Baseball

Even 111 Years Later, T206 Honus Wagner Still Dominates

If there is one baseball card that even non-collectors know quite well, it’s the T206 Honus Wagner card. Samples of this card now rarely sell for under $1 million. In fact, even the lower graded Wagner cards of this 111-year old tobacco card set have sold at levels approaching $1 million.

Collectors Dashboard promotes transparency on data and offers context about some of the top purchases within the collectibles sector. It is now undeniable that collectibles have become an alternative asset class.

As collectors and investors alike are fighting it out for some of the industry’s top cards and memorabilia, Collectors Dashboard also wants to remind all interested parties that there are no guarantees that buying any asset of any kind will generate a profit. The best analysts on Wall Street cannot give a guarantee profit on Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, Tesla, and not even in Bitcoin.

Where the story of THE Honus Wagner card gets interesting in 2021, outside of a 111 to 112 years of aging, is that there are multiple avenues for true collectors and investors alike to chase this card.

There is also still a question about just how many T206 Honus Wagner cards really still exist. Some of the samples sold before and during the 1980s before there were grading companies may not have yet resurfaced, but the official count that Collectors Dashboard is willing to endorse is “Sixty… ish.” The PSA CardFacts site for the card endorses that “approximately 60-75 or so known copies in the hobby today.”

Sports card enthusiasts, which would include collectors and investors, should also take note that recent card sales of other players have managed to eclipse the sales prices of the T206 Honus Wagner. Some of those would include rookie cards of superstars like Mickey Mantle, Mike Trout and LeBron James.

TWO FRESH 2021 AUCTIONS

An auction at Heritage Auctions ending on May 7, 2021 went into extended bidding. This was for a PSA 1.5 (Fair) graded T206 Honus Wagner. Their “Guide Value or Estimate” was $2 million or higher. That figure was $1.85 million in the auction heading into extended bidding and closed out at $2.28 million after the buyer’s premium and after 18 bids.

Golding Auctions has a PSA 2 (GOOD) sample coming in the May 2021 auction. Its minimum bid was listed as $1.0 million, but the bidding as of the morning of May 7 (2021) was already at $2.2 million after 8 bids. One early estimate had noted that the card might fetch $5 million or more.

WAGNER KEEPS SELLING HIGH

With one current auction and one just ending, there have been other recent sales of T206 Honus Wagner samples. What collectors and investors alike should consider is that the people who generally buy a Honus Wagner card do not turn around and flip the card immediately. Not many collectors have been able to say that they owned a T206 Honus Wagner, so they tend to enjoy their catch for a period of years before sending it back into the collector space.

A T206 Honus Wagner sold via Heritage Auctions with an SGC grade of only “Authentic” and it landed $2.52 million in the February, 2021 auction. That sample had some heritage of its own as it was previously owned by the late big league broadcaster Joe Garagiola.

In October of 2020, a PSA 3 (VG) graded sample sold in a Mile High Card Company auction for $3.25 million.

In October of 2016 the prior card sale record was a Goldin Auctions gavel price raked in $3.12 million for a sample known as “The Jumbo Wagner.” That same exact card, which is among the better grades at a PSA 5, had been purchased for $2.1 million in 2013.

LOOKING BACK IN TIME (AND WAITING)

The infamous “McNall/Gretzky Wagner” was sold to the owner of the Los Angeles Kings back in 1991 for a sum of $451,000. That was a record for that time period, but that great sample fetched a sum of $2.35 million back in 2007.

While the McNall/Gretzky Wagner card comes with much controversy and history, it would likely bring a “GOAT” sales price that has not ever been seen in the sports card business. Could it be the first card to eclipse the $10 million mark? That remains to be seen, and may never be known.

IF YOU GET A TIME MACHINE TO 1980s — BUY HONUS!!!!

One routine adventure that investors and collectors alike dream about is being able to go back in time to buy something. If you bought $2,000 worth of Apple or Microsoft stock in the 1980s and held forever you would be rich now that the companies each have surpassed $2 trillion in market cap.

If your time machine lands you back in 1980, go find a card dealer who is willing to unload a T206 Wagner. The Sports Americana Baseball Card Price Guide #1 annual price guide from 1979 listed this card at $4,800 for Mint, then $4,000 for Very Good to Excellent, and then $2,000 in Fair to Good condition. You now know that a “zone” for indexing purposes puts these cards in the Fair to Good category. Even at a 100% premium or so that card would have cost $4,000 to $5,000 at that time.

Jumping forward to issue #8 of the same Sports Americana Baseball Card Price Guide in 1986 listed the same price guide for the grades as $32,000 — then $13,500 — then $5,000. again, you would not have seen the card sell at the lower end for that price but it was a ballpark figure.

THE UGLY WAGNER CAN STILL BE YOURS, SORT OF

Back in 2010, a T206 Honus Wagner came up for auction from a group of Catholic nuns in Baltimore after inheriting the card. This sample should be named the “Ugly Wagner” rather than the “Nun’s Wagner” because its “Authentic” grade from SGC is really a cut card missing all but the bottom border with his name and also because the card had been shellacked long ago. The card sold for $220,000 in 2010 after the auction house commission buyer’s premium paid.

If you are willing zoom forward to 2019, and the Rally Rd. app for ownership of “shares” in collectibles entered into an agreement with Goldin Auctions to acquire the card and then offer it on the Rally platform. The card was sold in shares at a $500,000 valuation, but recently in 2021 Rally opened a trading window and the card had shares sell at a $950,000 valuation.

AND FOR SOME DISCLOSURE

As Collectors Dashboard wants to expand transparency in the collectibles market for collectors and investors alike, there is a disclosure to make here. Yours truly is a Rally app participant, and is a shares owner of the “Ugly Wagner.”

Categories: Baseball, Sports

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