from Amazon
Friday, September 26, 2008
Child prodigies
“I know, for myself, when the hockey season was over, I couldn’t wait to play baseball. I had no interest in playing ice hockey until September. Then you get a guy like Gordie Howe, he couldn’t skate enough. I don’t have the answer, other than I think it’s good for kids to participate in all sports.”
...
According to Mr. Gretzky, there is a neighbouring town close by his Los Angeles residence that he described as “a baseball factory.”
“But not one kid has ever made it to major-league baseball from there,” Mr. Gretzky said. “It’s a tremendous program; a lot of them get scholarships and play Division 1, but to actually play major-league baseball, not one. But everybody asks the same thing, ‘Do you think my son can make pro?’ The answer is, he’s 15, just enjoy it. Just let them have fun.”
I have a Wayne Gretzky rookie card. Two maybe. I’ll have to check. Anyway, I saw this:
http://www.hockeyheadquarters.com/articles/gretzky-rc-80000.php
I thought: “I’m rich, b!tch!”
Then I see that it was graded the highest possible grade you can grade a card. Not really what I have. I have your typical card in a pack, with whatever nearMint type of usage.
Anyway, I’m looking around, and I found this site:
http://www.thepit.com/cards/Quote_Board.asp?prevPage=playerSearch&sort=orderStatus&playerId=1138&productCode=GRD&productCode=UNC&productCode=GRD
The PSA7 is 500-600$.
According to here:
http://www.psacard.com/grading/grading_standards.chtml
I probably have a PSA7 or PSA8. I seem to remember this was the a bit less than the value of the card 10 years ago, so it looks like the best that’s happened is that it just matched inflation.
***
I have tons of cards from the late 70s, early 80s. In the mid to late 70s I used to… gulp… cut the cards so that I could… gulp… sticky tape them inside a workbook. That’s if… gulp… my mom didn’t throw them away first. At some point, I started taking better care of them. As luck would have it, I started doing that with the O-Pee-Chee set of Gretzky’s rookie card.
Anyway, I guess I will just give them to my kid once he’s of age…