[LAP-news] Fwd: The High-Stakes Trading Card Chase
Mark Rauterkus
mark.rauterkus at gmail.com
Sun May 18 16:41:56 EDT 2025
We should make trading cards.
Coaches
Teams
Swimmers
Skills
--
Ta.
Mark Rauterkus *Mark.Rauterkus at gmail.com <Mark.Rauterkus at gmail.com>*
Mark at Rauterkus.com <--- causing lots of missed messages, sadly.
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and other sites <https://HUB.CLOH.org>: SKWIM.us, U CAN Swim
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Coach at The Ellis School for Varsity & Middle School Swimming
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New course: Mental Skills for Young Athletes
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From: Front Office Sports <info at frntofficesport.com>
Date: Sun, May 18, 2025 at 7:11 AM
Subject: The High-Stakes Trading Card Chase
To: mark.rauterkus at gmail.com <mark.rauterkus at gmail.com>
Young collectors are on a mission to score ultra-rare, big-money cards.
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Sunday Edition
May 18, 2025
Ultra-modern and rare cards are driving Gens Z and Alpha into the sports
collectibles market. They’re breaking open packs on a mission for unique,
numbered cards, sometimes spending thousands on rising digital
marketplaces. There’s little sentimentality here: “They just want that
excitement of the chase,” one 23-year-old collector tells *FOS
*contributor Greg
Bates <https://fos.cmail20.com/t/t-l-gasuy-jyqiyjjtl-j/>.
—Meredith Turits <https://fos.cmail20.com/t/t-l-gasuy-jyqiyjjtl-t/>
Young Collectors Are on a High-Stakes Chase for Ultra-Rare Trading Cards
AA Mint Cards
Josh Richter dropped more than $150,000 on three MLB trading cards during a
single week in early May. One cost him $85,000: a 2024 Topps Update Rookie
Debut Patch Auto (RDPA) 1-of-1 with a Kanji signature of Chicago Cubs
pitcher Shota Imanaga.
But that’s fairly typical for Richter. The 24-year-old deals full-time in
high-end cards that he either flips right away because of their instant
demand or keeps in his personal collection. His two other purchases that
week were a 2022 Topps Chrome Gilded rookie autograph 1-of-1 of Kansas City
Royals superstar Bobby Witt Jr. ($50,000) and a 2024 Bowman Draft Sapphire
autograph numbered to 5 of Royals rookie Jac Caglianone ($15,000).
Richter—who owns 14 RDPA cards from 2024, which is the top card for a
rookie since it contains a game-worn patch from their first MLB
appearance—has become a major player in a market filled with experienced
collectors and flippers. Even at 24, he holds his own in an industry that’s
projected to be valued at $2.75 billion by 2033
<https://fos.cmail20.com/t/t-l-gasuy-jyqiyjjtl-i/>—a nearly $1.3 billion
jump from its 2023 figure.
[image: Josh Richter dard collection]
Josh Richter
“It’s a lot of investing and it’s a lot, I guess, gambling in a sense,” San
Diego-based Richter tells *Front Office Sports*. “I’m investing a lot into
prospects and some of their best cards to ever be produced and hoping that
they pan out to be the Mike Trouts and Ronald Acuñas of the game. Then
there’s also a lot of the buying players I just like. … It’s a mix of
buying low to hopefully sell high in a short period of time or buy low and
sell high in a long period of time.”
Most young collectors aren’t all in on high-end transactions like Richter.
But on a smaller scale, interest in trading cards is high among Gen Z and
the younger Gen Alpha. They’re particularly on a mission for numbered,
rare, and ultra-modern cards, manufactured in the past eight years.
The chase is on in large part because these young fans have a different
portal into collectibles than their predecessors. With more than card
shops, Gen Z and Alpha collectors are all in on the massive marketplaces of
eBay, Fanatics Collect, and other online shops: a veritable smorgasbord to
find exactly what they want—and what others may not even know is out there.
And they’re willing to spend.
------------------------------
Ezra Levine, CEO of Mascot, a leading trading card marketplace and
inventory-management company, estimates thousands of Gen Z and Alpha
collectors use the Mascot app—he doesn’t have specific demographic data.
(Mascot also supports other types of trading cards, like Pokémon, which are
also hugely popular with young collectors.)
“The interest is clearly very high,” Levine tells *FOS*. “These are
tangible, cultural items. The technology and the ability to both transact
and engage with them has really increased.” It’s now far easier, he says,
“for these kinds of digital native demographics to participate in
collectibles.”
[image: AA Mint Hobby Shop]
AA Mint Cards
Aaron Amarant, along with his dad, Mark, opened the AA Mint Cards hobby
shop in Cooper City, Fla., in late 2021. Amarant, freshly 23 years old, is
now running the successful store. He interacts with Gen Z collectors daily
and sees their spending habits firsthand. “A lot of it, no surprise, is
driven by what’s hot, social media, pop culture, modern events, stuff like
that,” he says. “Then that giant case hit—Kaboom, Downtown chase.”
The ultra-modern Kabooms and Downtowns are the most coveted NFL cards from
collectibles company Panini. Amarant says young collectors will come into
the shop with their parents and beeline to the cases that contain these
prizes, hoping they’ll pull the singular one in the lot.
Breaking—where contents of a sealed box or case are split among a group of
customers—is also fast-rising among young collectors. They purchase slots,
generally a team or specific player, within the break before a box or case
is opened live on WhatNot, Fanatics Live, YouTube, Twitch, and other
streaming platforms. They receive cards that match the team or player
they’ve claimed.
“They’re looking for that ultimate chase card versus when you get a little
bit older, [you seek] what’s more meaningful,” Amarant says. “It seems like
they just want that excitement of the chase rather than actually collecting
to hold on to it long-term.”
AA Mint Cards
Amarant himself is big into Formula 1 cards, which are in relevant infancy
with manufacturing giant Topps only breaking into the racing world in 2020.
Young collectors are seeking “stuff people aren’t really aware of that we
like to hunt for and find,” he says. “They want to find cards with unique
stories behind them. At least, for me, that’s what I love, especially in
the Formula 1 card space.”
------------------------------
Vintage cards—usually considered pre-1970—aren’t on the menu for most Gen Z
and Alpha collectors.
“When you hear about legends and older players, I don’t think the right
word is boring, but it feels like it’s not relevant. Where you have a
player who’s crushing it nowadays in the current market, like a Jayden
Daniels or Caleb Williams, you are collecting alongside their career …
[and] it feels more relevant,” Amarant says. “You’re investing in their
career as it’s going on and then you can reap the rewards if they do well
or you can feel the pain with them if they get injured or something like
that. It’s closer to almost a fantasy football element than a nostalgia
part.”
That’s the case for Corey Zaslow, who started collecting cards at age 13.
Now 16—and with more money to spend—he works at AA Mint and can afford to
buy more of what he enjoys: basketball, football, and UFC. His biggest PC
is of NBA legend LeBron James. Zaslow owns 10 higher echelon cards from
James’s career, including a 2005 Topps Chrome Gold Refractor numbered to 99
(valued at more than $10,000) and a 2006–07 Ultimate Collection Signatures
in a BGS 9 with a BGS 10 autograph grade.
He uses large followings on Instagram, Facebook, and Discord to buy, and
says that although he has some big cards in his arsenal, the monetary value
isn’t all that important. He agrees there are plenty of young collectors
who are in the game as a business, no sentimentality involved. But for his
part, Zaslow feels like he’s a true collector—one thing he has in common
with collectors past.
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NBA Postseason
The Thunder’s History Lives in Seattle [image: Jun 1996; Seattle, WA USA;
FILE PHOTO; Seattle Supersonics guard Gary Payton (20) lays the ball up
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In 2008, owner Clay Bennett and the city of Seattle reached a $45 million
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Written by Greg Bates <https://fos.cmail20.com/t/t-l-gasuy-jyqiyjjtl-jl/>
Edited by *Meredith Turits*
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