June’s Hot List
June flew by and the fireworks have already gone off for July. It’s time to check out who had the hottest (and coldest) cards for the month of June. The real theme of June was staying the course though. Most players saw little movement one way or the other. After a couple of years of declines, I’ll take stagnancy as a win.
Hot List
5. Vintage Baseball- Many of the top movers in the Card Ladder Player’s Indices are baseball players who have long been retired. This type of movement is likely the product of timing. Baseball gets a lot of attention around the All-Star break as it enjoys the spotlight unabated for a while. As people shift to thinking about baseball, the cards of their childhood heroes get a bump. It’s tough to do, but buying basketball when you are excited about baseball and vice versa can pay off.
4. Jordan Love- Quite a few NFL players came close to cracking this list this month and I expect them to start dominating it soon. Shoot, most quarterbacks with a shot at a starting job have seen their cards creeping up in value in the past month. Collectors are getting ready for the season and the expectations around Love are amongst the highest.
3. Bobby Witt Jr.- Witt and Gunnar Henderson have been the two brightest young stars of the 2024 season. Both are in the top five for odds to win the AL-MVP. Witt has seen a slightly bigger jump in prices likely due to the fact that he’s had an extra year for the rookie hype to subside. Gunnar’s cards were priced too high to see a 25% jump like Witt’s Card Ladder Index enjoyed last month. Both are on remarkable runs. Even though several big name young MLB players haven’t performed well, there are enough young stars in the game to keep interest high.
2. Aaron Judge- Judge is hunting 60 again and collectors are taking note with a 25% Card Ladder Player Index jump. If the Yankees can make it deep in the playoffs and Judge keeps crushing homers, we’ll finally get to see what his real hobby potential is.
1. Jaylen Brown- Brown won a title, the Finals MVP award, and now he gets crowned the king of June’s hot list. Surely, June 2024 is a month he will never forget. I do worry that collectors might though as Brown doesn’t have a flashy game that screams superstar. He’s well-established as a top-25 hobby guy, but he’ll have to fight off Tatum and a few others if he wants to cement his place as a top-10 hobby player.
Cold List
3. Vintage Basketball- Many second-tier stars like Dirk Nowitzki, Dominique Wilkins, and Moses Malone have seen their cards dip 10%-20% in the last couple of weeks as the focus shifts away from basketball. It would be nice to write the dips in basketball off to timing, but vintage basketball is the only holdover on either hot or cold list from last month suggesting that the decline is not simply a product of the sports calendar.
2. Phil Foden- Foden looked like he was finally ready to grab that superstar mantel with the Premiere League’s Player of the Season award, but national team play has him right back to fighting for playing time. The good news is that Foden’s cards are as cheap as they’ve been since 2021 so this might be a nice window to snag some cards of one of soccer’s brightest young talents.
1. Jayson Tatum- Wait, what? Tatum is 26 and just won his first NBA title on a team that appears built for long-term success. His Card Ladder Player Index has dropped a massive 31% in the past month. That’s the biggest drop for any widely traded player in that time span. These facts don’t add up.
Part of the issue is the timing as NBA card prices tend to peak a month before the NBA Playoffs. The other issue though is opinions solidified on Tatum, rather unfairly, in the past few months and that opinion is he is a great player, but decidedly not a superstar. In a hobby where perception is everything, that goes a long way to explaining Tatum’s ranking here.
Wrap Up
June is in the books and we’ll be perusing July’s hot list before you know it. My bold prediction is that Pete Alonso will be on it. Who’d I miss on these lists? Who will be on it next month? Let me know in the comments.