that community.

Future Of Card Collecting

Will the recent boom in sports card collecting hold? I expect the money-making-centered “collectors” to subside over the next couple of years. Once they realize how difficult it is to play the sports card stock market, they will move on to greener pastures. The fun part is that companies are getting more creative. One of the most popular products of the season was the Monopoly Panini Prizm boxes. Combining card collecting with one of the most well-known board games of all time was a good move. Could there be other collaborations that happen similar to this?

It is a great time to get into card collecting. The hobby has lots of fun and knowledgeable people who are willing to give advice when needed. This is a hobby that has evolved over the years and it will be interesting to see where it goes from here.