What’s it going to take to revitalize the NBA card hobby?

[hermanotarjeta]

I like the idea of tariffing all cards of international players at shows. You want Giannis or Luka? Gotta pay 25% extra.

I’m convinced that will jump start the card popularity of American-born players, which are the majority in the NBA. It would make the basketball hobby rich again.

At least that is what I was told.

[Nomad]

I would hate to see Mathurin, Nembhard, and Siakam on the Pacers get penalized for being Canadian. I mean, they have a few things to teach us.

[minnesotachill]

When Lebron announces his retirement, it will revitalize the card market for a while.

Plenty of people will race to Ebay and scoop up anything they can get their hands on, similar to what happened when Kobe passed.

[anusinha]

Cooper Flagg. As long as there is something to gamble on people will flock to the wax. The degens are all flocking to pokemon right now, they just need something to get a gambling fix on.

[NBAicons]

https://x.com/Will__Stern/status/1907931717928914949

It's funny to come to Blowout and read the gloom-and-doom narrative. And then go to social media and read the hype-it-to-the-moon narrative.

I imagine things are somewhere in between.

[Torro]

Baksetball cards market has been developing an uptrend for at least couple of months. MJ nice stuff (and also some Kobe stuff) are making new record sales. What makes you say "The hoops card hobby is as down as it has ever been"? There are more hobby participants in basketball cards than ever, even more than in 90s. The last month total sale volume on Ebay was basically the same as at the peak of 2021 boom.

You must be talking about new prospects of 2024-25 class or some other ultra modern stuff related to new prospects and hype around them?

[codered]

Originally Posted by Nomad

I would hate to see Mathurin, Nembhard, and Siakam on the Pacers get penalized for being Canadian. I mean, they have a few things to teach us.

Siakam is not Canadian

He is from Cameroon

[tjforce]

Originally Posted by codered

Siakam is not Canadian

He is from Cameroon

Yeah... right next to each other on a map.

[hermanotarjeta]

Originally Posted by Torro

Baksetball cards market has been developing an uptrend for at least couple of months. MJ nice stuff (and also some Kobe stuff) are making new record sales. What makes you say "The hoops card hobby is as down as it has ever been"? There are more hobby participants in basketball cards than ever, even more than in 90s. The last month total sale volume on Ebay was basically the same as at the peak of 2021 boom.

You must be talking about new prospects of 2024-25 class or some other ultra modern stuff related to new prospects and hype around them?

Basketball cards has clearly taken a backseat to football and baseball cards - and we’re entering the nba playoffs.

What exactly are people buying like crazy in basketball out there? For every buyer, there’s a seller who wants to get out.

[hermanotarjeta]

Originally Posted by codered

Siakam is not Canadian

He is from Cameroon

Originally Posted by tjforce

Yeah... right next to each other on a map.

It doesn’t matter what country he’s from - Tariffs either way!

[codered]

I think fanatics moving forward (I have no faith in panini as they ride out) needs to find a way to get a small handful of releases directly into collectors hands at a reasonable price. The over saturation of breakers/breaking as opposed to people opening their own boxes has definitely made the hobby less fun.

These releases need to be reasonably priced with a fixed ceiling. Said product can also not be sold in hobby shops or be used in online breaks with breakers. Fanatics would have to penalize any shops or breakers that try to resell with suspension of product/accounts

It wasn’t that long ago when I new released would come out and the break section would be full of personal breaks of new products. If you posted a break mid day, it would most likely be on the second page by the evening after more people posted their breaks. People enjoy personal in hand breaks, they are a fun experience. It’s a much different experience then watching breaks on line and just picking up the singles you like. Breakers have inflated wax prices to a point where most people realize it doesn’t make much sense to break personal boxes.

[tjforce]

Originally Posted by hermanotarjeta

It doesn’t matter what country he’s from - Tariffs either way!

Can't tell if that that thud is from a mic drop, or from everyone's 401k hitting the floor!!!

[codered]

Originally Posted by tjforce

The poor ROI has also been the way things are pretty much any time other than a brief period between 2017-2020.

Even then, starting in 2019, things got hard to find at SRP.

I think average ROI use to be better pre 2018 than today. Pre 2018 you could wait out a product like certified. You might only get $15-20 worth of cards per box on average but a few months after release that product was $50-60 a box.
You don’t see that today. Price on wax start high and might drop a little but often your getting $20-30 worth of cards from a box north of $200.

Biggest difference on ROI today is there is way more “lottery” cards.

[codered]

Originally Posted by tjforce

Can't tell if that that thud is from a mic drop, or from everyone's 401k hitting the floor!!!

Shhh…..we aren’t supposed to be checking those

[hermanotarjeta]

Originally Posted by tjforce

Can't tell if that that thud is from a mic drop, or from everyone's 401k hitting the floor!!!

Buy da dip!

[mfw13]

The reality is that the card market is over-saturated....there are simply too many products being released, across all sports.

How many cards of any given player does any collector need? I can't even keep track of all the Stephen Curry cards being released, and he's only one of about 8-10 players I PC across all five sports.

That said, I think three things COULD revitalize the NBA segment of the hobby:

- Fanatics buying the rights to Jordan cards from Upper Deck (they can certainly afford to do so)

- the upcoming switch of the exclusive from Panini to Topps, which will allow Topps to create some Heritage/Archives style retro NBA products like they did in the 00's.

- the development of some lower-end product line (i.e. box prices at $100 or less) that collectors could actually afford to buy/rip. The number one factor that keeps many people away from NBA products (myself included) is the lack of affordable wax to rip.

Does Panini release ANY affordable products? Even Donruss, the supposed lowest-end brand, is $250+ for a hobby box!
-

[imbluestreak23]

Michael Rubin will never get access to MJ.

Never

[kipgen]

Originally Posted by mfw13

The reality is that the card market is over-saturated....there are simply too many products being released, across all sports.

How many cards of any given player does any collector need? I can't even keep track of all the Stephen Curry cards being released, and he's only one of about 8-10 players I PC across all five sports.

That said, I think three things COULD revitalize the NBA segment of the hobby:

- Fanatics buying the rights to Jordan cards from Upper Deck (they can certainly afford to do so)

- the upcoming switch of the exclusive from Panini to Topps, which will allow Topps to create some Heritage/Archives style retro NBA products like they did in the 00's.

- the development of some lower-end product line (i.e. box prices at $100 or less) that collectors could actually afford to buy/rip. The number one factor that keeps many people away from NBA products (myself included) is the lack of affordable wax to rip.

Does Panini release ANY affordable products? Even Donruss, the supposed lowest-end brand, is $250+ for a hobby box!
-

More choices of cards for a collector to collect is never a bad thing

[Italy61587]

Affordable (to the average person) products that are worth opening

Most of the trash offering shouldn't even be over a hundred bucks per box

[hermanotarjeta]

It’s interesting to note that superstar cards (Curry and LeBron) numbered to 50 or less can be found for less than $20.

[tjforce]

Originally Posted by hermanotarjeta

It’s interesting to note that superstar cards (Curry and LeBron) numbered to 50 or less can be found for less than $20.

It's great. Most people understand now that you can't just throw a serial number on a junk card and make it valuable.

The same thing drives collectability now as it did 30 years ago: Aesthetics, design, lineage, significance... and then rarity

[mfw13]

Originally Posted by kipgen

More choices of cards for a collector to collect is never a bad thing

Yes and no.

If those choices are noticeably different from each other in terms of price point or design, then yes....more choice is good.

But if all the "choices" are virtually identical, then they become largely irrelevant.

[mfw13]

Originally Posted by tjforce

It's great. Most people understand now that you can't just throw a serial number on a junk card and make it valuable.

The same thing drives collectability now as it did 30 years ago: Aesthetics, design, lineage, significance... and then rarity

If only what you said was true.

Look at what Fanatics did with Heritage HHN.....look at all the gamblers who support breakers.....they all still believe that artificial scarcity = value.

And collectability is becoming largely irrelevant as breakers/gamblers/investors take over the hobby....all that matters is profit potential.....just witness all the people who still prepay for products before checklists are released.

[slyguy]

Originally Posted by BostonNut

Getting the NBA back to a watchable sport would be a good start.

You don't like 75-100 three pointers shot between the teams almost every night? Lol.

[volblorx8634]

Originally Posted by kipgen

More choices of cards for a collector to collect is never a bad thing

I agree. Great time to be a collector. In the last couple weeks I've added a PC gold /10 for $2.25 and a first ballot HOFer parallel /15 for a rainbow for $19.50. Both shipped including tax. That's wild and the great part of the oversaturation/overproduction/hyping/flipping/investment culture of basketball cards now. You can get cards you like for almost nothing, like you said not a bad thing.