Bonus! Bonus! Steve Van Buren, 1950 Bowman.
Player: Steve “Big Boy” Van Buren
Card: 1950 Bowman Gum, Card #23
Team/Position: Philadelphia Eagles / Runningback
Cost: Acquired in a $20.00 Lot
After writing about Steve Van Buren’s Leaf rookie card yesterday, I received a wonderful surprise today: Steve Van Buren’s first Bowman card that doesn’t look like a boring old stock photo.
While the 1950 Bowman set looks a lot better than the earlier efforts, it doesn’t have the intricate team logos that make the ‘51 and ‘52 sets so gorgeous.
I’m currently contemplating putting together the cheaper 1951 Bowman set because of cards like the Van Buren pictured right.
The cards have a good assortment of completely random backgrounds — I mean, Steven Van Buren running through a coniferous forest can’t be touched by modern cards.
Van Buren’s got the ball in his off hand, retaining all three points of contact. Van Buren’s elbow’s a bit wide and the ball’s not as high and tight as we’d like to see but we’ll chalk this up to artistic license.
The market for vintage cards has also stabilized, which doesn’t make for terrific profits in the short-term, but if you’re ever forced to sell off your collection, you’re not going to lose too much money.
If cards are the stock market, than Vintage cards are the blue-chips. Maybe they’ll lose ten-percent based on a poor auction time, but for the most part you’ll get back what you paid for ‘em.
Modern cards on the other hand will absolutely screw you over. Even if a rookie succeeds, unless he’s on pace to break every conceivable record, you’re going to lose money. There’s very little appreciation from early speculative prices.
Even if Sanchez goes onto multiple Pro Bowls, his cards won’t touch the early prices again unless he starts playing like Manning, or winning like Brady. Even then, the cards from Playoff Prestige, Bowman Draft or Upper Deck Draft won’t come close to touching their early prices.
I suppose we just live in a society of instant gratification and pissing contests. Throw in eBay and you’ve got cards going for ridiculous sums of money only to drop in value like a new car driving off the lot.
For the price of a loose pack of just about any product at your local card shop, you can acquire an early-50’s card of a Hall of Famer. The rush of winning a great card at a damn good price should equal that of rippin’ packs. You’re never going to pull that $300 Sanchez though, but you’ll avoid the awful cycle of ripping, selling, using the profits to rip more, and eventually selling more. In the end, you’ll end up with a shit-tonne of base cards and no-name autographed rookies.
If you consider that fun; then, so be it.
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