Baseball Card Market Report for June 20-26, 2024 - Top eBay Sales

PLUS -- Checking in on 1990 Leaf Baseball Cards

Jun 28, 2024

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Willie, Mickey, and … Jose?

Given Willie Mays’ passing on June 18, it’s hardly surprising to find the Say Hey Kid well-represented among our list of the most expensive baseball cards sold on eBay last week (see bottom of post).

Indeed, Mays takes his usual spot among hobby heavyweights like Mickey Mantle, Jackie Robinson, Babe Ruth, and Shohei Ohtani.

Of course, the baseball market is always good for a surprise or two, and last week was no exception. Dennis Eckersley, anyone?

Or how about a Jose Canseco? Been a while since Jose was dominating the old Hot/Cold lists, at the same time, huh?

In fact, Canseco was big business about the same time a certain card set was making its own waves across the hobby…

Checking in on 1990 Leaf Baseball Cards

Back in the summer of 1990, Donruss took the hobby by storm when they unleashed their revamped Leaf brand as a two-series premium offering designed to compete head-to-head with Upper Deck.

The cards were an instant phenom, and any dealer offering unopened packs at a show drew a crowd to their table. Often, a hush dropped over the entire place when a collector started opening a pack at the table — would he pull a David Justice, John Olerud, or Frank Thomas rookie card?

That 1990 Leaf set has seen its ups and downs in the years since, but there’s no doubt it remains a collector favorite, and the rookie cards of Thomas, Sammy Sosa, and Larry Walker still draw attention.

Continuing our theme of looking into the market performance of some iconic sets of recent decades, this week we ran through the most expensive 1990 Leaf cards sold on eBay during May of 2024. You can watch that video right here.

As a follow-on to that vid, I decided to dig into the ten most expensive baseball cards from that 19990 Leaf set to see how their values have changed since before the pandemic.

Here is what I found, with approximate selling prices for PSA 10 cards from late in 2019 and from this spring (2024), based on sales in the PSA Auction Prices Realized tool:

1990 Leaf Frank Thomas (#300) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $140
2024 Value: $140
Profit/loss: $0
% change: 0

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1990 Leaf Sammy Sosa (#220) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $50
2024 Value: $50
Profit/loss: $0
% change: 0

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1990 Leaf Ken Griffey Jr. (#245) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $45
2024 Value: $95
Profit/loss: $50
% change: 111

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1990 Leaf Larry Walker (#325) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $75
2024 Value: $60
Profit/loss: -$15
% change: -20

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1990 Leaf Albert Belle (#180) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $30
2024 Value: $30
Profit/loss: $0
% change: 0

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1990 Leaf Greg Maddux (#25) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $15
2024 Value: $25
Profit/loss: $10
% change: 67

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1990 Leaf Nolan Ryan (#21) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $12
2024 Value: $35
Profit/loss: $23
% change: 192

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1990 Leaf David Justice (#297) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $15
2024 Value: $25
Profit/loss: $10
% change: 67

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1990 Leaf Barry Bonds (#91) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $20
2024 Value: $18
Profit/loss: -$2
% change: -10

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1990 Leaf Bo Jackson (#125) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $15
2024 Value: $32
Profit/loss: $17
% change: 113.

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—

Overall, these prices are pretty flat, with some individual cards not changing in value from beginning to end, a few losing, and a few seeing price bumps. Overall, this group of cards has seen a collective 22% increase in selling prices since late in 2019

This is one of those sets that really illustrates the extent of the pandemic hobby boom, and the subsequent “bust”…or at least correction. Look at the selling prices for some of these cards in 2020 or 2022, and you’ll see some eye-popping numbers that look like a thing of the past, at least for this set, now.

There’s a cautionary tale in there somewhere about the intrinsic value of cardboard — which is pennies at best — and the idea that baseball cards can be good long-term investments.

Some can, no doubt. But things get dicey real quick when cards with high production numbers and showing players who will never make the Hall of Fame start riding an overall hobby boom.

Now, here are some cards that are riding high right now…

Top Baseball Card Sales on eBay for June 20-26, 2024

(Quick note — this list contains affiliate links to the original eBay listings.)

If you want to see updated 30-day market toppers anytime, we have a couple of resources over on WaxPackGods.com:

Most expensive baseball cards sold in the last 30 days
Most expensive football cards sold in the last 30 days
Most expensive basketball cards sold in the last 30 days

Now, on with the show …

Baseball Card Values Newsletter

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