Alright. We're back. Card ladder confidential. Cold open question, something that's not on the sheet. I always do this to, Chris and Josh. We're gonna start here. What was the bigger surprise?

Luca on the Lakers or the result of the Super Bowl? We'll start with you, Chris. Oh, man. That's funny that you put it that way because those were two I it wasn't I it wasn't necessarily surprising that the Chiefs lost.

The line was, like, one and a half and, in in the Chiefs favor. And there was just a lot of I think, I think even you maybe you and Nick both picked the Eagles too, if I remember right. I I cheated because I picked the Eagles publicly.

And then in the one of the group chats I was in, there was, like, Drake actually last second was like, who do you all have? And I I I hedged and I said the Chiefs in that one. So I was trying to say get all my bases covered.

Okay. Okay. It's fair. Okay. So that but that shows even more so that it was like it was fifty fifty. You know? So it wasn't a huge surprise that the Chiefs lost. What was very surprising was the nature of the loss.

A game that wasn't even as close as the final score, and the final score was a three score separation. That was very surprising. Also, very surprising is Patrick Mahomes playing one of the worst games by the numbers.

If you look at his overall box score numbers are gonna say, I think he hit all of his overs. But if you look at like his qbr score, which adjusts for garbage time and strongly penalizes you based on negative plays like a pick six.

If you look at some of those metrics, it was one of the worst games ever played by a quarterback in the Super Bowl.

So that that's surprising. That's that's that's surprising. But that the Chiefs loss was not so surprising. So I'm going to give I'm gonna say the Luca trade is more surprising because every dimension of that trade was surprising.

It was surprising that he was traded for so little. It was surprising that he got traded to the Lakers. It was surprising that he won't finish his career in Dallas, which a lot of signs were pointing that he would.

So all the dimensions of that one are more surprising. I'm gonna I'm gonna lean that way. Okay. We're there's plenty of Luca chatter baked into this one.

So we'll we'll we'll offer more, and I have one to come back a question to come back to you on, Chris, based on something you said, but I wanna hear what Josh, what do you have to say on on on this cold open question?

Oh, I mean, I think the Luca trade is the most surprising sports event of the decade, so it's gonna be everything else you ask me.

I think it's a an incredible trade because I think Lucas probably if he did a dynasty draft, he'd probably be, like, the the number one pick, and he got traded in the middle of the season.

Yeah. It's it's not, debating if I wanna go to how far I'd wanna go deep into it. Maybe I'll put it put it on ice a little bit, but I wanna hear, like, a a Mahomes card related question.

Chris, based on I know you have some Mahomes cards. Like, you're not like a massive Mahomes collector, but you've got some key Mahomes cards.

Does a putrid performance in the Super Bowl and especially one that is not analytically favorable for the the most the most, popular player, the best player in the NFL, Does it like, are you deep like, after that, when you, like, went to bed and you woke up the next morning, like, did you think differently about your Patrick Mahomes cards, or was it just, like, one bad game, I'm good?

Well, you know, the putrid analytical performance is my worst nightmare. It is. Look.

I mean, the way I've approached Patrick Mahomes collecting is really different, I think, than the way I have approached other players that I collect or at least it's different than like collecting Luca and yo, coach with Luca and yo, coach.

I'm collecting based on sort of expectations to some extent.

I am sort of anticipating that they're going to add to their legacies, especially Luca at this point. I clicked Mahomes more like from the vantage point that I collect Michael Jordan, which is that I'm collecting based on what is done.

And I've got my method of rating, the best football players of all time and that method puts Mahomes and in a solid tie for third place.

And I do give him the tiebreaker because he accomplishes things most recently. So I don't really feel the impact of this one.

I wasn't ever collecting Mahomes on the basis that he was just gonna win every Super Bowl. I was more collecting and based on the fact that he had already won three Super Bowl MVPs and two regular season MVPs.

So for me, you know, that's it it didn't really I I I would have loved if he won, but it didn't really impact my approach at all.

In fact, I'm trying not to be a vulture and descend on carcasses, but there's a few Mahomes cards. I really wanted to get this season and the prices were high and I'm gonna make a move on them now.

And, you know, hopefully the the owners don't don't take it the wrong way. So, before we close this thread out, maybe one last one for you, Josh, is based on the result of this Super Bowl.

Do we think that Mahomes and, like, the confidence in the market takes, a a bigger dip in the wrong direction, or does Jalen Hurts and the fact that he had the game he did, Super Bowl MVP, does his, does his market take a bump in the right direction?

Which one do you think which which one is greater? Jalen Hurts going up or Mahomes going down? What what do you think? Well, I think Chris has the right take.

If Mahomes does go down, I think you'll probably see people like Chris and and other smart people just jumping on and buying some of those rare cards that pop up that wouldn't have otherwise because to his point, like, he's already got three and he's not even 30 yet.

And Brady basically started peaking after he hit, like, 34, 30 five an inch.

So it's possible that Mahomes could just keep going and win five or six more and we forget about this. It doesn't really matter. So I would say probably the Hertz going up would be my guess.

I I don't really see that sustaining. This Hertz thing is interesting. I think, you know, he's, like, around, like, tenth or eleventh best quarterback in the league, somewhere in that range.

And, you know, the the narrative coming out of the Super Bowl was, like, it was the defensive line that won this game. It was the defense. You know, they they had a pick six.

They had a turnover. He had great field position. And that's true to an extent, but hearts did play pretty well, so I would expect maybe a short term bump. I I just don't know if, people wanna trust that long term.

It kinda feels like the Tatum Celtics championship a bit. Like, he's on a a far superior team top to bottom, and he's the best player in the team, but I'm not sure he's gonna get the credit from the hobby.

Final final, and then we'll move on. I promise. Twenty twenty draft, lots of quarterbacks. Great Prism product, by the way. I love 2020 Prism. I think the shine and the design is very nice.

You know, we've we've got Tua, Herbert, Burrow, Love, Hertz. How how should Hertz should should Hertz be, making its head should he be more than Justin Herbert, more than Joe Burrow, Love, Tua?

Like, where do you think after this, victory that he falls in the pecking order in terms of, market and demand, Chris? Man, he's certainly, ahead of Tua and Jordan Love, in my opinion.

Although Jordan Love is a quietly snuck into top 10. I think maybe he even finished top six or top five in QBR this past season. So he's he's sneaky, and doing it maybe with not quite as many weapons as, like, Hertz and Burrow.

Burrow, I don't know that he's, he's done enough to feel more collectible than Burrow right now, in my opinion. Burrow, by any metric, I think, had a had a better season than Hertz did, this year in the regular season.

Hertz Hertz is almost verging on big game merchant where he just when the lights are the brightest he just puts up masterful performances because even though he lost his first Super Bowl performance, it was it was also one of the better Super Bowl performances you'll you'll see.

And, he really went blow for blow with Mahomes in that game. And then in this game, he was he was excellent, almost almost flawless.

So, you know, it it just, like, it kinda depends. Like, you know as a collector I think one thing that we care about a lot is we want to root for a player and really buy into their success over the duration of a season.

And it would be a little bit, frustrating as it hurts collector to see Saquon, getting more MVP votes and getting more of the accolades.

It would be frustrating to see the defense and the defensive line getting a lot of credit be or even hurts his most deadly play.

The play that nobody's ever been better than hurts at which is the QB sneak or the tush push That hurts his I mean, the Chiefs were able to stop Josh Allen on that.

They weren't able to stop Hertz, and Josh Allen is pretty good o line too.

So it would just be frustrating as a as a Hertz collector on a certain level to sort of see so much of the credit being spread places other than the player that I collect.

I want the player that I collect to be the focal point of it all.

So you can so, like, to answer the immediacy of your question, I I think, you know, there still might be an edge given to a guy like Burrow. Maybe Herbert is is more of an interesting a closer call.

But if you really believe in Hertz and, like, you've watched him in the Super Bowl and you've watched how the Eagles have performed since he joined the team, and you think that he's really one of the main drivers behind that and he's got this secret weapon that nobody can stop, which is the tush push, which is one of the highest, you know, highest value plays in NFL history.

When you kind of combine all those things together, like, I see a case for just sort of Jalen hurts being your your niche indie rock band that nobody else knows about yet and you know about it.

And and he's already got a Super Bowl MVP under under his belt at a young age. So I think maybe there's there's a there's a there's an interesting angle you can take as a Hertz guy.

Josh, before we close this out, agree, disagree, any other thoughts on the stack rank of Hertz and his twenty twenty, counterparts? No. I think I agree. I'd put him below Burrow, and I would put him above all those other guys.

Yeah. Hertz definitely has this, this little niche, like Chris said, where the media doesn't give him credit and, like, the hobby doesn't give him credit based on feelings.

But if you look at the stats and his importance to the team, I thought he was the best player in that game for the Eagles.

Like, you it's hard to, like, pinpoint, like, oh, Jalen Carter was the best. He he didn't get, like, a single tackle. You know? It's hard to say, like, oh, one defensive tackle caused the most, you know, chaos and pressure.

You can't really pinpoint one. But I thought Curtis led the offense really well. I thought he made the the right plays, the right the right throws. He scrambled when he needed to. Like, the best player on the team is Saquon this year.

He had 25 carries for, I think it was 57 yards, which is just obviously not not good. The Chiefs stacked the box and and went after Saquon, and then Hertz stepped up and won the game.

So you have to give him a lot of credit. He's got a Super Bowl MVP. I mean, if you're a collector and media says he sucks, that's even better for you.

You can just buy him more. Yeah. If he can in evaluating the two games, I I recall the last time the Eagles played the Chiefs and lost, the how great of a game Hertz had, and he just had one, like, really costly fumble.

That was the only negative play, and he had one interception in this game. But outside of it, he was, pretty flawless.

I I think if you're buying into a player for potential more upside and success I mean, you can't tell me that the Eagles aren't ripe to go back to the Super Bowl after this performance next year.

So if that were to play out and that were a case, it'd be three Super Bowl appearances and potentially another win, and then you start to get into some interesting territory.

But I don't know. I've always viewed Jalen Hertz as an overachiever and someone who always, like, overcomes adversity.

And I'm by no means an Eagles fan, but I am a Jalen Hertz fan. So I'm excited to see kind of how collectors react to that win in the future, and appreciate you guys both going off track a little to start.

I felt like that was topical, and maybe we'll just dive right in, like we always do. Card ladder updates. Josh, I'm looking at you. What are you working on? Are you doing anything over there? Any updates? Anything you wanna talk about?

I think we since we last were here, we allowed multiple custom indexes. I think that's the only, like, major announcement. Everything else has been kind of behind the scenes data improvements, but nothing for nothing to bring up here.

What it one question in just in terms of, like, the market and positioning and the world of tech and everything that's going out that I wanted to ask you is just, like, just thought your thoughts on AI and maybe just AI and sports cards in this space.

Like, how are how are you as, you know, kind of the the, I'll say, brains behind the operation at Card Ladder?

How do you how are you thinking about just AI and maybe its application in Card Ladder or just throughout the rest of the hobby?

We're thinking about it less than most companies because we're kinda sticking to our guns that the collectible space is not based on predictions and estimations.

It's more based on what's already happened and then sort of the, collectibility side of things, the rarity. Like, these are all really tough things to, to judge.

And when you do, like, use AI and put a number on a card that doesn't have a public sale, I think you're really doing a disservice to the hobby in general, by saying you're putting a cap on it.

Like, this auction here, here's our estimated value or whatever. You're putting a a literal cap on the on the value of the card.

Whereas if you get two people that really want something for their collection, you know, for humans, not robots, this is this is more of like a human interest hobby than it is something that can be programmed by robots.

But that's we're we're interested in it in the sense that it can help us automate some things. And, you know, we still have estimated values on card ladder, so it can help us get to those numbers quicker maybe.

But I think, I'd like to be one of the Zags on that one in the in this space, at least. It has great usages in medical field, other like, big data and tech.

There's other places that it is useful. I just Chris and I always love to Zags, so we'll we'll be happy to take that mantle. Do do you think, and I, like, I love your response, and it makes so much sense to to me.

Do you feel like we might get into this spot where because AI is such a trend and because automation makes everything everyone's life easier and the consumer's life easier.

Do you it feels like there was this trend a while ago where people were starting these hobby businesses that no longer are here because the money was hot and people just were coming in.

They really didn't have any, like, knowledge of, like, how the hobby works and collectibles and pricing and all this stuff, but they decided, okay.

Well, there's money here. I know tech, so I'm gonna go build this thing. And now that thing doesn't exist anymore.

Do you think, like, the v two of that with maybe companies that are here or established going too far into, AI might cause something similar or might cause maybe a lesser of experience from consumer and be based on, you know, business leaders just saying, okay.

We need to put more AI in our thing because this is what the market is talking about or not.

Yeah. It's like all the companies that just, like, slap a AI layer over their existing products, and it's got the little shiny star logo in the top right that, like, makes it AI or whatever.

Yes. I'd say it's more like the gambling repacking. I think there's a a huge flood of people jumping into that part of the space, and it's gonna get super competitive, and the margins are gonna get smaller.

And I would worry about some of those companies ditching their existing business models and jumping over to the gambling side. But, you know, gambling two x is, like, every year, basically, in sports gambling.

So what do I know? Indeed. Interesting. I'm glad we could hit that. Chris, did you did you have any commentary or additional thoughts that you wanted to share on this topic before we move on?

Yes. I do. Yes. I do. I clearly agree with what Josh said. And, also, like, people, use the term artificial intelligence in day to day conversation or AI, but it means so many different things, I think, when people use it.

I think a lot of the the time when people say AI, they actually mean, the use of an algorithm or algorithmic programming or just technology in general.

And as far as, like, Card Later goes on that front, we've, been at the forefront of using algorithmic functions and image matching technology and things like that to allow our users to estimate the price of their cards, to find and locate sales, and to, you know, use the the picture feature that lets you take a picture or upload a scan of your card and quickly find the sales history of it or punch in the cert or whatever.

So, like, there's lots of things that we do that are technologically sophisticated, but that that aren't artificial intelligence. But I think when people say AI, they actually mean stuff like that and we do stuff like that.

But, on the topic actually of AI, of artificial intelligence, of the thing that ultimately is measured by the Turing test of whether or not it can be indistinguishable from the reasoning that a human performs.

It's sort of that being the ultimate metric.

And that idea of artificial intelligence, the CHAT GPT of it all, if you go if you go to CHAT GPT or one of these other, large language models and you start asking it questions about sports cards, ask it how many optical vinyl one of ones does Patrick Mahomes have.

And the answer will certainly not be correct, and it might even be nonsensical or utterly misleading.

And why? Why is that? Even to this day, I can go to something like chat g p t, and it's getting better. But I can ask it a sports question.

I can ask it something like, give me the list, my favorite topic. Give me the list of the top 10 NFL players with the most combined regular season Super Bowl MVPs, and the list will be wildly inaccurate.

It'll try and it'll get it'll approximate some things, but it just it just doesn't get it right. Okay. Why? Why is that? Why can't it answer questions about optical vinyl or even something as mainstream as total MVPs for NFL players?

And the reason why it can't is because artificial intelligence is largely based on the quality of the dataset that it's trained on.

So, for example, in the sports card hypothetical, what dataset exists that an AI could be trained on that could teach it to answer practical questions that collectors want to answer.

And that data set just quite frankly it it doesn't really exist. And it it certainly doesn't exist in the fashion that artificial intelligence needs it to exist in.

So AI, one of the modes of AI, there's there's two basic modes. There's sort of the the black box mode where they, stack these neural networks on top of each other and nobody really knows how that works.

I'm not gonna talk about that one because I don't need it either. But the other way that they do it is through statistical inference.

And so the statistical inference would it it's just, looking at a huge data set, assigning characters or, assigning numbers to basically clusters of letters and assigning how and and determining how frequently they appear together.

And then that creates a statistical model.

And so, once once it's been identified how frequently different clusters of characters appear together, it can then start to formulate ideas or reasons just based on the probability of these these words occurring next to each other.

And then when you prompt it with certain words that appear next to other words, it could start giving you answers.

So you would need a data set to train it on for the collectible space that's, you know, that that's basically just like bibles worth of insight from collectors.

The collectors have to put this pen to paper and write down these ideas and then organize them properly and combine it with databases and then train a language model on that dataset.

And we're so far from having those inputs, so far from having those inputs that, the idea that language model is going to be able to really serve collecting, it's I I think it's a ways off.

It's it's quite a ways off. I and and one of the main reasons why it's just because we as a community, as a hobby, we haven't produced the literature.

We haven't produced the body of knowledge yet to even make training a language model possible. Okay. We're gonna get off this because this is super fascinating.

But in in, Chris, what you just said, what would, in your mind, be a foundational building block that would need to be created in terms of an input that then ChatGPT or whatever the language model is could then go use and do something that's of substance and not just spit out a bunch of inaccurate garbage about how many Patrick Mahomes gold vinyl cards really exist?

Like, what what would be a a a foundational piece where that would actually help start and make this thing, something that could benefit business or consumers?

It's a great question. Maybe, a good starting place would be the transcripts of every stacking slabs episode.

They don't you don't you don't wanna put that in day. I'm telling you that right now. Yeah. I don't know. It's a great question. I love it. Okay. Cool. Yeah.

Just my tech brain was interested in that and hearing from you, and feel like now is the time to open up the, can of worms that is Luka Doncic. And there's a lot to say. I had a topic on here, and then Josh had a topic on our sheet.

So we'll just combine it combine them both and hit it. So my comment was some time has passed since the news. What are you gathering about the Luca move and its impact on collectors?

And then I'll put in Josh's comment. Josh said team collecting versus player collecting. We all know Luka collectors who morphed into Dallas Mavs collectors or organically and now are stuck figuring out what to do next.

I wonder if we'll see more collectors focus strictly on player collecting and follow the player across the team. If Luka freaking Doncic can get traded, then I think it signals to everyone that anyone can be traded.

It seems like younger collectors already focus on players over teams. So should should we, as experienced collectors, take anything from that? So a lot of different thoughts on Luca, but where do we wanna start?

Like, maybe, like, as the dust settles, let's let's hear your reactions to the trade and how you're feeling. I know you did emergency pot, and then we'll get into the collecting. Maybe we'll start with you, Chris.

Yeah. Well, player collecting is a really interesting thing to me, Brett. And, this like Josh's question points out, this is the ultimate stress test of it. I I know some Mavs collectors who, are loyal collectors.

I'm thinking of my friend, Mark, who's, who also shares the misery of Chicago Bears sports fandom with me, but he still continues to collect Bears players and support the team and believe against, all rational analysis that the Bears will be good.

So and maybe maybe they won't be next year. You know, maybe we finally turned the corner. So, he but but so he has dealt with we have dealt with a lot of abuse as Bears fans.

He continues to collect and love and follow and support the Bears and his players, and he has a a really cool Chicago Bears collection of some of the great Bears players. But, this and and and he was the same with the Mavericks.

He's his, one of his main PCs is Dirk Nowitzki. I think that probably is his main PC. He loves the Mavericks. He supports the Mavs. He, when he lived there, he would go to the games, at American Airlines Center.

And this trade pushed him away from the Mavs. And he, at least for now, has adopted the Lakers. He even changed his Instagram bio to hashtag lake show. That's that's astonishing.

I mean, there were about thousand people protesting outside of the first home game. People are being escorted from the building American Airlines Center for haggling or a heckling Nico Harrison and, Patrick Dumont and Mark Cuban.

And, there there was an SMU game over the weekend where people were chanting, fire, Nico, just because Nico happened to be there and SMU is at Dallas University. I I haven't quite seen anything like it.

I just, it's really hard. It's really hard, Brett. I'm sure you could attest to this. I mean, what would the Indianapolis Colts have to do for you to defect from fandom of that team and follow a player to halfway across the country?

That that's what that's what I think my challenge is to, like, really dig in and why I love the topic that Josh presents, and we'll let Josh weigh in on it.

But one of the observations I've made just in the hobby and, like, meeting collectors and observing collectors is there's you've got the different intentions or reasons to collect, and you've got individuals that focus in on their favorite teams.

They're a season ticket holder of the Jaguars, and then they're gonna go team collect Jaguars, and they're gonna maybe niche down and focus in on, like, specific cards, like, or specific sets.

And then they're not like I don't when I see them post, I don't think about players. I think about the team that they represent.

And I feel like I have always come at my collecting maybe not always, but, like, in my mature collecting years have come from the more team collector perspective because I've always associated my fandom more with a team than an individual itself.

And this even goes towards I would consider myself a way bigger fan of the Indianapolis Colts than I would can say a a fan of Peyton Manning.

It's just the way it is. It's although, like, Manning took me to my mountaintop moment, and I love Manning for that as a fan, and I collect Manning, I I associate more with the horseshoe.

Even in these later years where they've done nothing to really excite me, it's just this fandom I have towards my team.

So to see so many collectors, leave the Dallas fandom and go follow Luca, it's it's I asked like, I think about if I were in that position, what I would do, and I think it would be really hard no matter how egregious the move was.

It would be really hard for me to say, I'm I'm I'm out of here, and maybe that's a hometown thing.

Like, I I've I've such strong association with my hometown team. And so I've been, like, debating that in my head of, like, what would I do?

But then the last point is that I I I'm not sure in this era of collecting, there's a player that's probably had more individuals, he'd been a magnet for more individual collectors than Luca just based on his style of play when he was a rookie, the rise of the hobby.

And so, like, the fact that there's so many, collectors who were Mavs fans that now have dropped the Mavs and have moved to follow Luka in LA, like, I'm not surprised or shocked by that because they were Luca fans they were Luca fans first.

And by Luca being a Luca fan first, that just made them, a Mavs fan. And now that this all transpired, it's like they have no attachment to the Mavs, and so they peace out.

And so my thoughts are that not only will Luca's cards, you know, be more in demand even after this honeymoon period, I think it is probably the best thing to ever happen to Luka Doncic's cards and market because the Lakers are the Lakers, the biggest, best brand in the NBA historically.

And we all just look at the we'll go to Instagram, open it up.

Look at all the Lakers collectors. Pre Luca, there's I can't think of a a a team with more collectors than the Lakers based on their rich history and collectible play players.

So, this topic's fun. Josh, I just said a lot. Like, what's on your mind with it? I'm gonna try to react to everything, but I can't remember everything you guys said.

I'm most fascinated and I brought this topic up. I'm most fascinated at the team collecting versus player collecting. I've I we already kinda sensed it.

You know? The I feel like the generation before us and then part of the millennial generation has always been locale based, team first support. And the younger generations, I feel, have moved more towards the players.

You know, there's a there's a big contingent of kids who root for Anthony Edwards, Ja Morant, you know, like, the TikTok, era of watching highlights of your favorite players.

And the other interesting point about the hobby is a hobby is oriented around the players. There's not team cards. The cards are depicted of a single player. So the hobby itself is completely geared towards player collecting.

It wants you to focus on individual players. And if you do collect a team, let's say you you start collecting players from these from these teams, but then the teams just start trading all those players.

Like, what's your incentive to continue to try to collect that individual player?

Do you jump players? It becomes really complicated, and it's just much easier to orient your collecting around an individual player. There's a lot less risk and there's less to worry about.

So I think we're kinda seeing that organically happen. I've noticed it. And now this trade has just really opened up my thought process of, does this get even more focused on player?

I you guys are making the anecdote that we know a lot of people, you know, friends around us that have, like, literally just dumped the Mavs.

Mark changed his avatar to a Lakers jersey. Like, he's just, like, completely out in the Mavs. I would say I would, challenge you guys to name me a collector who has stuck with the Mavs through this.

Like, we can name all these people that have left. I can't name a single person who's like, yeah. This is great. Sticking with the Mavs.

Luka was out of shape. Davis is better. There's not a single person in the hobby that's like, let's let's stick with this. The Mavs were Luka Doncic. Their offense was oriented around him. The franchise was oriented around him.

I would argue he's the number one dynasty pick in the entire NBA. If all the teams reset and a random team had the number one pick, you could pick anyone, and, obviously, you're taking into consideration age, talent.

I think he'll be the number one pick. You could take Jokic, but he's five years older. So I think a lot of people might just like, I'll just take Luka.

He's younger than five years younger than Giannis. LeBron's freaking 40. Nobody's taking him. I think he's the number one pick, and they traded him for a 31 going on 32 year old whose nickname is street clothes.

It makes it's the most insane trade that I've ever it makes absolutely no sense. And they they took no consideration into the fan base. They just feel like, whatever.

We're trying to win. Who cares about the players? It's like the teams themselves are signaling we don't care about these individual players. So I find it fascinating, and I think the fans are gonna respond by being like, fine.

We'll just root for players. You know? I've been doing it for years. I've rooted for LeBron over the Suns for years because the Suns are a dumpster fire for fifteen years.

They yeah. From when Nash left to when we got CP three, they were the worst team in the NBA. Why would I support that team and go pay tickets to watch them? I could just watch them run.

I could just go to you know, when the heat come into town, I could just watch the best player in the world. It makes more sense for me to latch on to something that I know is more consistent and is gonna stick with me.

You know? So I think it's an interesting topic. I don't necessarily have an opinion on you should do it this way or that way or, you know, financially, this is the smarter decision.

It's just something that I think is fun to talk about, and and it's fun to be to bring it up. I I wanna put in One one last point. Yeah. I don't think the city and the team of the player matters at all.

I don't think the Lakers' argument is a good argument because the number one collectible and financially collectible player in the NFL plays in Kansas City, the middle of the country.

Nobody cares about Kansas City outside of Patrick Mahomes. It doesn't matter where you play. I think Luca would be popular if he was in Milwaukee or New Orleans.

It doesn't matter. The fact that he's going to LA is gonna give it a short term boost because people think that's should give it a short term boost. I think it's more that he's gonna be playing with LeBron.

He's switching teams. He's getting this reset. I think it's just a really exciting story for Luca to see how pissed off he's gonna be at what happens and where he takes his game to the next level where he starts bringing his new team.

I don't think it really necessarily matters that it's LA, but they don't give it a short term boost of excitement. I get the Lakers lore. But just the fact that the number one player in the NBA moved teams is just it's crazy.

I, I have a maybe a Luca collector question, back to you, Chris. But as I got the news and just to, like, maybe put an exclamation point on what you said, Josh, is was the fact that I've there are a lot of great players in the NBA.

But to me, like, the my, like, pick number one player, like, in a dynasty last year, like, I'd probably waiver on a couple guys.

But, like, after last year, like, Luka taking that team to the NBA finals, like, for me, like, the in my mind, I was like, he is the he he is the best player in basketball.

And to see him change change teams like this is so shocking, and I can't even wrap my head around it.

But I guess, like, a question that I have, Chris, and I don't know if you've had any conversations with maybe newly minted Luka collectors or what, but the fact that, like, you've got this group of Lakers collectors.

There's a lot of Lakers team collectors because why wouldn't you be? You've got, you know, Magic Johnson. You've got Kobe. You got Kareem.

You've got Shaq. You know, you got LeBron. I mean, just the list goes on. And now you got Luca. Do you think that those fans who have now have inherited Luca for hopefully the rest of his career, I'm sure most Lakers fans are thinking.

Do they start collecting go back and collect all of Luka's stuff, go collect his math stuff, or do they not care about that stuff?

And now the only stuff that they'll care about is Luka on the Lakers when those cards come out, which I think will maybe get one Luka Lakers Prism card.

But, like, what what is your perspective on that dynamic? Well, I do hope, honestly, that, Prism Prism will probably have to put, like, the text, like, trade it to Lakers on February whatever.

But I almost hope that, Luka's Dallas Mavericks uniform era, bookends perfectly with the end of Panini's license, which ends this season.

Not the least of which because, Panini is located in Dallas, and I've been to that office once or twice over the years. All of the cubicle seemed to have Luca paraphernalia.

I mean, he was just such an impactful player to Dallas and to the sports card manufacturing scene in Dallas that, it would be a really clean ending to the Panini's NBA licensed era if everything stayed in Mavs.

And then let the Lakers stuff coincide with the beginning of, fanatics taking over that license. Of course, I think Panini probably especially because the rookie class is a little bit less hyped this year.

They're gonna take I mean, they'll probably have Luka and Lakers uniforms on box art to to sell the products because this will be it'll be exciting.

And then I do think that, I I think, like like, I I would I would turn the question back to you with Halliburton.

You know? I think that, you know, you have the Haliburton situation where, Haliburton was in Kings, in Kings attire in his rookie season. And then in a few years, then he started getting the Pacers, the first Pacers stuff.

Or other examples are like Jalen Brunson. You know, his his first Knicks uniform prism card sold for, like, $6 a week or 2 ago, which is a crazy number.

Or you can look at Shae Gilgeous Alexander, and he's a little bit different. Shae Gilgeous Alexander, it seems like his his, rookie cards are are they they do really well regardless of team.

Those are those are his most sought after cards, but but it's just seems to be different with a player like Halliburton or Brunson that, that there's a lot of appeal for the first Knicks or the first Pacers uniform.

Yeah. So I just on the Halliburton front, I have the like, there was this point that I had where it was just like, I I I looked at the King stuff, and I I said, I don't care about this stuff.

And I ended up getting rid of, most of my King stuff because I was like, I just I don't I'd rather just have the Pacer stuff.

And then it gets into this dynamic of, like, well, then then I'm sacrificing the rookie cards, and does that bother me?

And then the more I thought about it was, no. It doesn't bother me. And then it really is like a way to, like, think about you, like, my myself and my collecting.

And that was, like, a moment when I realized, like, associate like, I am not opposed to going out and collecting a player because they fascinate me. I like watching them, this and that, like, upside, all that those things.

But I that was, like, that was one of the few moments over the last couple years where I I realized about my own collecting, like, just my the connection with the team itself is takes priority over, maybe some of these other things like rookies, even though they're in different jersey and that sort of thing, which varies.

It's different, person by person. But I I am curious just, like, if there are going to be Lakers collectors.

They might I'm sure many bought Luka cards, but, like, will they then go then sell those Luka rookie cards to then get into the first Luka LeBron or Luka Lakers card that that just because they like better because they consider themselves a Lakers fan over a Luka fan.

That sort of thing is interesting to me, and I'm curious how that'll all play out. Yeah.

I'm I'm super curious too. It it it really it's like, it's like different from player to player. Like, like like, I think about Shaq, and, he has, post playing days, logo man, autograph cards. Not not a ton of them, but he has some.

And I just wonder, like, how would Shaq in a Phoenix Suns uniform versus a Cleveland uniform versus a Boston uniform versus versus a Lakers uniform, versus an Orlando Magic uniform, would they all sell for the same, or would one go for more?

And if one would go for more, why? Is it because there's more team collectors of that particular team, or is it just because Shaq as an individual, more of his story happened to take place in a Lakers uniform?

Or people just think the Magic uniform looks cool with the pinstripes, and it just makes for a nicer aesthetic experience?

I think there's a lot of layers to this. I think there's a there's a lot. There is. And I'll throw one more, grenade out there and maybe get your reaction, Josh, on this.

Is that in that example with Shaq and the logo man cards, I think maybe it let it what matters less is whatever jersey he's wearing, and what matters more is the fact that it's a logo man, and that's what matters most to collectors.

And I think back to the Halliburton example that we're just talking through, and it's like, well, I say, like, I don't I'm not really interested in the King stuff.

That doesn't preclude maybe an interest in going and getting the two gold prism cards that Halliburton has in King's uniform because it would help me then complete the whole gold prism run.

And the fact that I can complete a gold prism run of a player like Halliburton, is way more interesting to me, and I would be willing to set aside some rules.

So I say all that to say, I think maybe, like, what's most important at the end of the day is, like, the product or parallel over the the team.

But those are just some thoughts. What do you think, Josh? Yeah. Totally agree. I think, you know, like, the mainstream media would tell you, oh, he's on the Lakers.

This is such a a great thing for the for the marketing of the NBA. Like, the final the numbers are gonna go up because he's in LA, and he's a star, and he's following magic and all this stuff.

But the hobby cares more about the hobby, which is what you said, the rarity of the card, the product, the parallel.

So, like, people that come in as, let's say, Lakers fans, they're like, oh, crap. I wanna start collecting Lucanelle or people that are newly joining.

They're gonna have to, you know, decide, am I gonna collect rookie cards and Mavs jerseys, or am I gonna do only Lakers? But, eventually, they're gonna wanna probably have some of those rookie cards.

And so they're gonna they're gonna wanna get some Mavs cards, and I think they're gonna be willing to do that because it's like, this is what the hobby respects, you know, the rookie cards, the rare parallels, and this is what what I'd you know, I I should have in my collection.

I've got maybe a a a good example to put a bow on it.

Yes. Think about all the LeBron prism goals. The one that commands the most value is the twenty twelve, which is in a heat uniform, which presumably would be because it's in a heat uniform.

If we're strictly taking the the team point of view, it has less significance than the Cavs, both because he was drafted there, because he brought them their their first championship, and because he's from there.

And it has less significance than the Lakers because of all of the Lakers' lore. And yet, what trumps all of those factors, because he does have Cavaliers uniform prism golds, and he does have Lakers uniform prism golds.

The what trumps them all by maybe even an order of magnitude in terms of value is the fact that it's the first prism gold from the first prism gold set and it and it's LeBron.

And then the second most valuable LeBron prism gold, I'm pretty sure, is the 2020, which is is in a Lakers uniform, but it's not his first.

So his first season with the Lakers was twenty eighteen nineteen, but it shows him in a Cavs uniform. But that's his first, you know, as a Laker gold.

The first prism gold to show him in a Lakers uniform is the twenty nineteen twenty prism gold, which that that prism card had a moment in the hobby during the pandemic as the first Lakers LeBron, as did the 2018 optic, which showed LeBron in Lakers uniform.

But but the 2020 prism gold LeBron, So that's a thirty year Lakers card, second year Lakers uniform prism card.

But that one's the second most valuable because of the amazing photograph of him doing the tribute dunk to Kobe, which in a Lakers uniform matters too, I think.

But it's it's once again, it's it's not the fact that it's it's not Lakers fandom driving it. It's that this is a really significant image on a card.

So the two biggest ones are you couldn't if if your theory was based on, like, team collecting predicting them, it wouldn't predict that those would be the two biggest, but they are.

Yeah. I love this topic because new people coming into the hobby are like, oh, it's based on performance from the day before.

His prices are gonna go up or he switched to the Lakers, And Stephen a Smith says the Lakers have a big market, so I should do this.

Then when you get into the numbers and the reality of the hobby, it doesn't work that way. And people are going after the twenty twelve Prism where they're going after twenty eighteen rookie Luca cards.

Like, we have our own rules once we get into the hobby, and they just don't coincide with mainstream media or Teams or, you know, whatever you're you're you're seeing on TV.

Oh, you know, we could do a whole show on Shaq or excuse me, Shaq. I don't know.

I've got Shaq on my mind after the logoman talk. LeBron prism catalog, in all of the first like, 2014, first Cavs, LeBron. Like why doesn't that get more love? Like 2014 is an incredible card. He wanted trophy in his hometown.

There's just so I mean to have a player, there's not many and we should maybe at some point do this whole basketball, football, who are all the guys who've had who will have had prism cards, playing day prism cards in every year.

But, like, I feel like digging into all the nuances behind those players, like, to to to to withstand the entire long, longevity of, you know, prism catalog, I think that'd be fun to dig into.

And there's no player probably more interesting than LeBron James, but this is I felt like we we we covered a lot of ground on the Luca front.

Who knows? We'll probably come back. I what final here. Where where do the Lakers end up this year?

I'm I'm holding you to the hot seat, both of you. How far are they gonna go in the playoffs with Luca? Who wants to go first? Go for Josh, please. I do not I just I am laughing because, you know, Chris has been rooting for the Mavs.

He has season tickets to the Mavs. They've been all on the Mavs. He's got Mavs, hoodies, and all this stuff. And now him and I are texting about, like, is Alex Len any good? You know?

How how is the Lakers how's the Lakers backup big looking right now? You know? That's where Chris, like, that's where the Matt the Luca fans are as they're now coming to, like, Lakers fans trying to figure out catch up really quick.

And and so I I love it because Chris and I are obviously close friends, and now we're kinda rooting for the Lakers together, and it's great.

It's like the car and they brought Maxi Cleaver, as you know. So it's like this full uniting of card ladder team, so it's great.

I yeah. I don't wanna, like, spoil everything on what we think, but I think they're gonna be pretty good. I just I don't see how you can have LeBron and Luca on the same team and then not be good.

The other thing is Luca made the finals with the Mavs, and then two years before that, he basically had a completely different team and made the Western Conference finals.

So I think just having Luca on your team puts you in that contention.

It's it's it's a matter of, like, how good everyone around him plays and and how efficient he is in the playoffs. And putting him with LeBron is like this dual supercomputer thing that we're gonna have to figure out.

Like, can they make Jackson Hayes like Shaq, basically? Let's look at so far, like, Jackson Hayes, like, hasn't missed a shot. Those two he's just getting, like, super easy lob dunks. They've got decent defenders surrounding them.

Gabe Vincent's really solid, I think. Ruiz is playing well. I think they're gonna be pretty good. Is you know, do they run into the Thunder or the Nuggets? Do they, you know, do they, like did someone get injured?

And, you know, there's all these different factors. But I think having those two guys puts them in contention at this point. Anything additional, Chris? And Austin Reed is the bowler. Austin Reed is good.

I saw him just, like, destroy the Pacers. He's really good. The Maxi Kleber of it all is great. Yeah. Tell me. That cherry on top is so funny to me. Picard let her move. That was us. We did that. We followed it. We phoned it in.

You know, we were talking about the team collector thing and like Christina would be the polar opposite because Christina was like, if Maxi didn't get traded away from the Mavericks and with Luca to the Lakers, then I would sell all of his cards.

So she was like the ultimate anti team collector where she just wanted her role player collect guy that she collects to just go with the main guy that we collect.

That's pretty funny. Here's what's amazing. I mean, there's a real case that Austin Reeves should be the sixth man and, lead the second unit, but he played so well in the game before Lucas debut where the rock was out.

So good. Luca was out. He had 45 points, seven rebounds, seven assists, and three steals.

I mean, the list of guys in NBA history who have done that is is maybe like 15 players to put up at least that stat line. So there was just no chance that you could bench a guy after a performance like that.

So you've got a lineup rolling out of Luca, LeBron, and Austin Reeves. And you know who is bringing the ball off the floor most of the time is the point guard who's Austin Reeves, which was really interesting to me.

So why not? You have a reason to get excited about this team. There are lots of reasons to be excited about this team as from the Luca collecting standpoint.

Not the least of which would be the Mavericks this year without Luca are fifteen and seventeen and they have like a negative a minus two net rating, which would be the best non Luca team that he's ever been on.

And that's still a team that misses the playoffs in the West, but that's still better than what he's used to.

The Lakers without Luca this year are fantastic. So he he comes and hops on this team. And, you know, I it's it's it's it's bizarre to, to to to see him on a team that's great without him.

That's never had. That's not, that's unusual. It's never happened before. And then I think LeBron was letting everybody know in that first game that he still got it.

I mean, he was like, you're playing against the Jazz and you're bullying them and even up like 25, you know, he's like playing lockdown defense against a kid that went to college with brawny just to show you that he can still do it.

And he's like leaking out for outlet passes up 30 just to let you know that he still got all the legs and all the endurance and all the stamina and all the energy.

And then in the fourth quarter up 25, he's taking charges from Walker Kessler, just to let you know how badly he wants us and how hard he's gonna play.

So he really shouldn't have done that because, like, he got, like, bruised on his chest or something.

But yeah. But I think, like, there's a lot of reason we have to miss him. Dude, he's, like, he's literally top five in the NBA right now, and he's forty forty effing years old in his twenty second season.

Like, you can't even put the asterisk on it that he's 22 and he's put his twenty second year is playing good.

He's playing good in a vacuum. It's it's insane. He's literally, like, the fifth best player in the NBA right now. And he's got the, in my opinion, the second best player in the NBA on his team.

So we don't think we didn't break up as those guys are not gonna get double teamed anymore. So LeBron's just gonna flow through the paint single covered and just, like, make these easy jumpers now. And he's gonna get leak outs for dump.

It's just it's crazy. I want I'll I'll close this round, by just maybe one compliment, which I haven't there's a lot of loud noise at the beginning of the season and people making fun of the JJ Reddick hire.

And, obviously, his family and himself have gone through a lot this year with the fires and all that stuff. But as a basketball fan, I'm not sure there's a guy you can kinda get behind more than just saying, you know what?

I'm gonna block out all the noise, and I'm gonna have a push the Lakers to be a really good team, which they were pre Luka trade, and then all of a sudden, Luka falls in his lap.

And I'm just like, I don't know. I was a fan of listening to him and his content, and now he's oversee over exceeding everyone's expectations.

So to me, this it just feels like this new era of the NBA is being ushered in here with this move where you've got this coach who no one else thought could be good is good, and then this team, resurgence of LeBron and Luka and everything else, not a team.

Even Oklahoma City, not a team I'd wanna play in the playoffs if I'm gotta be honest with you.

So there. We did it. We covered Luca, and we've hardly got any time left, but but that was it to be expected. I wanna throw this one out there because, Josh, you posted this or you said it on crossover. Maybe I'm it was Chris.

I don't know. But there's one question I wanna hit because I think this will be an interesting way to close out this episode. And the question is, should collectors stop bidding on auctions? So, Josh, I think that was you somewhere.

Did you post this, or did you say it on the crossover? I think I texted it to Chris, and he was really amused by that. Because it's like obviously, it's like a stupid it makes no sense to, like, say it out loud.

And you say, like, don't put up it makes no no sense. But then when you really dig into it, and if you pick out a specific card where you wanna play this theory because that's happened to me where it's like, I've texted them.

Like, if I didn't bid on this card, I would now own it for half of you know, I could own it cheaper.

It's like, well, that doesn't make any sense. Well, yeah, because I'm the second highest bidder. I sent it from 5 k to 10 k. It would have ended at 5 k if I didn't bid.

It went to 10 k. Now he's gonna ask the 15 to flip it to me because he saw that on the number two bidder. If he had bought it at five, I could have got it for 7,500. So I could have got it for less than the auction.

Is is this is this, have you ever since making this statement, is this something that you've you've tested, like, like, waited and seen how it played out and see if the card gets posted up in, like, on Instagram or in a marketplace, have you tested your theory out yet?

It's hard to test the theory because you'd have to live in two dimensions and do one where you bid on it and one where you don't because the cards I'm bidding on are, you know, super rare cards.

So it's not like I can just see it come up a second instance and, like, and play the hypothesis out side by side.

So it's really more of just, like, I'm just workshopping it right now and thinking it through. And, sure, I've tested it by I stopped bidding on auction.

It's freaking it's annoying as hell because I know I'm just bidding against flippers who just wanna flip it back to me. Is it how in this era of collecting sports cards in the hobby and all of the different, personalities, personas.

And I think we all can agree that we we need all of these types of individuals to make this whole ecosystem do the things that we want it to do.

Where how, I don't know. How critical of a role or how prominent, I guess, of a role do we think the the flipper audience is right now?

Is it, like, big? Is it, like, bigger than ever? Like, how how do you see kind of the people who are, like, taking cards away from collectors and then relisting them?

How big of a I don't I don't wanna say issue, but maybe I'll just say that for a lack of better way to describe it. How big of an issue do you think that audience is and that persona is to our hobby right now, Chris?

Pretty big. Alright. Josh, what do you have a strong take on this now? Pretty big. I mean, I just I was just gonna say, like, Is it a few is it is it, like, just a few loud people, or is it just a lot of people? Like, what is it?

There's, like, two to three per lane, like, per vertical. And the ones that Chris and Aaron, we can name three to four. And I'm sure another friend we have in a different vertical or a different sport could be like, yeah.

We've got three of those guys too. And I also don't think it's ever gonna go away because we live in a free market system, so we can't prevent it.

And I it's been happening forever. I don't think this is, like, anything new. There's it's probably just more prevalent because we see them on social media immediately after buying it.

They're, like, posting, you know, before they even have the card that it's available. So, like, we just get that information, that feedback loop quicker, and it's it's more frustrating because we see it.

It's an issue, though. Yeah. Like, I I can tell you a number of times for it's been having specifically with more players than others.

But, there's a number of times when, I've been watching a card end at auction, and I lose the auction, and then I see it on eBay or not on eBay.

Sorry. On Instagram in a story sale, you know, within two or three days for for sale for one of the from one of the usual suspects.

There's been, an increase in dealers and flippers, descending upon online auctions that I think is unprecedented.

I think it's always been a factor, but I think the amount of dealers and flippers who are bidding on Golden and, Fanatics and Heritage and eBay, obviously. I I think it's it's really high. It's in an all time high.

And the business model that a lot of them settled on, and to Josh's point, it is a free market and it's completely their right to do it, is win stuff at auction, especially if they feel like it's going cheap, and then relist it and and mark it up and wait for a collector to come along and buy it and pay the markup.

I don't wanna single anybody out or call anybody out, so I'll I'll make it a little more general. But, there was a pretty significant Michael Jordan card that was auctioned, maybe about half a year ago now.

And, it, it was one on one of the big auction houses, and then it was posted for sale to Instagram within a month. And it's also listed on eBay for sale right now too, And it's marked up about 50% of what the what the dealer wanted for.

And I've had a few moments where, you know, I know his Instagram contact. I know what he's asking for with on OBO on eBay.

I've had moments where I was like, I'll just pay the 20% markup. You know, he wants a 50 markup. I'll offer a 20% markup over what he paid, and hopefully, we can settle there in the middle.

And then it's just like, well, I'm paying buyer's premium twice. So what to to pay for this card. So then you so then you start game you then you start doing what Josh did, which is game theory, playing out scenarios.

What if I just don't bid on this at all and just let the dealers peck away and, like, you know, dealers wanna get a deal, so they're not gonna bid crazy high like a collector will.

So let them peck away. They buy it. They sell it. They take their markup. But after all the markups have been taken, I'm still gonna get a better deal than if I was actually duking it out with with other collectors and dealers.

It's all kind of piling on to one auction to try and win it. And we drive up comps. We drive up prices. When really those comps and those prices, they're not really being set by end collectors.

They're also being impacted by dealers and flippers who are also looking at other comps and trying to figure out what price they can bid so that they can resell it and or just sit on it until somebody is willing to pay the markup.

So the theory, which is which is comical and it's not practical, but it's to illustrate a point, which is that there is a lot of dealer and flipper activity on auction on auctions right now that, that make it funny just to think about.

What if collectors just abstain from bidding at auctions and just waited for the dealer to win it and waited for them to take their their markup. And at the end of the day, we might end up paying less if we did it that way.

Yeah. But this logic, we should just we as collectors should just pay, like, a monthly stipend to all the dealers. Like, here's your money to not bid. Like, you guys just get money by not bidding. Like, we just do the reverse.

Just here, you just take your $200 stipend every month, and then you can't bid on these auctions. Oh, man. I yeah. This I can't imagine. It's true, man. Like, it you can't find a hole in the steering. You can't you know, it's it's real.

You know you know when they they it enters my lane sometimes, and I'm just like I just wait, and then it it pops up. And I'll tell you, like, for me, when I see a card that I lost out to, it's fallen in the flip flipper vortex.

No matter how much at that time, no matter how aggressively I bid, when I lose it and then I see it relisted for a two x price, like, there's just something about no matter how much I wanted it, like, a day ago, resync, it's just like it loses its luster for me.

I don't know if it's my mindset and try to move on, but it to me like this. I try to put myself in the shoes of the dealer and I'm just like, how much dead inventory do you have? Just sitting there.

You're just sitting there winning all these auctions, like, like in your the the price, you're marking it up. Like it's it's absurd, like and you're just sitting there waiting for some, you know, mark to come and, you know, take a bite.

It's just to me, I don't know how it I'm like, on the other end, I'm not sure how it works, and that's the part that I'm always just so because I maybe it's because I don't have the means to just spend, you know, a premium price on a bunch of cards at auction that I don't care about.

But to me, that's kind of the fascinating thing. It's just like, how did these dealers even make this work?

I mean, it works because they keep doing it. Like, if they were losing money, they would have left. It definitely works. There's a because you only need one collector to buy. And Chris and I have bit.

I'm sure you've bit too. But Oh, yeah. We don't wanna admit it, but it's like, yeah. I guess it's only 20% more. I pay, you know, I pay 20% BP all the time. I'll just, you know, I'll I'll I'll eat it. It's fine. Yeah.

The the art of the dealer, once upon a time, was about, unearthing collections and finding things on obscure social media marketplaces and, like, you know, seeing somebody post this really random rare card on eBay and then DMing them and forming a relationship and then figuring out they've got all this stuff and sort of surfacing it and placing it with collections and stuff.

And, and that that that there are still dealers who do that. They're very good at it. But but now there's a whole new breed of dealer, which is just I'm gonna bid on all these highly visible public auctions, and I'm gonna win.

And then I'm gonna sit on the cards until somebody's willing to pay more. And to Josh's point, it does work. Do I have a Can I give one more small example? I had a Yes. A collector that I'm I'm friends with.

I know him. We DM all the time. He had a Todd Gurley card that he was selling, and he came to me first. So this is, like, this is the avenue I prefer. Collector to collector, he's looking to get something else.

He knows I would enjoy it. He offered it to me at at price x. And I was like, you know, this is not doesn't quite fit into my PC. I really appreciate you reaching out. You know, go ahead and and sell it to someone else at VPN.

I'm I'm not interested. Like, three days later, a a flipper comes to me with that exact card and offers it at x plus x times point five. And he's like, dude, I found this card for you. I thought of you first, like, just reaching out.

Thought I'd help you out. It's like, dude, that card was offered to me for 50% less, like, two days ago. Thank you, though. And it's just like that happens to me, Chris, and I'm sure you've read all the time.

How about when they, how about when you have the guy a offer you the card, and then guy b comes along, hasn't secured the card yet, but knows the guy a has it and knows he could buy it from guy a and you so he offers you a card that, you know, he doesn't even have yet, but he's trying to get your offer.

Take your money, knock off his percentage, and actually buy the car from the source, then flip it to you.

How about that one? I've had that happen more than a few times. So does guy, a, ship it directly to you? He might as well. Right? Let's let's save the the postage fees. This is the stipend. I'm gonna start this is our new phrase.

This is, like, the monthly stipend. Just like government checks that you the dealers get. Can you imagine just, like, looking up, like, going in just, like, like, there's, like, you know, three flippers in your category.

And can you imagine just, like, sending out, like, a reoccurring monthly, like, PayPal or Fed Venmo to them?

It's like, honey, what is this for? It's like, I'm just taking care of my, flipper friends. Yeah. It's like alimony or something. Like, you, you have to pay for the kids or something.

Exactly. Maybe we can have one, one positive takeaway before we close out this episode on the flipper front because the most question the most number one question I always get is, I have a card in the flipper vortex.

What do I do? So I know we kinda joke don't bid on the cards, but maybe it is don't bid on the cards.

But, like, what bay based on all of your interactions with the flippers and especially on a card you, like, really want, like, what what piece of feedback do you have for the audience?

Maybe we'll start with you, Josh, just in terms of, like, how do you get a card out of the flipper vortex without breaking breaking the bank or doing something you're you're not proud of.

Well, maybe I wasn't clear enough in the previous segment. Don't bid on the card. I'm dead serious. Just stop bidding on it.

It will lower the price of all these cards. These people will get pissed off, and we'll stop it. I I obviously can't make everyone do this, so it's not gonna actually work. But, I I honestly think that's a good strategy.

Like, just don't bid on it because the the odds of that card ending up with, like, a long time collector who's just gonna bury it away and that was really your last chance to get it and it was a one zero one is much less frequent than, you know, it's gonna end up with someone in your vertical that you're gonna see it in a week.

I guess you kinda have to take into account. If it is a one zero one, you might be a little bit more nervous about that scenario, so you might wanna bid.

But just, you know, put in your max bid of what you think it's actually worth. And if you and if you lose it, you know, don't don't mega bid that one.

And it also depends on the player. Chris brought that up. I thought that was a really good point to to call out. It does depend the player. And this is, like, this is, like, probably the theory that Chris has been working off of.

Let me find the players that the mainstream media hasn't hasn't figured out yet statistically and that the hobby hasn't figured out statistically, and they're not in the hands of the flipper vortex people.

And I can just kinda sneakily get this guy now, and I think Jokic is a really good a really good player for him to play that that theory out.

And I'm guessing Jokic is one of the guys you don't have to worry about as much as Luca and and, Mahomes and Jordan.

Yeah. You're exactly right. But if the guy who would jump the shark with was Christian McCaffrey, which is crazy because like, why are flippers dealing with Christian McCaffrey cards?

But the situation that speaks to your question, Brett was McCaffrey's immaculate rookie year premium patch shield autograph one of one hit, fanatics, months ago. I don't know. Maybe it's not like a year ago. And, didn't I didn't.

I I bid up to, like, a few grand because I thought that's about what it was worth. And it's really not a card on my McCaffrey, Mount Rushmore. It's it's very close. It's very close, but it's not quite there. And I lost the auction.

The guy who won it offered it to me, obviously, as if I hadn't just seen it end up. He eventually sells it to another guy who offers it to me. I say no again. The card ended up on Card Hobby. No idea how it got there. Now it's in China.

Offered to me again by somebody in China, I I Three times. You offered I still say no. Three times. You got offered it three times. It's like, I haven't so I have, like, resisted this card, and it still is, swirling the flippers vortex.

But, I I have to admit, just to be completely honest, that, if it was a Mount Rushmore McCaffrey card, I would end up paying off one of these guys and taking it out of the vortex.

And that's the ultimate decision you have to make. Are you gonna pay that ransom, or are you just or is it so, like, it really it's almost a good exercise.

It's almost a good thing for a collector that it forces you to decide, is this a Mount Rushmore card for me or not? And if it's not, then let it rot.

Well, that's the issue that we're that we're finding ourselves in is that the dealers and flippers have this are getting closer and closer, and I think they're now at the point they've discovered what those cards are, and they know that there are Mount Rushmore cards.

That's why the they've honed in on the one on ones and the black financing stuff because they know those are the those are the ones we are just gonna bite the bullet and do it.

Like, it stopped working for base prisons at first, and we all gave up on that. It stopped working for the cards out of two fifty that are autographed like the LeBron ultimate.

It stopped working for that stuff because the supply was too much. But now it's the point where the flippers vortex card people are circling the stuff we that they know we're just gonna have to fight it.

Do you Brad, do you get, because we're sorta, like, making this divide now. Like, are you a collector? Are you a flipper? And we're sort of, like, criticizing one side. And Chris and I have taken this stance.

Like, you guys are allowed to do this. It's a free market. We're allowed to complain about it. Do you deal with this as a content creator? Like, I'm curious if you have are you like, oh, Brett, you're on the side.

You know, you shouldn't take sides, etcetera. Yeah. My my my, position is, I think we, as a hobby, try to put, like, individuals into these nice little boxes and say label them. Like, this person's this, this person's that.

When I think in all actuality, like, we as operators in the hobby to try to get cards, like, sometimes we gotta sell cards to get cards, even cards that we just bought. So I think, like, there's a lot of gray area.

But I think, generally, it's the how egregious some of the actors are, and that's when you can speak out when someone is, you know, buying a car that's on a weekly auction and then, you know, relisting it for double the the cost on eBay then, you know, the next day and then also taking to Instagram where they're going on and on about how it's for sale and hitting you over the face.

Like, it reaches a point where it's like, alright. There's no, like, tact here with your approach, so, like, we're gonna, like, speak out and criticize, like, that type of behavior, in the hobby.

So, yeah, I'm very much like you can I'm very much like you can as long as you're not, like, committing fraud or, like, trying to steal money from someone, like, you're allowed to do whatever you want.

But know that, like, you it comes with heavy criticism. And we know that collectors are a certain way, man.

And and when you start to step outside of that way or if one collector starts to look at something you're doing kinda funny, then there's probably a whole another line of people doing the exact same thing.

So, yeah, I don't know. I I I try to be, diplomatic in a way, because I believe, like, we need all of these, personalities and types to make the hobby continue to move and thrive.

But, yeah, I'm if if someone, like, comes up to my doorstep and and pisses on the the the doormat, like, I'm gonna probably come out there and and yell a few things.

But if it's, like, happening across the street at, you know, my neighbors or whatever, like, I probably will just look and be like, what a what an ass.

Like but I probably won't go speak out. So it's it's it's just like it's how how close it is and how like, did it impact something I'm doing directly?

Then that's where I start to get really fired up. But if not, I just kinda deal with it. Alright. Anything else we have? And what else is on your mind? We could we've gone on Broadway on Luca.

We've talked about, not bidding on your auctions. We didn't get to pickups. We didn't get to a couple other topics. I feel like we covered a lot of ground. How do you guys feel about today's episode?

I'm feeling great. It was it was good. Yeah. We did. We we covered a lot of stuff. Stuff like that wasn't on the outline, but that made it good, made it more spontaneous. Josh, you feeling good?

Yeah. We didn't cover the, like, sales volume, but I feel like it's pretty consistent with the last few months. I didn't see anything that jumped out as, like, this month was crazy or anything. EBay had a huge month.

They went over 200,000,000. Yeah. And maybe a preview, and we'll dig into this last maybe next week as a topic. We were gonna talk about the volume of 10 k cards sold via platform and maybe via card ladder data here.

I think eBay is always maybe viewed as a platform not to send 10 k cards or above, but eBay, obviously, the biggest platform, had 395 cards that are 10 k and above in January.

Fanatics, 202 in Golden nine. That sort of stuff, I think you can pull from card ladder, and it's interesting data.

And maybe we'll get into a a deeper discussion on its implications on hobby behavior and our activity and where we buy or where we list cards in the future. But for now, that is it. We've covered a lot of ground.

Appreciate card ladder for, this conversation, Chris and Josh and team. Appreciate you all for taking some time listening in. We'll always get feedback after these, so appreciate you. Until next month, we'll talk to you all soon.