Michael Jordan Market Thoughts, By Clippersfan3

Taken from Hobby Kings:

I personally do not think the Michael Jordan market as a whole is in a bubble. I don’t think it’s anything close. Personally, I don’t think we have seen anything yet in terms of prices. I think things are going to get a lot crazier.

I think certain cards are in bubbles.

I think the Playmakers is an easy card to explain.

It’s not worth $4000. Sure there were a couple sales but for one reason or another there may have been 2-3 people that were willing to pay any price. They have gotten what they wanted and have likely moved on. Since there is no longer support over $3000 the price is going to drop at the next support level.

I think this MJ movement is a perfect storm:

These are the elements that are contributing to this phenomenon.

1. Card designs are stale and bland.

2. Every good idea has been grossly overproduced resulting in destroying the market for that idea… ie low numbered cards, 1/1’s, autos, jerseys, etc… many of the cards that have MJ’s likeness from the 90’s were only done once and in some cases twice. Obviously certain sets were done over and over again such as the credentials but I think thats an anomaly.

3. I personally believe there were many people collecting basketball cards during the late 90’s then there are today. Basketball cards were “IT” during this time. Baseball was still recovering from the 94 strike and football was and still is an American only sport. I would go to shows and every table was mainly basketball. Today there are many non-basketball sports card tables at shows. It seems a lot of people gave up arond the time I did… early 2000’s. It seems a lot have come back. Most of us that were teenagers in the 90’s are now in our mid-late 20’s. We now have disposable income to buy silly things like basketball cards. Our purchasing power will only increase as we get older. Due to the reasons above many of us who have come back don’t like whats going on in todays cards and have shifted back to the cards from when we were younger. I think this is a much bigger reason for all this then is given credit for.

4. This last one is my personal opinion. I have been meaning to make a thread about it but haven’t figured out how I want to approach it. But here goes. What is up with Panini and retired players? It seems that every break I see, half the cards are of retired players. Personally, I don’t open Panini because I don’t want to pull cards of guys from 20+ years ago. If I want to get those cards I’ll find that wax. I buy modern wax to get modern players. I really think that turns a lot of people off toward buying modern product. I have no reasoning to think this way but to me it makes sense. This could also be a reason for a 90’s resurgence. Maybe people would rather have a Patrick Ewing card from 98 and not some half donkey design from a 10-11 product.

Many people not only consider MJ to be the greatest basketball player of all time but there are many who buy into the notion that he is the greatest athlete ever. Even ESPN did a special about a decade ago and said this. It was called the 50 greatest athletes of all time.

People who have a lot of money to throw around and want to buy trendy collectibles are not likely to go toward basketball cards. However, they will want the best and if they want the “best athlete” ever they will gravitate toward MJ. Not to mention the cards from his playing days look amazing. It’s hard to not get sucked in.

This hasn’t been mentioned at all but I think is worth discussing. MJ is around 50 years old now. What do you think is going to happen when he is no longer with us? What if it is 20 years from now and the collectors of my generation are in there mid-40’s. I think we will see an explosion in prices like never before.

Lastly, my main reason why I don’t think this is a bubble.

Every time there is a bubble there is one thing that is consistent.

People create bubbles because they are trying to make money. People were buying tech stocks in the late 90’s to make a flip. They weren’t trying to collect them.

The housing market in the US crashed for many reasons but it seems there were more people trying to make money off housing then were trying to buy a house for the sole reason to live in it. Obviously those who were the “collectors” in this scenario got hosed.

I think there are far more people collecting these cards then trying to make a buck.

There are cards that I have been watching for years and when they were at $50 there were many to be had. It was not uncommon for there to be 6-7 listed at a time. Now some of these cards trade in the $200-$250 range yet some of them don’t show up for weeks.

I have a couple MJ’s that I acquired in the last several months that have suddenly tripled in value but where is the selloff? The more expensive they become the harder they become to find.

It seems that the number of MJ collectors is growing more and more and many cards are getting locked away.

It’s a bubble if the MJ PMG sells for $11K and suddenly 20 pop up on ebay in the coming days/weeks. That would be a big selloff yet every time a new record is established there is no selloff.

Take two other players for example: Blake Griffin and Derrick Rose. It seems that most people buying those cards were buying to flip. This was illustrated when peak prices were acheived and there was a massive selloff thus crashing those individual markets. Since all the flippers have left and made their money all that is left are the collectors and potential future flippers. Now those cards are selling at there current support levels.

The only way I see the overall Jordan crashing is if all these people are buying to flip and I can’t imagine all these people are going to sit on these cards for years to make a buck. Most people aren’t that patient. There are flippers but it seems there are far more collectors.