Topps fucked up Bowman Chrome baseball card release - causes huge $$ chase

[Daly]

A fun side to gambling is sports cards. And unlike 20-30-40 years ago the “modern” hobby is picking up (baseball) players right when they are drafted (or signed, international) In the Bowman product these cards are marked with a “1st” in the upper corner. Even more rare are the 1st cards that are autographed.

Even more rare than an autographed card is a refractor card. A base non numbered auto 1st there can be 1000 plus of. Bowman has a numbering convention based by color. So a blue has 150, green is 100, yellow is 75, gold is 50, orange is 25, red is /5………

But the real “chase” is known as the “superfractor”. Its made out of a gold vinyl and is 1/1.

The yankees prospect “the martian” Jasson Dominguez Bowman 1st autographed Superfractor was bought by a speculator for $474,000. This was 2 years before he hit his first HR in the bronx.

I was lucky enough to pull a Bo Nix (QB Oregon) Superfractor out of Bowman U football and I sold it within 2 hours for 3,500. So to put it mildly superfractors are a huge deal to collectors.

Welp they fucked up….



So in english there are 95 1/1 cards out there that are 2/1 and to keep the sanctity of the 1/1 Topps/Bowman is offering over 300K in bounties to buy back one of the two cards, first come first serve.

The #1 chase is Ethan Salas the #5 prospect in MLB who plays for AA San Diego Padres. His buy back alone is $75K

This was all announced tonight and prices for cases have jumped $600 a case or $50 a box instantly.

Should be fun to watch how this turns out.

[Daly]

Of course the dumb shits at topps didnt think to check ebay before they dropped this….. would habe saved themselves $1k

Sold for 2,000 5 min after announcement



3,000 bounty

[Daly]

https://www.topps.com/pages/bowman-chrome-buyback

[gut]

https://www.topps.com/pages/bowman-chrome-buyback

Curious your opinion, but I think it would be crazy to sell back anything for less than 10k. "Error" cards, if the kid makes it (and maybe even if they dont) will be worth a fair amount.

[desertrunner]

I’m not into the baseball card world, but find it interesting. Thank you for sharing.

[Daly]

https://www.topps.com/pages/bowman-chrome-buyback

Curious your opinion, but I think it would be crazy to sell back anything for less than 10k. "Error" cards, if the kid makes it (and maybe even if they dont) will be worth a fair amount.

This is definitely a “take the money” situation. These arent a true error card per se, its a fuck up.

Lot of people are saying they may have either done this purposely or even if they didnt managed in a way to bring them in even more money.

There is a 1/1 babe ruth card in this set in a red sox uniform. One of the largest wholesalers of cards put a 200K bounty out on that card. This is similar to the 200k for Druw Jones in 2023 bowman that was paid out. Until these huge cards are found collectors buy up boxes at a much higher rate and expense than products without the bounty. Between the Ruth and this 300K thats a half million dollars on the table for collectors to chase. Its like a glorified scratch ticket.

A case of 12 boxes was selling for ~4500. This equates to roughly 70M for Bowman if they sell out. If prices go up $500 its an extra $8.3M in their pocket.

In other words….. if they planned this it would be a brilliant marketing.

[DJ_Chaps]

YALL SEE THE PANINIS FOUND IN THE TRASH COMPACTOR?

[PositiveVariance]

Interesting. Thanks for posting.

I was a big card collector as a child in the 90's. As fun as it was, I just couldn't get back into it as an adult during this last reemergence of collecting.

As an adult, I have realized just how -EV the hobby is, especially when buying new boxes/packs.


The math:

$300,000 in Bounties
186,666 Boxes

$300k ÷ 186,666 boxes = $1.60 per box additional EV.

At a $50 additional increase, this is -48.40 per box. -96.80%. This is ON TOP of the already high -EV on opening new packs.

There are HUGE YouTube channels who's content is simply opening (called "cracking" or "busting") packs/boxes live on YouTube. This has become very popular to watch them open packs live. They have even taken a content idea from YT slot channels, an event called "Group Pulls", where many viewers pool their money and the YT channel operator does the actual playing, while the investors watch online. Except sending you cash, they send you whatever specific number card was assigned to you prior to the event.

I wish I could find this particular video I watched awhile back, a guy made a video of the expected value of buying boxes, then reselling the cards. Since it's known how many cards and card types are out there, the math wasn't that difficult. He then used current online selling prices of these cards. I don't remember the final number, but it's obviously highly -EV. Wish I could locate it.

It's to bad, because "breaking" packs is a lot of fun. I guess as long as someone doesn't expect to make a long term profit, it's no different than -EV casino gambling, where you are "paying" for the cost of your entertainment.

Also, if you do get into the hobby, only buy from reputable vendors (don't buy on eBay) as some of these people open and reseal packs or worse they "weigh" each pack with a high quality scale to determine which packs contain the premium cards (many premium cards have a slightly different weight than commons).

[PositiveVariance]

It's amazing at how many bounties have been claimed already. The status for each card is listed as either "Unclaimed, Claimed, or Pending". Many cards are in the Claimed or Pending status.

Including $75K for Ethan Salas



How did the card collecting community not catch this prior to the announcement?

I'm assuming the 2023 card packs have been sold since at least January, if not before? Prior to the Internet, they could have printed 100 of each and it may have never been discovered. In this day and age, no doubt 2 of the same cards will eventually be offered for sale simultaneously, and there would be questions.

[aayjay]

If your going to buy and collect baseball cards it better just be because you enjoy the hobby, just like almost all collectibles, just pick what you like or your going to waste a ton of time & money doing something -ev and boring. Similar to coins , stamps, etc , overall -ev heavily. You can find a niche and exploit it but not for long. Cool limited Lego sets were +EV might still be, but wont be forever

[desertrunner]

DRUFF- can you please cover this topic on PFA radio?

[Daly]

Interesting. Thanks for posting.

I was a big card collector as a child in the 90's. As fun as it was, I just couldn't get back into it as an adult during this last reemergence of collecting.

As an adult, I have realized just how -EV the hobby is, especially when buying new boxes/packs.


The math:

$300,000 in Bounties
186,666 Boxes

$300k ÷ 186,666 boxes = $1.60 per box additional EV.

At a $50 additional increase, this is -48.40 per box. -96.80%. This is ON TOP of the already high -EV on opening new packs.

There are HUGE YouTube channels who's content is simply opening (called "cracking" or "busting") packs/boxes live on YouTube. This has become very popular to watch them open packs live. They have even taken a content idea from YT slot channels, an event called "Group Pulls", where many viewers pool their money and the YT channel operator does the actual playing, while the investors watch online. Except sending you cash, they send you whatever specific number card was assigned to you prior to the event.

I wish I could find this particular video I watched awhile back, a guy made a video of the expected value of buying boxes, then reselling the cards. Since it's known how many cards and card types are out there, the math wasn't that difficult. He then used current online selling prices of these cards. I don't remember the final number, but it's obviously highly -EV. Wish I could locate it.

It's to bad, because "breaking" packs is a lot of fun. I guess as long as someone doesn't expect to make a long term profit, it's no different than -EV casino gambling, where you are "paying" for the cost of your entertainment.

Also, if you do get into the hobby, only buy from reputable vendors (don't buy on eBay) as some of these people open and reseal packs or worse they "weigh" each pack with a high quality scale to determine which packs contain the premium cards (many premium cards have a slightly different weight than commons).

Download “Whatnot”.

Its primarily a card breaking app (you can shop for clothes and sneakers too). Im on there a lot shooting off $$ on baseball cards. Its a lot of fun but the place is ripe with scams and games that would make a carnival workwe blush. You need to know what you are doing.

There is a whatnot room called “backyard breaks” druff could spend 3 months of radio on. They started off pre covid with a backyard game selling on facebook. $29 game they bought from china for $3. Covid came allong and broke them. The same guys got together and turned to selling cards. During the covid years the market exploded. They became the largest room on whatnot and sell millions of dollars of cards including the most high end premium cards going. They are run by “Bro Culture” age guys but somehow the ownership level guys are all millionaires now.

[Daly]

So they fucked up and made two…….





Whoooops….

[PositiveVariance]

As the kids like to say, this could be a nice way to get "Clout" for the accounts involved, or even better, drive the price of the card up substantially.

Send someone else in the card community a picture of your card and have them claim they found it. The Card manufacturer would almost have to answer for it.

[gut]

As the kids like to say, this could be a nice way to get "Clout" for the accounts involved, or even better, drive the price of the card up substantially.

Send someone else in the card community a picture of your card and have them claim they found it. The Card manufacturer would almost have to answer for it.

I think ultimately here, is this is a market that has priced out common people from joining, and will probably just keep going in its cyclical nature of value.

Seems like what I have heard of the shoe market now, basically the average consumer is 3rd in line, after the producers and the Re-sellers.

[Daly]

As the kids like to say, this could be a nice way to get "Clout" for the accounts involved, or even better, drive the price of the card up substantially.

Send someone else in the card community a picture of your card and have them claim they found it. The Card manufacturer would almost have to answer for it.

All three were pulled live on video by a breaker.


I guess its not imposable that its a ruze but I think its way more likely they fucked this up worse than they thought.