Sunday, March 18, 2018

I Like My $15 Card Better Than Your $700 Card

There are a lot of collectors who are enamored with the newest Angels pitcher/hitter Shohei Ohtani, or the Japanese Babe Ruth.  He was both a good hitter and pitcher in the Japan Pacific League the last few years.  His crossing over to Major League Baseball was one of the biggest stories during this offseason.  Anytime a noted names moves across the Pacific Ocean card collectors seem to take note with their wallets.

Exhibit A.




$700 plus for an autograph from the 2018 Topps Heritage set.  Seems like a lot for a player who has not taken a single regular season at-bat, or thrown a single regular season pitch.  Ohtani has thrown innings and taken at-bats during Spring Training.  They have not gone so well.  He is hitting .100 at the moment and has struck out almost one-third of the time.  Ohtani has also pitched a little more than 2 innings and given up 9 runs.

Not exactly the type of player who would have a large card budget in my collection.  Even if he were a Cardinals player, or made an appearance on the Durham Bulls, I would pass him by without a thought at the moment.

I felt like there were better uses of my money in the Topps Heritage set this year.  Namely, there is an autograph of Cardinals prospect Jack Flaherty.  It's a nice looking card, but more importantly there is a pretty good chance that Flaherty is going to be a pretty nice pitcher......




even if his first time around in the Majors could have been a little bit better.  

He has a nice looking card in Heritage too......




and for around $15 this seems to be a little bit more sound of an investment.  Flaherty does have an ERA of almost 5 in Spring Training, but he also has 20 strike outs in just 13 innings.   Swings and misses are always a good thing with pitching prospects.  I am guessing that Flaherty ends up in Memphis to start the season, but at some point he will end up on the Cardinals.  Just a hunch, but I am guessing my $15 card might end up being a little bit better than your $700 card.  

4 comments:

  1. I'll never understand that kind of prospecting (if that's what it is). You could get at the very least, signed cards of Aaron, Mays and Griffey for that price. Maybe I'm just living in a different world.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You could not only get some great autographs for that amount of money. Not only that, but I have no idea how Ohtani could maintain that sort of value long term.

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  2. I'd love to sit down and talk to the guy (or girl) who paid $700 for that Ohtani. Like Hackenbush said... you could easily buy autographs of Aaron, Mays, and Griffey... and probably have money left over for a Koufax too.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You could put together a pretty nice package of autographs for that amount of money.

      Delete

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