As I’m pretty sure everyone knows, last week the Cooper Flagg Rookie Debut Patch Auto (or “RDPA”) sold for $8,040,000. Dylan Harper’s sold for $2.88M, and Kon Knueppel’s went for $2.34M. The athletes were, according to The Athletic’s Larry Holder, “the 34th, 35th and 36th athletes across all sports to ever have a trading card sell publicly for at least $1M.”
To give the Flagg sale some context, it sold for more than any Honus Wagner (at least any known to the public), and all but one 1952 Mantle (an SGC 9.5 from a 2022 Heritage auction). What I think is super impressive here in the middle of it all – and I don’t want it to get lost in the mix of the prices – is that someone at Topps, at some point, came up with the brilliant idea of putting the RDPA on a uniform and then onto a card, and NOW someone else convinced the guy who found it to sell it on Fanatics Collect. They have created an incredible, immediately-important collectible out of thin air – and now keep it in their ecosystem long enough to get a piece of the secondary market sale. The RDPA may be the most significant trading card innovation since grading. And before that, Benchwarmers. And before that… cards in cigarette packs, maybe? We should rank these one day.
Anyway, the news of these sales is great… for a very small group of people. But I think most of us still just want to buy a physical blaster of some fun cards and hope for an autograph of almost anyone. Because it’s a thrill. Has it gotten too far out of reach for the regular collector? I don’t think so. The Skenes RDPA was pulled by an 11-year-old. The Flagg came from a $515 spot in a break – by breakers who weren’t universally reviled. These crazy prices aren’t a new phenomenon; it just feels ickier now, with grifters like Kevin O’Leary cosplaying as one of the Paul brothers. But does anyone else remember Wayne Gretzky and Bruce McNall buying a T206 Wagner in 1991 for the then-unheard of price of $410,000? That was huge news. Thanks to newspapers.com for the ability to always pull stuff like this:
It also gave us the secondary gift of this over-the-top but pitch-perfect-for-90s-newspapers column from Mike Downey. Here’s a taste:
Once your eyeballs stop bleeding, I’d like to assure you of this – today’s newsletter will be for the regular people!
Now let’s get to the ancient Greeks!
The philosopher Heraclitus once said, “a man cannot step into the same river twice.”
I thought of this as I was sitting in a movie theater last week, watching The Transformers: The Movie, which was re-released (and recently extended!) in theaters to celebrate its 40th anniversary. I was hoping that, as Hot Rod and Daniel raced to Lookout Mountain, and the familiar chords of Stan Bush’s “Dare” blasted in theatrical surround sound, I would be transported back to my childhood, overtaken by goosebumps and chills, filled with the warm glow of the Matrix of Leadership.
I was not.
Instead, the scene just came and went. I’m not sure why – the theater’s lack of any real surround sound didn’t help; the experience was fine but it wasn’t a full-on modern movie theater outing. Maybe it’s because I’ve seen the movie several times the last few years at home. Maybe I’ve just lost my center and sense of self, as Mantel CEO Evan Parker often suggests. But as I was wondering where the warm fuzzies were, I was reminded of Heraclitus, whose saying basically meant – to me, at least; your interpretation may vary – yes, you can technically walk into that same river again, but you are changed and the river is changed, and the death of Optimus Prime will never hit the same.
I put my theory to the test during the later rendition of Stan Bush’s other classic, “The Touch.” I remembered it fondly, but wasn’t taken to a new spiritual plane. Heraclitus strikes again.
As I drove home in tears, I remembered something I saw earlier in the day – a Topps Chrome MLS Big Bird Superfractor that was listed for $25,000 on eBay. And, as luck would have it, I was already buying obscure packs of stickers from the 1978 “Americana Sesamstrasse” set, in search of the Cookie Monster rookie. I was excited to get those packs. Maybe, I thought to myself, it really was the crappy sound in the theater.
Searching for the Cookie Monster rookie isn’t an easy task; the Sesamstrasse set has several Cookie Monster cards/stickers in the set. My line of thinking is generally this – the “true” rookie is the lowest-numbered one in the set. However, if there was one of him eating a cookie, that would likely qualify as the one people would want. Much like how we logically concluded that the Jennifer Lopez rookie was the one with her name on it, and not the lower-number one that just said “The Fly Girls.”
As it turns out, there are no cookie-eating cards. So now we are chasing card #7, which is also the cleanest and most straightforward picture in the set of him:
There is a secondary issue here. There was also a 1978 set of kids’ counting cards by a company called “Western” that some eBay sellers are trying to pass off as Cookie Monster’s rookie. I call shenanigans – rounded corners and a number on the back (in this case, the number “1” and a picture of a pear) point to what is essentially a deck of cards where you know what you’re getting, not a sealed pack of random stickers and cards. Without the randomness, what are we doing here?
So, if we can all agree to be on the same page, I’d like to open up my three packs of Sesamstrasse with everyone reading Mail Day. But first…
Side note: I watched The Goonies the other night and got the goosebumps from “Good Enough,” so maybe I do still have a soul! Take that, CEO Evan Parker!
Additional side note: I bought a “Chunk” sticker from the 1985 Topps set for $16.
I previously had bought a Mikey, but with the pop culture wave hitting cards now, I had an internal debate over which character was more iconic. Worst case? I now have both.
Side side note: There obviously is a Heraclitus card you can get for about $12.
Unrelated side note: Leaf’s “Roots Run Deep” set looks really great. In retrospect I should have passed on Benihana and spent the $40 on these instead.
Okay, let’s look at these cards! Spoiler alert: This was more disappointing than my Transformers experience.
They look great on the outside!
The back:
But they are SMALL. Here’s a Jennifer Capriati rookie for reference:
As you can see, we DID get a Cookie Monster, but it was not the #7. I also got… a pumpkin. And some flowers.
How about this table?
TABLE ROOKIE!!
I am going to spare you the rest and fast-forward to the full haul. I somehow managed two Berts, two blue guys, and four inanimate/organic objects. Lesson learned. Next time we are searching for the Voltron sticker rookie from a non-German set.
Have a gander:
But hey… I got table, faucet, flowers, and pumpkin! They’re colorful. That’s a win. But it’s off to eBay for the #7 sticker.
Epilogue: As I was throwing away the wrappers, I noticed something in one of the packs. Could it be…
SOMEONE CALL BRUCE McNALL!!!
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