"The Etiquette of Death in the Hobby" Hobby Quick Hits E219

0:01 Robby Quick Hits delivering that breaking hobby news loads you want to know those Josh card Shop shaff You've got your cover, your host John new Name. Hello, everyone, Welcome to another edition of Hobby Quick Hits. And on today's episode, we're going to talk about, you know, something we've all probably run into or thought about, or made a decision or took a stance on.

0:43 Right. We've had athletes pass away right during their playing days, soon after or even in old age, right, And there's sort of a there's no written rule, but an unwritten rule too whether or not you should sell their cards or be buying their cards, and that sort of thing. And so I'm gonna you know, recently Greg Biffle and his family unfortunately lost his life, lost their life in a plane crash in North Carolina. You know, there's no good time, but how they season makes it even all the more tragic. And I'm not so much a racing collector or dealer, but this came into play and I'll save that for when we get into the main topic.

1:37 But you know, what are the thoughts on selling not selling, you know, refusing to sell when someone dies, especially tragically, right unexpectedly, you know someone you know, Ted Williams dies in his eighties. It's kind of you know, not unexpected, did if you will? Right? Tony Gwyn unfortunately gets cancer and dies way too young. Right, those kinds of situations. While the finale is the same, Uh, the the situation, the circumstances are different. What's the etiquette hobby wise when it comes to that. So that's what this show is going to tackle, uh today And uh, you know, by all means, my door is always open. Let me let me know. Am I wrong? You agree what I'm going to say later or you don't, John, You're wrong, So let me know. There's really this is an opinion based show today, so there's really no wrong answers per se.

2:45 So let me know what you think. As always, let's check out. This week's hobby Wax release is Take It Away Max. Hey guys, it's Maxim Sports here shopping in the weekly releases the next few weeks here. Starting off on the twenty ninth, we have twenty twenty five Tops five Star Baseball. On the thirtieth, we have twenty twenty four twenty five tops UEFA Club Competition's Merlin Chrome Soccer Blaster as well as the Soccer Hat Trick and the Soccer Hobby Boxes, and on the thirty first we have twenty twenty four twenty five tops UFA Club Competitions in Sception Soccer and on the second we have twenty twenty four twenty five five tops UAFA Women's Champion League Chrome Soccer Hobby as well as the Chrome Soccer Sapphire coming out on that day as well for that product. Also in the second we have twenty twenty six try Star Hidden Treasures Autograph footballs, and on the seventh we have twenty twenty five Pinni Immaculate Football, twenty twenty five tops Comb Update Series Baseball Sapphire, and on the seventh we also have twenty twenty six Upper Deck Golf and finally on the ninth we have a bigger lead Prison Football. Enjoy the rest of the show and thank you for tuning it.

4:05 Let's go around the hobby verse and catch up on this week's hobby news. And find out all right, the big news of the week as you probably already know, but just in case, Collectors Universe, parent company of PSA and SGC, is now the parent company of Beckett, buying their grading services or acquiring their their grading services does not include Southern Hobby or dragon Shield. Their supply Southern Hobby distributorship and dragon Shield is the supply side company does not include those, but does include pretty much everything else. So know, there are people up in arms saying that there's a monopoly, including our own New York State Congressman Patrick Ryan, who has petitioned the Federal Trade Commission to look into this acquisition and reverse it or you know, undo it, claiming it's a monopoly. So we'll see if that gets any traction or goes anywhere. Let's get back to the acquisition itself.

5:28 Collectors announce that Beckett much what they said, like with SGC would be run. It would be you know, separate and run individually as well. We've seen some stuff happen at SGC that wasn't on point what was said, So we'll have to see what happens with Beckett, you know. And and just to inject a little opinion here into the new segment, you know a lot of people claimed SGC would be killed off. They are running operational and I still do my bulk subs, not at the bulks up rate, but I still provide the service I still I'm only lost about twenty percent of you know, submissions since the bulk rate went away. I thought that number would be higher, but it isn't. And you know, SGC, like the Ryan, does a great job with that Gemery report.

6:30 But I talked to my guys at SGC and they wanted me to make this known as those numbers are what's going out the door, not what they're getting. So less is going out the door. Some of their grading staff has been poached by PSA, but they are still getting pretty close to the same amount of cards they were. It's just that lesser going out, so it looks like they're getting less. They're just not at that ten to twelve day and they're with less graters on the floor, they're not keeping up with the prior pace. So just keep that in mind when you look at those those numbers, right, it doesn't tell That tells a good portion of story, but it doesn't tell the complete story. So we'll have to see, you know, what comes down the turnpike in both fronts, right, Beckett and SGC. Under the Collector's Universe umbrella, we have a new record for an unsigned card, The Kobe Michael Jordan Exquisite Logo Man from two thousand and three, and the Heritage Winner auction which just closed, wound up with a three point seven million dollars there's a record

8:02 for a unsigned modern card in the same auction. Let's talk about some of the other closings in that auction. A PSA eight fifty two Manuel went for one and a half million dollars. A PSA one and a half of the same card but with Mantal's autograph on the front went for nine hundred and forty five thousand dollars, and a PSA eight Michael Jordan debut ticket from his first game, the highest, greatest, the highest graded version known with that eight designation brought almost just short of three hundred and forty two thousand dollars. So there's some of the highlights from the Heritage Winner auction. Let's talk about you know, the licensing has went back to Fanatic Slash Tops, at least on the basketball side, and they've released their their Chrome audition. Reviews have been mixed but mostly favorable, and of course a lot of one on ones and Gold Logo Man of the three award winners from last year, stuff on Castle SGA and Evan Mobley, so Defensive Rookie

9:34 the Year, Rookie of the Year and MVPH. So those are the chase cards, if you will, from that product. Let's talk about a new Japanese you know, we talked about show Hey, and we're gonna talk about we actually are going to talk about show Hey here in the news. But let's talk about another Japanese import. First, Munataka Murakami coming over. He's signing with the White Sox two years, thirty four million dollars, third basement in Japan. I think he's going to play first base for the White Sox. And he has some cards. Tops Now obviously made a tops Now card with the signing, but he had a you know, tops made some Japanese tops for the Japanese leagues.

10:26 He appears on those cards, and his first card is the traditional Japanese card manufacturer BBM. His first card in twenty seventeen. He has some others, you know, you can check eBay that they've obviously, since the signing is going to cost you a little bit more to acquire those. Let's stay on the Japanese baseball although these this is now Major League Baseball. The twenty twenty five hoped Chrome MVP gold logo men of Shohei Otani signed with the gold logomen One of one obviously just went for three million dollars on fanatics collect So a lot of big money cards on the higher end of the thing. And unfortunately, when you talk big money cards, crime usually isn't very far behind. And on the twenty second of December, which was a Sunday morning most stores are closed for today, three stores across southern California were robbed, including forty four Collectibles in Laverne, which took a twenty thousand dollars loss death days before their New Year's Eve grand opening. Other

11:58 stores in San Gabe and sam Demas were also hit as well. The police believe it is the same person scoping these all out. And this follows on previous six stores in the area in those areas Southern California were robbed uh previously. So this continues a burglary wave in Southern California of hobby and collectible stores. And you know, you know, my my take on this as a former store owner, I just hate to hear about it. I hate that it's happening. You know, there's the terrens. You know shatterproof glass security systems, but nothing is one hundred percent food proof. And it's said that especially this time of year, that someone's put in their their elbow grease, hard work, their own findinantials to to get these stores going, and just someone comes in the middle of night and robs them. I just that really gets me, gets my cross.

13:12 So hopefully the culprits are are apprehended, and not only apprehended, right, they usually catch these guys, but we need to have stronger penalties, right, longer sentences to be deterrents for for future crimes. A lot of times these guys get caught and they get relatively speaking, they get slaps on the wrist and barely serve gail time. And I think that's one of the issues why these keep occurring. Just just my two cents. So hopefully the perpetrator perpetrators are caught and made an example of. So that's the news, all right.

13:57 Today's topic is about the get of the hobby when it comes to a player passing away, and everyone will have a different opinion, like the rules, the unwritten rules, if you will, of how selling up someone who tragically passes away should be handled to no two people necessarily are going to think alike. I don't think anyone's necessarily wrong or right per se. But a recent thing happened which brought us to the forefront for me and made me want to record this episode. And you know many have heard the story with Derman Munson was the first time I realized even what death was, had no idea and was a young Yankee fan. Eventually became a Mets fan, but Derman Munson was my favorite Yankee. Had seen him play at Yankee Stadium, never met him. The news broke that his plane had went down and he was killed.

14:59 I had no idea what means. I had asked my grandfather. He let me know that, you know, Darman had passed away and went to heaven. Explained it in a way that a six or seven year old can't understand, and it hit me like a ton of bricks. I had no idea that there's an ending to us at that time. No I thought we lived, we all lived forever. As we all know, that's not the case. And that's how I learned that wasn't the case was through Thurman Munson's plane crash. It's the first time I've cried over a person's death. I had no at that point, I had no family members who had passed away in attend any wakes or funerals, and that hit me like a ton of bricks. And that's when I learned. And uh, you know, I was very upset, probably for a few days, and then, like a lot of the little kids, you know, you pick yourself up by the bootstraps and keep going, but never forget it. I almost feel like yesterday, even though it's you know, forty over forty years ago, and it's crazy to think, right, I think you should be in the hall. But that's a whole other show in itself, but you know, it's it wasn't the first tragedy where an athlete was cut down in the prime of his career, and unfortunately won't be the last. The most recent, uh you know, Greg Biffel, although I believe he was retired.

16:26 But well, we'll get into that minute in a minute. We've seen, you know, we've seen circumstances where athletes right lived to a ripe old age and then pass away. Willie May's and guys of that Elk and then we've seen you know, the Tony Gwinns and the Kobe Bryants much too soon, Kirby Puckets, and the list goes on and on, Payne Stewart, and you know, and you hate, you hate when it happens, and you know, you always usually if you have a heart and your compassionate, you feel terrible. But what know, hobby wise, what's the etiquette when someone at a fairly young age, whether they're still playing or maybe they recently retired but still young, tragically passes.

17:11 What you know? I've heard people talk about a moratorium where it's, you know, for two weeks, you shouldn't buy yourself a card of that player, right, And I get it. I'm not saying that's wrong. You know, some people say one week, some people say a month. You ask a different hobbyist, you'll get probably a different time frame. Others will tell you, hey, there's no timeframe. Just you know, it's unfortunate that person lost their life, but you have to go on right, business and life has to go on as usual. So there's no real written rule, right, it's just sort of that unwritten etiquette. You know. If you ask me, I'm sort of that two week. I kind of like that. But even that, Like I'm trying to think when when Kobe's, you know, tragically passed with the helicopter. Now, I didn't have a million Kobe's. I didn't have any Kobe autos in my show inventory. But I was doing shows, and if memory serves me correct, I didn't pull any you know, Kobe's out of my case, and I didn't change any prices. I just kept him in there, and if someone wanted them, they bought them. Again.

18:19 I didn't have a ton to begin with, so you know, but let me let me tell you what pretty what sort of instigated or brought this episode on. So you may have heard this past week Greg Biffle. I believe he's in the NASCAR Hall of Fame. I believe he's retired, his wife and two kids, and I think a few others aboard a private plane that crashed in North Carolina on all tragically lost their life. I believe he was in his late forties, early fifties. And you know, I'm not a racing fan. I know some race car drive, you know, I know the sport a little bit, but I'm no expert by any stretched imagination. My personal collection when it comes to racing consists of some unopened wax that I purchased and just socked away. As far as single cards go, I don't own any. I don't have any in my PC. However, about four or five years ago I bought a collection, as I sometimes do, and that collection contained just a bunch of mishmash of cards from different genres, right, Baseball, football, hockey, I think there was even some soccer cards, some nonsports, and then there was a probably about fifty to seventy five racing cards.

19:39 And what I do, I use a different selling platforms, but one of them being sport Lots. Sports Lots as a platform I use for at the lesser valued stuff, right, a lot of base cards, commons that sort of things. You can list them for eighteen to twenty cents on the low end, and then anywhere on based on the card or whatever you want to ask for. So I had these seventy five assorted racing cards, all different things. There are some prison in there, There was some Victory Lane, it was just a hodgepodge, a couple of autograph cards. There was a couple like sheet metal cards and what have you, and I just listed those on there. Again, this is you know, probably five or six years ago, and forgot about them, right, Like we do a lot of things, and you know, I don't sell a ton on sports lots, but you know, almost every day I get an email that you know, package up your this item has these items have sold, right. And so since I listed those racing cards, which is again probably five to six years ago, you know, I've sold soccer cards, I sold hockey cards, baseball cards, football, good ones, champions basketball, pretty any John Rife listed on there has sold. And I don't mean this to be sound as derogative towards racing, but none of those seventy five cards that I listed that were NASCAR sold not a one. To the point sometimes I'm even looking through it. I'm like, I've never sold,

21:12 you know, a racing a racing card. So here we are, five or six years later after I listed I'm not even thinking about it, right, The news comes across my phone about the tragic plane crash. Greg Biffle has passed away, and I kid you not. Not five minutes after that notification came across my phone, a notification came across my phone that I have a sports lot message. And that's how they let you know there's any issues if something's sold. They don't tell you what the message and tails they just say, check your sports lot inbox, you have a message. So I went to sports Lots, opened the message and didn't even know I had it, folks. To be quite honest, but Greg Biffle autograph card that I had listed at eight bucks five or six years ago, got the notification that it's sold, and like I said, it's literally five minutes after the news came across my phone that he had passed away. It's the only card that was bought out of all the seventy five racing cards listed. I went to my box where I have where I thought that card should be my sports Monster boxes, could not find it. Don't know if I moved it, don't know.

22:26 If you know, I don't know, I don't know. And then I thought about it, like I just said, you know, and it's not I just said, I'm not comfortable. This is probably someone and again I don't know what one hundred percent certainly, but I feel very comfortable saying this is someone that got the news that Greg Biffle died. Went on. Who knows how many platforms look for Greg biffle stuff, probably mostly autograph stuff, and said, man, eight bucks for a dead guy's autograph and click by, and I'm just not comfortable selling that in no situations. So and plus I couldn't locate this card. I'm still looking for it. And if and when I find it, it's not going to be sold. I'm going to keep it.

23:08 Someone says, oh, John, you're not selling it because it's only eight bucks. Now. It has nothing to do It's principal over price has nothing to do with the cost of that card. Could be fifty bucks, could be a dollar, it doesn't matter. Just I feel like someone just taking advantage of the situation. Now, if there were three or four other racing cards in with that purchase, and this maybe is a racing would look more like a racing fan rather than someone jumping on this because that person just died with his family in a plane crash. You know, maybe I would have felt differently, But I just didn't feel comfortable. I'm not doing it right. I'm not going on there trying to buy a bunch of cheap Greg Bilful autograph cards. I just I didn't feel comfortable. I felt kind of that it's sort of a sleazy thing to do, and maybe I'm wrong. Again, this is one person's opinion. And so I couldn't find the card, and I wound up having to just go to sports Lot and say, could not locate the card. But you know, one transparency, I'm not a phony person. I will tell you even if I had found the card, I would not.

24:18 I just don't feel comfortable selling it when I feel like it's just because he had died five minutes or you know, it was announced five minutes prior to that sale that he had passed away. I just I just think that's sort of kind of cruddy, kind of cringey, and I just don't want to be part of that, on either side buying anything or selling it. And so you know, again I haven't found the card. It's I've got a lot. You know, there's some boxes in here I got to get through, and uh, and even if I find it, it's just gonna sit in there. I've obviously taken the card off of sports Lot, which is the only place that was listed on in the first place.

25:00 And you know, I'm just not I'm not comfortable partaking in that. Am I wrong? Am I right? What? Say? You? You know, I just think it's you know, I think too, especially when it's someone of lesser star value, right, you know. And I don't mean any disrespect to Greg Biffle, but Greg Biffle is not Kobe Bryant or Willie Mays, you know, or other athletes we've we've lost in recent years. He's still a great human being who was very philanthropic. I was reading a great person that will be missed by by many raising fans and otherwise, and again, I just I thought it was just kind of sleazy five minutes right after that and just not gonna. I'm not going to be on either side of that out buying or selling of someone's debt. So, uh, that card is somewhere, maybe here, I'm assuming, but it's going to remain here.

25:57 I'm not going to profit often. I don't feel like other peop people should jump on someone's death and do it. What say you? Is there an etiquette? Is there an unwritten rule that you follow or believe in or think there should be. I know the most common one I've heard is when a player passes away, you know, there's a two week I know on a lot of the online platforms like Facebook message boards, someone passes away, they'll say no, Willie mace Cart's listed for sale for two weeks. Please just sort of the etiquette there that the online world has sort of embraced. You know, do you agree with that? Do you think there should be no unwritten rule?

26:38 Just it is what it is? What say you? Where do you fall? Am I wrong for doing what I did? You know? Let me have it like I you know, I don't feel terrible, but maybe you know? Let me know what you think? What would have you done the same situation? Would you've done what I did? Something else, something in between? What? What say you? Let me know where you stand on something like this, because it's it's just an interesting topic when it happens. And and again it's there's no set rule, it's just what somebody uh is comfortable with? I guess. So where do you? Where do you fall here? Where do you weigh in at? Thanks? Thanks for listening and we'll see you next time. Let me know. Thank you