Nonsense Newsletter No. 78: A May hobby preview, Uncle Ned, cards that stand up on their own, record numbers for PSA & More!
Sponsored by SGC Cards gosgc.com
In this week’s tantalizing edition of the Nonsense Newsletter, John Dudley goes all deep-dive into previewing this month’s hobby happenings. I recount the story of a dear friend, his uncle, and a decent-sized box of memories. PSA continues its record-breaking pace of grading cards, and I take a quick look at cards that don’t need a stand! And, of course, there’s more wonder and excitement in our Quick Hits section. So please, take a gander into this week’s edition of the Nonsense Newsletter!
Contributor: John Dudley
May is already here and that means it is time to see what this month has in store for us hobbyists. It’s not the biggest of months, but there are some exciting products, especially if you like soccer. It’s also a month that is pretty uneven in that most of the releases are at the end of the month.
 Week of 5/1
What I’m excited about: Not Much
It’s a slow start to the month unless you are big into Pokemon. Leaf does have a new product in Multigraphics Basketball which focuses on multiple-signed cards. It has a strong checklist, but collectors have not warmed up to Leaf’s previous sticker-heavy issues. The product does have on-card Bill Russell autos which is awesome and a step in the right direction for the hobby’s upstart producer.
Contributor: John McTaggart
My friend, Brian, recently received a letter from an attorney about a decent-sized box that now belonged to him.Â
There were instructions included on what he needed to do in order to claim this decent-sized box, as well as a deadline date to contact the attorney and set up a pick up time and place for the aforementioned box.Â
Now, Brian is from Arizona, graduated from Arizona State University, got his dream job with one of the auto companies here in the Detroit area, and has called it home for the better part of 25 years now.Â
He’s raised a family in a wonderful neighborhood, been married for more than 20 years, as a pair of daughters, both in their late teens now, and seems to be living the quintessential American dream.
Hockey Card Heroes is a breaking company and card shop specializing in hockey breaks and singles. They provide affordable and great-value hockey breaks and singles in a family-friendly, fun, and entertaining environment that emphasizes the love of the hobby. Oh, did we mention it is run by one of your favorite SCN contributors John McTaggart 🙌
Quick Hits
Hobby News- Topps Now is an underappreciated gem of a program. Topps expanded it to football on NFL Draft night for the first time. Messieurs Young, Stroud, and Levis all got the Topps Now treatment, including autographed offerings. The autographs were offered as packs with each one containing a Young, Stroud, and Levis numbered to /199 or less. The pricing might have been a bit overly optimistic as Topps Now autos normally sell fast but these sat for a while with their $300 price tag. Still, it is good to see their NFL program start.
Vintage- I’m a sucker for odd-ball cards and super-unique stuff, I admit that.So, when I stumbled across this article on Sports Collector’s Daily, I was hooked. In 1964, Topps made a set of baseball cards designed to stand up! Is that sweet or what? This set featured a full length image of a Major League Baseball player that could be folded in such a way that the card actually stood on its own!! How cool is that? Anyhow, if these odd-ball type stuff is something you may be interested in, check out the article here.
Grading News- The monthly grading volume numbers are out and it is good news for PSA. They equaled last month’s record of 1.22 million cards graded in the month. My guess is that is their maximum capacity currently. SGC had a solid 96,000 but dropped a little without the increased volume from their Topps Series 1 sale. Beckett got hit hard, dropping to 56,000. The numbers are even worse for BGS when you dig into it. They are being propped up by their TCG numbers. SGC graded three times as many cards from the main sports as BGS last month. CSG continues to hide their numbers do maintenance on its database. I’ve been predicting a price war for a while and with numbers like this, it is past time for BGS and CSG to get aggressive with their pricing or continue to slowly slide into irrelevancy.
Pop Culture News- It was the movie no one really wanted, and now it is a trading card set. Marvel’s Eternals gets the red carpet treatment from Upper Deck this month. While not the most popular of the Marvel films, the set looks to be the same high-quality offering Upper Deck has had for other Marvel blockbusters. Each box contains one numbered parallel, a film cel card, and then either an autograph, metal, lenticular, or plexi card.Â
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