Topps loses Baseball license in 2025

[BMW]

https://www.npr.org/2021/08/20/10295...facturer-topps

There are dozens of other articles as well.

I honestly never thought I'd see the day. You would have thought that the only way Topps baseball cards would stop happening would be if Topps themselves went under. Not that they would lose the license.

I have to say, I really am not a fan of these exclusive licenses. Perhaps the 1990s with 9-10 publishers was a bit much, but I loved having 3-5 card sets in the 1980s.

If there's one thing I could hope, but I won't hold my breath, is that the cards themselves move away from what they've become. Which is more akin to gambling than collecting your favorite players (or even a whole set).

I don't want or need 75 different Topps Aaron Judge cards, many with artificial scarcity so they are "worth" dozens or hundreds of dollars just days after they were printed.

[Curve Ball Dave]

Originally Posted by BMW

I don't want or need 75 different Topps Aaron Judge cards, many with artificial scarcity so they are "worth" dozens or hundreds of dollars just days after they were printed.

Way back when in the early 90s I was at a card show. A couple of kids were pouring through their latest Beckett to see what their cards were "worth". I wanted to say, "Good luck finding someone to pay you that." but I didn't. I bought baseball cards with the change left over from my lunch money when I was a kid. That's all they should really be, inexpensive bits of memorabilia of your favorite players, not investments.

[BMW]

Originally Posted by Curve Ball Dave

Way back when in the early 90s I was at a card show. A couple of kids were pouring through their latest Beckett to see what their cards were "worth". I wanted to say, "Good luck finding someone to pay you that." but I didn't. I bought baseball cards with the change left over from my lunch money when I was a kid. That's all they should really be, inexpensive bits of memorabilia of your favorite players, not investments.

Back in 1987-1990, that was me. I wasn't even an adult yet when I realized that those dollar values were, at the best, retail prices and at the worst very inflated.

In the 1980s, there were literally news articles talking about baseball cards as investments. I'm not saying you were insinuating this (I don't think you were), the cards-as-investment was a top down thing, not a grassroots thing.

Check out that Newspapers search on the topic during those years.

The gist of it was - The T206 Wagner and 1952 Mantle started getting press for getting tens of thousands of dollars during the early-to-mid 1980s. In the 1980s, most adults in America could remember someone who had baseball cards in the 1950s and 1960s. Most people didn't save those cards (which is part of why they became valuable). Everyone could relate to "if I only saved my cards, I could trade my 52 Mantle for a new car". People started writing articles about baseball card investment potential using frankly infantile understanding of markets and economics.

Eventually, though, the card companies got wind of it and started building their business models to cater to the "get rich quick" schemes. Nobody wanted to get a Ken Griffey Jr card in 1989 and wait until 2040 for it to be worth $5000. They wanted to get that card in 1989 and have it be worth hundreds of dollars in just a few years. Today, the card companies narrowed it down to "you can open up a pack and get a newly printed card worth $1000 immediately when you open it".

The people who drive baseball card production today largely don't care at all about what's on the card, just how much it's worth on eBay.

[Curve Ball Dave]

Originally Posted by BMW

Back in 1987-1990, that was me. I wasn't even an adult yet when I realized that those dollar values were, at the best, retail prices and at the worst very inflated.

In the 1980s, there were literally news articles talking about baseball cards as investments. I'm not saying you were insinuating this (I don't think you were), the cards-as-investment was a top down thing, not a grassroots thing.

Check out that Newspapers search on the topic during those years.

The gist of it was - The T206 Wagner and 1952 Mantle started getting press for getting tens of thousands of dollars during the early-to-mid 1980s. In the 1980s, most adults in America could remember someone who had baseball cards in the 1950s and 1960s. Most people didn't save those cards (which is part of why they became valuable). Everyone could relate to "if I only saved my cards, I could trade my 52 Mantle for a new car". People started writing articles about baseball card investment potential using frankly infantile understanding of markets and economics.

Eventually, though, the card companies got wind of it and started building their business models to cater to the "get rich quick" schemes. Nobody wanted to get a Ken Griffey Jr card in 1989 and wait until 2040 for it to be worth $5000. They wanted to get that card in 1989 and have it be worth hundreds of dollars in just a few years. Today, the card companies narrowed it down to "you can open up a pack and get a newly printed card worth $1000 immediately when you open it".

The people who drive baseball card production today largely don't care at all about what's on the card, just how much it's worth on eBay.

Excellent post.

[Syd Thrift]

Well, with the Honus Wagner card in particular it got insanely expensive because originally the cards were produced by a tobacco company and Wagner, who did not smoke, asked that his likeness be removed from the set. So there were only a limited number printed in the first place and then of course those numbers dwindled over time.

Sports cards definitely hit a massive bubble in the late 80s and early 90s, and yeah, having 20 different brands was mildly annoying. I’d much rather have 3 brands than 1 though. And hopefully exclusivity deals won’t kill the baseball card indistry the way it killed, for instance, the pro football video game industry (Madden is trash now and has been trash for well over a decade, it loses people every year, and instead of just losing it to a competitor the entire market just slowly fades away).

[BMW]

Yeah, the Wagner was an outlier. Effectively like the Inverted Jenny postage stamp - it's a mistake that was corrected and that led to scarcity. Inverted Jenny was a printing error, Wagner was an error in judgment by the tobacco company that they were willing to honor Wagner's wishes.

I don't know if having a monopoly versus not will drive the card industry to be "good" again. Topps didn't really make this "artificial scarcity" as part of their business model only after they were the last one standing. Topps and Upper Deck, and Fleer and Donruss all started going down that road. Soon it was just Topps and Upper Deck and now Topps is just left standing.

From a pure business standpoint, who am I to say that if Fanatics offers the MLB 20 billion for exclusive rights that the MLB can't agree to that?

Ultimately it means that Fanatics will dictate how the industry is run (within whatever contractual agreement constraints they have with the MLB and MLBPA).

I'd love to be able to go back to the days of getting 15 "worthless" cards in a pack for a dollar. But it's probably more profitable to have 4 cards in a pack for $3 and the only ones that anyone really wants is the limited edition print that can go from the pack to eBay for $80 the day you open the pack.

It's also a telling sign that on this board, full of baseball and historical baseball fans, that this thread took over 12 hours to get posted and that it's not a super hot topic. Baseball fans aren't baseball card fans anymore. It's a very small subset of fans willing to spend hundreds to thousands of dollars a year on it.

[zappa1]

I'm glad. Baseball and Topps ruined the trading card industry for me. So, I'm not sad. Wonder what the modders will do after 2022. What baseball cards will be modded for the game if it's still around? Will there be new start up card companies?

[dkgo]

Four cards in a pack for $3?

Try ten cards for $2500. The only cards with any value are autos/memorabilia/parallels with short numbers

https://www.dacardworld.com/sports-c...ball-hobby-box

[BMW]

Originally Posted by zappa1

I'm glad. Baseball and Topps ruined the trading card industry for me. So, I'm not sad. Wonder what the modders will do after 2022. What baseball cards will be modded for the game if it's still around? Will there be new start up card companies?

Fanatics (currently mostly a clothing company today but look like they're trying to be an "everything" company) will be doing it starting 2026. There will be only one company really, just them. No start ups so to speak - it's a multi billion dollar company doing multi billion dollar things.

Originally Posted by dkgo

Four cards in a pack for $3?

Try ten cards for $2500. The only cards with any value are autos/memorabilia/parallels with short numbers

https://www.dacardworld.com/sports-c...ball-hobby-box

I know about those boxes/packs that sell for hundreds/thousands. It only drives home the gambling and big money aspects of what the card industry has become.

[rudel.dietrich]

Originally Posted by Curve Ball Dave

Way back when in the early 90s I was at a card show. A couple of kids were pouring through their latest Beckett to see what their cards were "worth". I wanted to say, "Good luck finding someone to pay you that." but I didn't. I bought baseball cards with the change left over from my lunch money when I was a kid. That's all they should really be, inexpensive bits of memorabilia of your favorite players, not investments.

Many of those kids grew up and became wealthy and have the money to throw around.
Thousands or hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars for a single card or NFT is pocket change to them.

[Curve Ball Dave]

Originally Posted by rudel.dietrich

Many of those kids grew up and became wealthy and have the money to throw around.
Thousands or hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars for a single card or NFT is pocket change to them.

If you check the prices of cards produced in the early 90s, which is what the kids were looking up, you will find next to none that have any real value these days. Even if the book price is $1000 (extremely unlikely), go to card shop and have fun getting that amount for your card.

[BMW]

Originally Posted by Curve Ball Dave

If you check the prices of cards produced in the early 90s, which is what the kids were looking up, you will find next to none that have any real value these days. Even if the book price is $1000 (extremely unlikely), go to card shop and have fun getting that amount for your card.

Yeah, I would find that odd. The kids from the mid-80s to early 90s were the exact people who got completely shafted by it.

Although I hate to say that you are not entirely correct and this will probably depress you because the industry has created another scam.

They run grading companies now. And for a sizable amount of money, you can have your cards graded. And for some reason, if a card is graded a 10, even those 1980s and 1990s can be worth hundreds to thousands. For example, a 1987 Topps Barry Bonds - essentially from the most overproduced set of all time - may be worth $1 normally. They go for $150-$250 if they have a PSA 10 grade.

So they invented a separate industry where:
1. They get paid a lot for grading each card (I was curious at the cost and it's something like $25 per 1 card to grade it).
2. They've convinced buyers that a version of the card that's 1% more centered than another should be worth several hundred times more because of it.

I made my peace with it years ago. In fact, today I'm an avid collector. Because I can buy unopened packs of 1980s and 1990s cards for less than what they cost 30 years ago, even before adjusting for inflation! Packs that I bought for $1 a pack in 1980s money cost 50c a pack in 2020s money.

I collect them and enjoy them for what they are. They are a part of my youth, and every card has something interesting about it that's completely unrelated to how much money it's worth.

[Curve Ball Dave]

Originally Posted by BMW

Yeah, I would find that odd. The kids from the mid-80s to early 90s were the exact people who got completely shafted by it.

Although I hate to say that you are not entirely correct and this will probably depress you because the industry has created another scam.

They run grading companies now. And for a sizable amount of money, you can have your cards graded. And for some reason, if a card is graded a 10, even those 1980s and 1990s can be worth hundreds to thousands. For example, a 1987 Topps Barry Bonds - essentially from the most overproduced set of all time - may be worth $1 normally. They go for $150-$250 if they have a PSA 10 grade.

So they invented a separate industry where:
1. They get paid a lot for grading each card (I was curious at the cost and it's something like $25 per 1 card to grade it).
2. They've convinced buyers that a version of the card that's 1% more centered than another should be worth several hundred times more because of it.

I made my peace with it years ago. In fact, today I'm an avid collector. Because I can buy unopened packs of 1980s and 1990s cards for less than what they cost 30 years ago, even before adjusting for inflation! Packs that I bought for $1 a pack in 1980s money cost 50c a pack in 2020s money.

I collect them and enjoy them for what they are. They are a part of my youth, and every card has something interesting about it that's completely unrelated to how much money it's worth.

Yep to all of the above.

I got out of collecting due to the cost and space to put them. I was advised during that time by the guy who owned the card shop around the from my house, "Buy what you like. Do not buy to invest." I took his advice. I never paid top dollar for cards and bought them as memorabilia, never as an investment. Sure, I thought maybe some day I can flip a card I got in a $2.00 pack for $10 or $20, but I never for a minute thought I could make serious money off of my cards.

There's people who thought they could pay for their kids' education with Beanie Babies. How's that working out for them?

[Syd Thrift]

I mean, unless you're a Mieses fanatic it's pretty obvious that bubbles exist. Baseball cards and Beanie Babies both happened in the 90s. Unfortunately for baseball cards it appears that the bubble forever changed the way cards were picked up as well as the way they were made. Of course we all remember when you'd go to the local 7-11 or whatever and pick up a pack of Topps (or if you were cheap Fleer or Donruss) cards and hope that you got some guys on your team. I didn't know anybody who put them in their bike spokes as the meme goes but you kind of didn't treat them super well because, well, they were kind of cheap kids' toys. Then the card boom hit and suddenly you had all these cards that were manufactured to be collectors' items, everyone and their dad got in with putting everything into plastic sleeves, and somewhere along the line the industry became hostile to kids.

Now kids don't buy them even though there *are* card games and so on that kids play/collect/etc. I'm not convinced that this is forever dead to children but a. someone has to decide to make cheapo cards again, which nobody really wants to do, and b. it's at least one reason why the game is losing popularity and trending older and older (even though it's not problematic to play as children the way American football is).

I feel like the answer out of this is for major league baseball to massively expand who gets to make cards for them. Instead, they signed an exclusivity deal, which is going to send them the way of the Madden football series because this is what happens when you create monopolies. People are saying "they aren't sure" that this will be the outcome... well, nothing is for certain but I'm about as sure as I can get about this because this is the nature of monopolies. Madden, your local cable company/ISP, Ma Bell before it was forced to break up... capitalism thrives on competition, and where there is no competition, capitalism is kind of trash.

[Curve Ball Dave]

Originally Posted by Syd Thrift

I mean, unless you're a Mieses fanatic it's pretty obvious that bubbles exist. Baseball cards and Beanie Babies both happened in the 90s. Unfortunately for baseball cards it appears that the bubble forever changed the way cards were picked up as well as the way they were made. Of course we all remember when you'd go to the local 7-11 or whatever and pick up a pack of Topps (or if you were cheap Fleer or Donruss) cards and hope that you got some guys on your team. I didn't know anybody who put them in their bike spokes as the meme goes but you kind of didn't treat them super well because, well, they were kind of cheap kids' toys. Then the card boom hit and suddenly you had all these cards that were manufactured to be collectors' items, everyone and their dad got in with putting everything into plastic sleeves, and somewhere along the line the industry became hostile to kids.

Now kids don't buy them even though there *are* card games and so on that kids play/collect/etc. I'm not convinced that this is forever dead to children but a. someone has to decide to make cheapo cards again, which nobody really wants to do, and b. it's at least one reason why the game is losing popularity and trending older and older (even though it's not problematic to play as children the way American football is).

I feel like the answer out of this is for major league baseball to massively expand who gets to make cards for them. Instead, they signed an exclusivity deal, which is going to send them the way of the Madden football series because this is what happens when you create monopolies. People are saying "they aren't sure" that this will be the outcome... well, nothing is for certain but I'm about as sure as I can get about this because this is the nature of monopolies. Madden, your local cable company/ISP, Ma Bell before it was forced to break up... capitalism thrives on competition, and where there is no competition, capitalism is kind of trash.

Yep to all of the above.

[Leo_The_Lip]

Originally Posted by Syd Thrift

Ma Bell before it was forced to break up... capitalism thrives on competition, and where there is no competition, capitalism is kind of trash.

What today's children forget about Ma Bell is that the monopoly forced them to provide service everywhere--even the sticks. Sure rural folks only got 'party' lines, but they had something. Today much of southwest Virginia (and other rural areas) don't have any internet options from the marvelous competition that doesn't see dollars in bringing service to sparsely peopled areas.

[rudel.dietrich]

Originally Posted by Syd Thrift

I mean, unless you're a Mieses fanatic it's pretty obvious that bubbles exist. Baseball cards and Beanie Babies both happened in the 90s. Unfortunately for baseball cards, it appears that the bubble forever changed the way cards were picked up and how they were made. Of course, we all remember when you'd go to the local 7-11 or whatever and pick up a pack of Topps (or if you were cheap Fleer or Donruss) cards and hope that you got some guys on your team. I didn't know anybody who put them in their bike spokes as the meme goes but you kind of didn't treat them super well because, well, they were kind of cheap kids' toys. Then the card boom hit and suddenly you had all these cards that were manufactured to be collectors' items, everyone and their dad got in with putting everything into plastic sleeves, and somewhere along the line, the industry became hostile to kids.

Now kids don't buy them even though there *are* card games and so on that kids play/collect/etc. I'm not convinced that this is forever dead to children but a. someone has to decide to make cheapo cards again, which nobody really wants to do, and b. it's at least one reason why the game is losing popularity and trending older and older (even though it's not problematic to play as children the way American football is).

I feel like the answer out of this is for major league baseball to massively expand who gets to make cards for them. Instead, they signed an exclusivity deal, which is going to send them the way of the Madden football series because this is what happens when you create monopolies. People are saying "they aren't sure" that this will be the outcome... well, nothing is for certain but I'm about as sure as I can get about this because this is the nature of monopolies. Madden, your local cable company/ISP, Ma Bell before it was forced to break up... capitalism thrives on competition, and where there is no competition, capitalism is kind of trash.

I can't speak about baseball cards. But my son and many of his friends both male and female collect NBA licensed basketball cards.
He and his friends watch hours of Youtube videos of people who have channels dedicated to collecting and showing off their 'pulls'
He listens to two podcasts about the collecting industry.

Maybe he is unique, but I can say that at least some kids are still very much into it.
And the internet very much plays into their hobby.
They can check values anytime they want, connect with others who share their hobby.
And cards are banned at his school, but he has photos of them on his tablet. And he has an app where can track his collection.

That and people our age (I am guessing you and I are roughly the same age) who grew up in the late 80s and 90s and now as adults have more income are what are fueling the hobby.

[ThatSeventiesGuy]

Weird. I figured if Topps ever lost the license, it would at least go to Upper Deck or some company I've heard of. Meh, Topps did themselves in by going the route of charging ever more money for a pack of cards. I miss the bygone days of my youth, when I could get two for a buck. Probably was even less for a lot of you guys.

The good ol' 80s, when Donruss would print enough of those puppies to endanger a Pacific Northwest forest. When three, then four, then five companies were making cards...and then Upper Deck got all upscale, and charged the princely sum of 89 cents a pack! What's wrong with you guys, my grandma ain't made of money!

Remember when it was a hobby for kids? Yeah, it's been a bit. I can't think of the last company that didn't try to milk every last dollar out of sports cards. Maybe Pro Set, but they didn't last long, alas. To heck with those snot-nosed punks, they ain't got any cash!

[joefromchicago]

Can you still buy the slabs of gum that used to come with Topps cards? I need to replace some shingles on my roof.

[Syd Thrift]

Originally Posted by rudel.dietrich

I can't speak about baseball cards. But my son and many of his friends both male and female collect NBA licensed basketball cards.
He and his friends watch hours of Youtube videos of people who have channels dedicated to collecting and showing off their 'pulls'
He listens to two podcasts about the collecting industry.

Maybe he is unique, but I can say that at least some kids are still very much into it.
And the internet very much plays into their hobby.
They can check values anytime they want, connect with others who share their hobby.
And cards are banned at his school, but he has photos of them on his tablet. And he has an app where can track his collection.

That and people our age (I am guessing you and I are roughly the same age) who grew up in the late 80s and 90s and now as adults have more income are what are fueling the hobby.

I'm glad to hear that basketball cards are popular, although that maybe makes things slightly bleaker for baseball, since basketball is clearly followed by younger people more. Still, if the market exists for one sport, it exists for others. I seriously doubt Fanatics is going to spend a lot of money trying to re-expand into that market though because why should they? It's a risk and if they don't take it they still have the (dwindling) baseball card market all to themselves anyway.