OT: Player you regret collecting

[joelsabi]

I just was corresponding with a collector who collected nomar garciaparra for the longest time and now regrets it. say it was a complete waste of time looking back. anyone else felt this way about their collection or shifted away from collecting a certain player. What was the reason.

[suave1477]

Re: OT: Player you regret collecting

Well I can't honestly see someone regretting who they collect unless they did it for investment purposes.
But honestly if your going to collect it should be more for the love of the hobby.

As far as the Nomar collector unfortunately Nomar's career has dwindled down but he still has had a great run and worth collecting. Nomar hasn't become a bad person or anything, he is just getting older.

The only reason why I can see maybe someone regretting to collect a particular person would be because the player became a bad person in society.

Hey look at my collection. I collect D. Strawberry, not that great off the field but on the field it was a thing of beauty to watch.

His career dwindled down because of his extra activities but I wouldn't regret collecting him because he was a great player to watch.

[Kid4hof03]

Re: OT: Player you regret collecting

I actually agree with Jason on this one.

Regretting a bad investment, sure, but regretting a choice to collect a certain player, that has not happened to me.

[kylehess10]

Re: OT: Player you regret collecting

I don't regret collecting Andruw Jones, but I do regret spending almost $600 on just his hat and batting gloves. His stuff is just so cheap now after his horrific season with the Dodgers in 2008.

[mbenga28]

Re: OT: Player you regret collecting

William Roger Clemens

[allstarsplus]

Re: OT: Player you regret collecting

William Roger Clemens

I would have to say Sammy Sosa 1st and Roger Clemens second. Luckily for me, I got out of almost all of my Barry Bonds items.

I have probably over $50,000 worth of Roger Clemens and about $20,000 of Sammy Sosa which is all based on money I have spent on the items I still have.

Like I found with the last Steiner Yankees Clemens jersey I sold, it is better to sit on it for another 20 years as the values are really bad now (unless something changes in the future).

[whirl]

Re: OT: Player you regret collecting

Many years ago, an art dealer offered me a Charles Russell water color. He said it would undoubtedly go up in value. I told him that was great, but I didn't like it. He said if you don't like it, don't get it. Investment should be secondary. I think that is good advice for collecting too.l

[bigtruck260]

Re: OT: Player you regret collecting

When I was a kid, I spent 90% of my lawn-mowing money on 1990 Upper Deck cards. At the time, I had Missouri's largest Ben McDonald collection. I religiously bought Beckett at the Walgreens to show my friends how much my collection was worth.

I came across it in my closet not long ago (I'm 34 now)...and will probably keep it to use as an example for my kids. Funny thing is, I used to have about 100 of them. Now there are FIVE. I had alot of hatred for the 'prospect' label - and many of those cards ended up as kinding for my juvinile pyro fetish.

With the Game Used stuff, I only collect players that I have already enjoyed watching. My collection is MUCH more past focused than what the flavor of the month is.

[corsairs22]

Re: OT: Player you regret collecting

Big truck
Just for clarity's sake, you mean that you used to have 100 Ben McDonald cards, not 100 kids. Right?

[joelsabi]

Re: OT: Player you regret collecting

Well I can't honestly see someone regretting who they collect unless they did it for investment purposes.
But honestly if your going to collect it should be more for the love of the hobby.

I think the guy regrets the amount of money he put down on the player and then seeing the prices at where they are at now. Hes still picking up his stuff so maybe it's a timing issue.

But I do not think he would have had the collection he has now if he waited until the downturn to occur to get started. Would he be able to accumulate the same quality collection had he started when the downturn occurred?

[legaleagle92481]

Re: OT: Player you regret collecting

Mark McGwire $600 autographed baseball when he did his first Steiner signing.

[sox83cubs84]

Re: OT: Player you regret collecting

Big truck
Just for clarity's sake, you mean that you used to have 100 Ben McDonald cards, not 100 kids. Right?

I'd presume he meant 100 Ben McDonald cards. After all, he's Big Truck, not Shawn Kemp .

Dave M.
Chicago area

[cohibasmoker]

Re: OT: Player you regret collecting

Pete Rose.

I got 99.9% of my Rose stuff from Paul Jensen. At one time I had at least eight jerseys, Mizuno bats, spikes, caps and other signed items. Once Pete did what he did, I sold almost all of the items I collected. With the exception of a few signed Sports Illustrated pieces (which are lying under a bed in our spare bedroom), and Reds warm-up for 1985, it's all gone.

Jim

flaa1a@comcast.net

[suicide_squeeze]

Re: OT: Player you regret collecting

Eric Gagne.

Being a Dodger fan, he was hot stuff during the "streak". 84 straight spanning over three seasons.....are you kidding?.....that was legendary.


Until his name surfaced in the steroid tabloids. Now, I have three perfectly signed balls of his, each with a different inscription ("Game Over!"....."84 straight"......"C Y '04"), a game used 2004 jersey, signed to perfection with inscriptions, and his black 2004 Easton game used glove.

I just wish I could get my money out of them. He's garbage.....a disgrace to the game IMO. But there are still a few fans out there, and the steroid "era" hasn't played out yet, so we'll see. He may eventually develope a whole new following after everyone comes to the realization his record will never in a MILLION years be approached by any mortal soul....

[godwulf]

Re: OT: Player you regret collecting

Not one player in particular, on whom I've ever spent a huge amount of money and now regret it, but a whole bunch of players on whom I've, cumulatively, spent a huge amount of money, and now regret it.

In the early years of my collecting, my focus was (as it still is) the Diamondbacks...but being a young team, many of its players had already been on one or more other teams in previous years...so I began collecting jerseys and bats of DBacks players from those other teams. And I sort of overdid it.

With some of my all-time favorite players, it's okay - the Matt Williams stuff from SF and Cleveland, the Luis Gonzalez stuff from the Cubs, Detroit, LA, etc, the Greg Colbrunn and David Dellucci and Mike Morgan bats and jerseys from everywhere...those I'll keep. But I bought "other team" bats and jerseys from players who were only with the team for a very short time, or who were guys I never really even liked that much. Richie Sexson, Troy Glaus, Lenny Harris, Jose Cruz, Jr., and quite a few others come to mind.

In most cases, it's nothing they really did that soured me on having their stuff - it's just that the stuff really doesn't mean all that much to me anymore because their connection with the team was so transitory, and I find it increasingly annoying having a lot of it around.

I just remembered a birthday present I got from my sister several years ago. She bought it right after Wally Backman was named the new DBacks skipper - his manager's jersey from the 2002 Southern League Champion Birmingham Barons. Long before my birthday, after Backman had been canned, my sister let me know that my present, when I opened it, might seem "a little odd"...but, after all, she couldn't very well return it.