Baseball Card Market Report for October 24-30, 2024 - Top eBay Sales

PLUS -- Checking in on 1984 Donruss Baseball Cards

Nov 01, 2024

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Your Mileage Market Lag May Vary

As I write this, the Dodgers just finished off the Yankees in convincing style to win the 2024 World Series. So which names lead off the list of the most expensive baseball cards sold on eBay in the last week (bottom of post)?

Why, Babe Ruth and Barry Bonds, of course! Maybe they’re the hobby’s antidote to Dodger fever? Could be, especially when you consider that the late Pete Rose also shows up several times below.

Of course, Shohei Ohtani leads all comers as usual, so maybe this list will be nothing but blue in a week or two.

For now, let’s step back in time to a hobby boom fueled by another Yankee superstar…

Checking in on 1984 Donruss Baseball Cards

It may not look all that impressive to modern collectors, but the 1984 Donruss issue set a new standard for photo quality, retail scarcity, and rookie card mania (thanks to Don Mattingly).

Indeed, this thing was so monumental in helping shape the hobby boom of the 1980s that you could make a good argument that the modern market would look vastly different if 1984 Donruss never existed…or if it had been another ho-hum early Donruss issue.

Earlier this month, we ran down the most expensive 1984 Donruss cards sold on eBay during September 2024 over on our YouTube channel:

So now, with the 40th anniversary season of this landmark set coming to an end, it seems like a good time to give it the old before-and-after treatment.

What follows, then, is a rundown of the dozen most valuable 1984 Donruss cards in PSA 10 condition based on recent actual selling prices reported in the PSA Auction Prices Realized tool.

(Note: The following section contains affiliate links to eBay listings for the cards noted.)

1984 Donruss Don Mattingly (#248) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $1200
2024 Value: $3500
Profit/loss: $2300
% change: 192

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1984 Donruss Joe Carter (#41) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $120
2024 Value: $260
Profit/loss: $140
% change: 117

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1984 Donruss Darryl Strawberry (#68) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $80
2024 Value: $260
Profit/loss: $180
% change: 225

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1984 Donruss Rickey Henderson (#54) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $75
2024 Value: $210
Profit/loss: $135
% change: 180

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1984 Donruss Nolan Ryan (#60) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $50
2024 Value: $200
Profit/loss: $150
% change: 300

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1984 Donruss Tony Gwynn (#324) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $40
2024 Value: $150
Profit/loss: $110
% change: 275

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1984 Donruss Tony Fernandez (#32) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $30
2024 Value: $120
Profit/loss: $90
% change: 300

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1984 Donruss George Brett (#53) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $35
2024 Value: $90
Profit/loss: $55
% change: 157

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1984 Donruss Ryne Sandberg (#311) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $40
2024 Value: $110
Profit/loss: $70
% change: 175

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1984 Donruss Pete Rose (#61) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $30
2024 Value: $100
Profit/loss: $70
% change: 233

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1984 Donruss Cal Ripken, Jr. (#106) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $35
2024 Value: $80
Profit/loss: $45
% change: 129

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1984 Donruss Tom Seaver (#116) - PSA 10

2019 Value: $20
2024 Value: $70
Profit/loss: $50
% change: 250

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—

Overall, these cards showed a 193% increase over the course of the pandemic — meaning they pretty much tripled in price as a whole. That’s a heady number when you consider that most of the big-name individual players we’ve looked at in recent numbers fell well short of that number.

That all seems to indicate that enough collectors and investors still recognize 1984 Donruss as a blue-chip hobby staple that it not only kept pace with the pandemic boom, it outpaced it.

Now for some other cards whose new owners are hoping/praying/incantation-ing for similar long-term results…

Top Baseball Card Sales on eBay for October 24-30, 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
Most expensive hockey cards sold in the last 30 days

Now, on with the show …

Baseball Card Values Newsletter

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