I’ve been collecting baseball cards since the early 90s.
My collection includes cards from 1990 all the way up to 2022. I like vintage stuff, too, but I don’t have the kind of money necessary to get into that part of the hobby.
This post is about my four favorite baseball cards. Some of them have some financial value, but all of them are meaningful to me as part of my lifelong collection.
1 – 1990 Topps #414, Frank Thomas Rookie Card
I got this card in a trade with my friend Dan. I gave him five “valuable rookies” (hey, at the time, Ramon Caraballo and Matt Walbeck were considered valuable) in exchange for this one.
That was an innocent time when volume counted more than quality.
I kept this card in a sleeve and in a binder and didn’t even remember I had it for like twenty years. It’s in great condition, though I’m not smart enough to know if its worthy of grading or not.
If I did have this graded at a major house like PSA, and if it earned a 10, it would probably sell right now for $100 or so at the most. My love for the card doesn’t have anything to do with its value.
I liked Frank Thomas because he’s the one power-hitter to come out of the Steroid Era totally clean. Frank did what Frank did totally naturally. That’s impressive considering his stats.
2 – 1990 Topps #336, Ken Griffey, Jr. All-Star Rookie Card
You can call it junk wax all you want, but this card is a beautiful piece of my childhood.
A copy of this card graded a perfect 10 by PSA sold recently for $750. Mine wouldn’t earn that rating – the centering is a little off and one of the corners is soft. I’m not sure I’d have it graded even if I could, because the slab would get in the way of making physical contact with the card. That’s my favorite part, actually touching this piece of my past.
KGJ’s rookie season is the stuff of legend. When I hold this card, I remember my early days of collecting, ripping $1 packs behind the hobby shop with my buddies and chasing my favorite players.
I’ll always love this card for the way it shocks me back into my early teen years.
3 – 2011 Bowman Sterling #15, Jose Altuve Rookie Card, Purple Refractor (#9/10)
Jose Altuve is one of my favorite players of all time.
This Bowman Sterling rookie card issue is the rarest Jose Altuve card on the market. Sterling collecting isn’t really about the base cards, it’s all about those autographs. That’s what makes this base Altuve RC one of the hardest-to-find cards of the future Hall of Famer.
The fact that only 10 of these cards was printed adds to its allure.
I’ve only ever seen one other version for sale. It was on eBay, listed for like $2,500, ungraded.
Not only is this one of my favorite cards, but it’s also probably the most-valuable piece of cardboard that I own.
4 – 1991 Stadium Club #200, Nolan Ryan “Tux” card
Stadium Club’s photography is second to none. Though these early 90s sets (among the first the company produced) are much maligned by modern investors, they’re huge memory markers for me, and I love looking at them.
Nolan Ryan’s 1991 Stadium Club card is famous for showing one of the greatest pitchers of all time winding up in a tuxedo against a very-90’s marbled background. It’s probably my favorite card of the junk wax era – so bold, so cheeky, and so funny.
Plus, the man could shove. Go marvel at his stats a little. He pitched 222 complete games in 27 years, averaging 8 a year. Today’s pitchers may not through 8 complete games in their entire careers. Nolan Ryan threw 5,714 strikeouts, almost 1,000 more in his career than the next-best pitcher. His many records are too long to list here. Many of them will never be broken.
This card has a permanent place in my wall display. It’s gorgeous and it has a great story.
Conclusion
At the end of the day, my collection is worth a lot more to me in memories than it is in money.
I’m sure my wife wouldn’t mind if I sold some of my collection and put the cash to better use.
The four cards listed here give me no end of joy. I love adding to my collection but appreciating the cards I already own is even more satisfying.
