To Collect or Not to Collect, THAT Is the Question

I’m a strong believer in beginnings. Another way to put it is I believe in second chances as a new beginning for I KNOW I’ve benefited from those many times over – hey, I’ve been married for 42-years and my wife’s reminded me often how blessed I am to still be around.

But for beginnings, or second chances to work, there has to be a plan; a goal, and with that revisiting why a restart is needed and ditching, keeping, or tweaking parts or processes. Enter in the new year, variant 2024, and I’m faced with the same dilemma as always in this hobby I love; should I continue collecting that set or this player?

When I returned to the hobby – at least this iteration of it in 2016 – I only collected Astros, Cowboys, and Rockets and with an added focus on favorite players on those teams. Glenn Davis, Cesar Cedeno, Bob Hayes, Don Meredith, and Hakeem Olajuwon were among the names sought. Later I expanded my horizons and went after major players on other teams, namely Hall of Famers and stars from my youth. The list began to grow as Willie Mays, Reggie Jackson, Gale Sayers, Otis Taylor, Pete Maravich and George Gervin were added, all players that I rooted for and admired.

Soon after with an even keener eye toward nostalgia the focus widened; connections to my dad (Alvin Dark, Bill Glass), childhood memories (Terry Bradshaw, Stan Mikita), and even adding a starting lineup for my birth year 1956 (an affordable one). Before I knew it my PC had grown to over 125. More were to come as that number grew when I began collecting players I never rooted for or liked, but I knew they were popular and happened to already have key cards from their catalog; so I said, “Why not?”.

That was my collecting system for about five years: Astros, Cowboys, Rockets, and an ever-increasing PC already larger than it needed to be.

In 2017 due to a family issue I began an almost year-long nomadic life between Texas and New Jersey. Finding two local card shops allowed me to cope with being away from home for long stretches, and I began buying random lots. At first mainly large boxes of commons for $20.00-$25.00 for about 3-5K cards. Initially they would go toward trading, but slowly began creeping into filling subsets like All-Stars, or Diamond Kings in addition to my team sets.

2021 came and I officially became a set collector. Until then the only sets I sought to complete were small ones, if not subsets then the less than 50 boxed sets. Fleer League Leaders, Topps Glossy All-Stars, Mothers Cookies, and that ilk were the usual targets. My affinity for Canada led me to seek O-Pee-Chee and Leaf baseball sets and it was no longer only small sets, but at least they weren’t huge 700+ sets. Then out of the blue I decided to collect EVERY 1987 baseball set produced. (This remains an active focus today with limited additions from football and hockey.)

Hockey. It never was part of my culture as I grew up in parts of Texas known mostly for the heat, thunderstorms, and tornadoes, no snow or ice, except occasionally. On one of my frequent trips to Crazy Ron’s Card Shop in New Jersey, the shop manager showed me three 5K boxes of hockey cards some kids had brought to sell to him, but he wasn’t interested as it was mainly early 1990s cards and he didn’t have time to sort through it. The kids left them. He asked for $20.00, I offered $10.00 and 15K+ hockey cards were now mine.

Here comes TCDB’s NJDevils (Joe). I had announced that I was collecting a few random hockey players and some sets when all of a sudden I get a box of 1984-85 Topps Hockey. Now I was all in, and a few Topps sets began to filter into the collection thanks in large part to Joe’s influence on hockey. That soon expanded to a Finnish hockey set. Then there was an explosion of food issued hockey sets; Kraft, Kellogg’s, and Jell-O joined the collection pantry.

It was real. It was fun. But it wasn’t being real fun. Stacks were building up on my desk in my home office, i.e. card room. Anytime my wife would venture into the room I’d cringe. I couldn’t look her in the eye, literally, because hers were always focused on the disarray she found herself in, and not of her doing, nor to her liking. That led to the purge of 2023, but somehow the Want List INCREASED! Clearly someone was unclear about the concept.

I’ve realized I’m more compulsive than I believe I am. OCD has been explained to me as a problem not for being obsessive, but rather for the compulsion to seek the obsession. Honestly one of my primary triggers is organization of my collection, which was part of the aforementioned purge.

Memories, artistry, or enjoyment all initiate increases to my collection, and as I’m saying bye to some cards the allure or closer look at other sets leads me to add to the Want List. I have been able to decrease the collection by trading some major stars including Derek Jeter (never been a fan), Ken Griffey, Jr. (never saw him play), and Albert Pujols (saw him too often beating Houston). They now are technically in my collection, but I will occasionally put them on the trade block to get one in return for a set I definitely hope to complete.

As Old Man ’23 left us, I’ve found myself expanding my Haves (TCDB terminology) through the various methods of trading and buying. I foresee much of the same this year. Just before publication, on the last day of the year, I made a last ditch effort to complete a small hockey set (#s 46-50), still in their original package, that were only offered in mail order and are considered part of the set of 1993-94 Score Canadian – Pinnacle All-Stars Canadian. It was declined automatically by the Ebay seller. That’s how it goes, thus I have decided to end my 3-year quest for it since it would require me to surpass those ever-present self-imposed financial limits. To collect, or not to collect; THAT IS the question.

2024 is here, and my collection remains fluid. The key to me is not so much having too many cards (how is that possible?), but if what I have keeps my interest. That, to me, is most important, for I am not an investor, I identify as a card collector.