Babe Ruth is known by all collectors of almost all ages. This past Sunday December 5, 2021 the Bambino hit another home run in baseball card collecting. This sale was among the highest sales of PSA 8 graded 1933 Goudey #149 of Babe Ruth. While not the record sale for a 1933 Goudey #149, this was the highest selling card price for the 2021 Fall Sets & Set Break 2021 Auction by Memory Lane Inc.
One thing is for sure… Babe Ruth keeps hitting home runs for his collectors. And for those who have collected Babe Ruth cards as an investment, the Bambino is still hitting homers for them as well.
George has the classic red background with a shouldered bat. The card was from a high grade set and PSA has the sales data to analyze some of the other Babe Ruth sales from this auction. Collectors Dashboard has pointed out in previous articles that a high sale works as a ripple for the card prices below it.
Collectors Dashboard evaluates high-end collectibles as an alternative asset class. This means collectibles are attracting the same capital that could have been invested into stocks or bonds. Babe Ruth cards that sell in the hundreds of thousands of dollars definitely fall within this theme. The one issue that has to be kept in mind is that stocks and bonds come with no profit guarantees, so baseball cards (even of Babe Ruth) get no guarantees of profits either.
There is also a reason we have selected the 1933 Goudey set as the important set of all for those who wan to collect Babe Ruth cards. (Image below by Memory Lane Inc.)
Here are the Babe Ruth cards sold by Memory Lane on December 4, 2021:
Babe Ruth PSA NM-MT 8 1933 Goudey #149 sold for $510,000.00 after 35 bids. This is the second highest PSA sale for this grade and condition. The first is Heritage Auctions for $540,000.00 on July 26, 2021.
Babe Ruth PSA NM-MT 8 1933 Goudey #144 sold for $436,736.40 after 42 bids. This is the high PSA sale for this grade.
Babe Ruth PSA 8 NM-MT 1933 Goudey #181 sold for $256,736.40 after 27 bids. The highest PSA sale for the grade was made by Goldin Auctions on August 11, 2021 for $344,400.00.
Babe Ruth PSA 8 NM-MT 1933 Sports Kings #2 sold for $193,294.80 after 27 bids. This is the high PSA sale for the grade.
Memory Lane also sold a SGC 2 (Good) Babe Ruth 1916 M101-5 #151 for $292,736.40. That sale was the result after 33 bids.
According to PSA here are the stats for the PSA graded Ruth cards:
Babe Ruth PSA 8 Goudey #149 has 20 examples in grade 8, plus 2 examples graded 8.5 and three with Qualifiers in the same grade. Heritage Auctions had the record sale for this card for $540,000.00 on July 26, 2021 in their Summer Sports Card Catalog Auction.
Babe Ruth PSA 8 1933 Goudey #144 has 32 in grade 8, plus 1 graded 8.5 and three Qualifiers.
Babe Ruth PSA 8 1933 Goudey #181 has 32 in grade 8, plus five Qualifiers.
Babe Ruth PSA 8 1933 Sports Kings #2 has 22 in grade 8, plus 1 graded 8.5 and 1 Qualifier.
The only Babe Ruth 1933 Goudey missing from this auction was #53 dubbed the Yellow Ruth. Then again, they had auctions an SGC 8.5 graded Babe Ruth 1933 Goudey #53 weeks earlier. It has only a population of 1 in the Combined PSA & SGC population charts (and was the highest graded example by SGC) had an opening bid of $200,000. After 19 bids the final price was $456,000.
Babe Ruth is still hitting homers long after his career ended. Don’t worry if you missed out or couldn’t afford these cards. Babe Ruth will be in demand for decades. We just can’t guarantee the price will be any more attainable than right now.
