Trend?

[warsawknuckles]

Okee... so i have a weakness for one particular card... 06/07 Parkhurst Captains autograph of Scott Stevens. The one in the Blues uniform. I know they are supposed to be short printed and super hard to find, I own 2 of them from 10 years of being mildly on the lookout for them.

I came across 2 different listings for this card on ebay within the last few days. One was listed for $200 with a Best Offer, which given what i have paid in the past is an absolute steal, the two i have were around $300, give or take a few bucks. I waited until the auction had a few hours left and shot an offer for $150 dlvd. It was accepted within an hour or so, and i was happy.

So i suppose the question is, and i am sure there were factors involved in the listing that may have influenced the sale price, but... these cards are scarce. They aren’t the Lemieux or Beliveau from the same set, but they are tough. And I don’t think that any have been unearthed and introduced via epack to the collecting world... so is this a trend? Scarce modern issues pricing downward?

Now to work on the second one...

And are all of these particular Stevens autos cut off center? The ones i have are graded BGS 8.5 because of the centering, would be 9 or 9.5 if not for this subgrade. And the one i just bought was visibly off center.

 

[odjickfan]

On limited singles like this, once the set builders and player collectors got their copy, price goes down.

 

[30ranfordfan]

Yup. This is it.

Scott Stevens. Great player, HOFer, desirable autograph - at least to some degree.

If you collect HOFers, you want a Stevens auto... and probably one that's hard singed. Lots of ways to check that box off spending under $30 though, I'm sure.... so if you want to plunk down $200 on a card, you're saving that for Gretzky, etc.

So who is going to pay top dollar for a Stevens autograph?? Player collectors that desperately want that card, or set builders.

So how many Stevens collectors want that card, and don't already have one? How many set builders are still actively working on the set and need it?

On limited singles like this, once the set builders and player collectors got their copy, price goes down.

 

[primetimepawich]

It's all that, and general depreciation. Outside of a few names, modern cardboard just doesn't hold its value, and even the market for some of the legendary names of the past has softened because they're just too overproduced. Each new year brings more "limited" autos and GU cards of the same players, to the point where they're not a novelty anymore.

Your Stevens autos are just as limited as they were 10 years ago, but 10 years later, nobody cares. To get your earlier copies, you paid the cost of doing business against Stevens and set collectors. Did you do the right thing? Seeing as you hadn't seen any other copies in around 10 years since, plus given the fact you never know when or if you'll see another copy of a short-printed card, I would say yes. But now, it's a different landscape, and you shouldn't expect to pay 06/07 prices (or sell at them if you chose to go that route).

I'm glad you got this latest copy at a price that was trending in the right direction and worked for you, but the $200 BIN/OBO might have been the seller's "pipe dream" price, and maybe they would've gladly accepted even less than you offered. The key is that you're both happy. I would just suggest that if going after other copies of this card in future, don't base anything on your original copies - temper your expectations of what you think you should have to pay. You might be surprised.

Joe Pawich

 

[TanguayFan]

I had one and sold it for around $200, IIRC, so $150 is not far off.

Set builders drove the price of those particular cards, and TBH, a lot of people have probably given up on the set after so many years, which is going to lead to severely decreased demand.

 

[TADontAsk]

For what it's worth, I got my copy in April 2010, in an eBay auction, for $191.45. The listing price you saw appears to be in line with that. If there were copies selling for $300, maybe it was closer to the release date.

I'll have to check later to see if mine is centered.

On a side note, that PWCC search tool is pretty great, but it doesn't list the results from this auction, even though it should go back to 2004. Plus, it has two other copies of this card listed as having sold for between $40 and $45, and nothing above that. So I don't know what to make of that tool.