Why I'm Not on Wall Street

Several years ago I went to a baseball card store with 4 friends of mine. As teenagers and sports enthusiasts, we only had a little spare money to spend and we spent nearly an hour surveying the field of cards available. I had only about 5 bucks to spend and was pretty sure I was going to invest in a Tony Gwynn Topps rookie card, which was priced around $4.00. I made my way through the store, I heard a couple of my buddies get excited so I hurried over to see what was up. They were pumped because they found out that the first Michael Jordan basketball card was available.

Jordan, playing a few hours north in Chicago was already popular in our basketball crazed little town. You couldn’t buy his card alone. You had to buy the whole Bulls team set. If my memory serves me correct, the whole set was $2.00. Yes, I put that decimal point in the right place…two greenbacks…two bucks…and with it you got the rest of the Bulls, also! All four of the other guys decided that they were going to get a Bulls team set, which included the Jordan rookie.

I was only slightly tempted to get it, but then thought to myself, “Basketball cards aren’t worth anything! And if I get that team set, I won’t have enough money for the Gwynn rookie. These guys can go with the fads and waste their money on a basketball card if they want to, but I’m going to make a wise investment!”

As it turns out, it was a pretty good investment as that Gwynn rookie card is now worth about $60. But, my friends made a better choice…that card, in that set for 2 bucks is now worth around $1,600 but has sold as high as $5,000.

Oh well, as they say, hindsight…