NBA Luxury Box

Sports Cards collecting is a very confusing hobby. In no other niche are there too many choices. While most of our options are glossed over or nit picked to death prior to their release, people still buy the product. Is it stupid to criticize anything for having too many options? Of course it is.

But let me try and explain myself in the best way possible. Sports cards are like beer. You have your cheap options, PBR (holy grail), Gennessee Cream Ale, Keystone, Ice House, and so on. Followed by that are your mid range run of the mill options, Budweisers, Coors, Millers, followed up by your high end craft brews. Sports cards are very similar in offering cheap options (Opening Day), mid range (flagship brands), and high end stuff (Exquisite).

If I were to give a college aged kid who has drank Ice House for the last 2 years $30 and tell them to buy some nice beer, they'd have no idea where to start. I'd venture to guess they'd come out with 2 cases of Budweiser***. I highly doubt they'd pick any craft beer simply because they do not know their preferred taste and have no idea what each beer is like.

the same is with card collecting. You give someone who just jumped back into the hobby $30 and put them into a shop, they will most likely walk out with flagship packs, simply because they do not know what is good.

Case in point, myself. When (fully) getting back into the hobby in 2005/06 I wanted basketball cards. the Cavs were in the playoffs and I was in full basketball mode similar to how I had been when I was younger in the mid 90's.

I walked into hobby shops and just stared at the boxes. Shop owners would try and sell me on products I had no idea about. try this, try that. this pack can get you this swatch serialed to 10...the pack is only $50!! Look buddy, I might not know much about the direction the hobby took in the last 8 years, but I'm not buying a pack for $50.

Eventually, I settled on something called Luxury Box. One pack was I think $20. My first venture into higher end cards. What I didn't realize is that the owner did not give me a pack, he gave me the box topper. I'm going to assume he knew what he was doing and hustled me pretty hard. At least that's what my buddy said when I told him what I bought.

Regardless, the lesson everyone (and myself) can learn from this is when you are getting back into the hobby, do some research. We have so much information available for us that there really shouldn't be much of an issue when it comes to buying or trading for cards.

If you want my input on trying different types of beer though, just buy PBR or cool colored labels. Never have I been steered wrong with that principle.




If you were even curious as to what I pulled in my pack, the D Wade above is it. He's serialed to 279. Depressing pull.


***I would hope that the person would also buy at least 1 FourLoko.