A Mickey Mantle baseball card sells for a record-breaking $5.2 million.

[DGUtley]

A Mickey Mantle baseball card sells for a record-breaking $5.2 million.

Mickey Mantle baseball card sells for $5.2M, breaking all-time record for trading cards - The last time this kind of Mantle card was sold, it was for nearly half that price

A new record in the world of collectable trading cards has been set thanks to an entrepreneur's willingness to shell out seven figures for a bit of history. It was announced Wednesday that Rob Gough purchased a 1952 Mickey Mantle card for $5.2 million. The purchase smashes the previous record set by a 2009 Bowman Chrome Draft Prospects Superfactor card of Mike Trout that sold for $3.93 million in August 2020.

Just like the Trout card, the Yankees legend's card was certified to be a Mint 9 on the universally accepted grading service for trading cards. Trout's card was autographed by the player himself and listed as a 1-of-1 based on its serial number. The Mantle card is from a 1952 Topps collection and not only does it not include an autograph, there was also certainly more than one made, and a pack you could get one in in 1952 cost just 5 cents. Still, it is considered to be the Holy Grail of baseball trading cards.



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https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/m...tm_source=digg

[midcan5]

I had several player cards from those times, but when I went in the military my brothers got into my stuff... Had some signatures too. In the olden days the players came out of Connie Mack stadium and you could approach them. Some friendly, some not so much.

[gamewell45]

I've got Mickey Mantle's baseball card (Tops) from 1968. I also went to the same school as his son, Mickey, Jr. attended.

[DGUtley]

I had several player cards from those times, but when I went in the military my brothers got into my stuff... Had some signatures too. In the olden days the players came out of Connie Mack stadium and you could approach them. Some friendly, some not so much.

Years ago, when my oldest was young, probably in the late 90's early 2000's, we used to go to Indians games alot, just she and I. Back then, the players would come out of the players entrance and sign autographs along the fence. Well, we were all the way around the fence. This player, I don't recall who it was, came out and went kid to kid to kid signing and saying hello to each and every youngster there. I bet it took over an hour. She was thrilled and tells her baseball-loving husband about it every now and then. (who by the way is due home from Afghanistan next Friday!!!!)

[Daily Bread]

Yankee cards were all I collected in the early 60s and I left 1000s of them in 2 egg crates in the basement of my Bronx tenement and there were a few Mantle Rookies in there . I still have a Sports Illustrated Mantle rookie card in my current collection - very rare ,that I was given by a parent in appreciation of me coaching his son on our Little League team.
Mantle and Maris the Kings of baseball in 61 but even though Mantle was my top guy I never gave up on Maris when he hit his #61 that day . I was lucky enough to be able to get in the Stadium that day to watch it . Those days are long gone and so are my cards - but in those days the cards had no monetary value at all , they were just who you were and what you worshipped . More important than money .

[Standing Wolf]

The sale price on that Trout card is a joke. The '1-of-1' card is a card company gimmick, designed to induce collectors into buying dozens or hundreds of card packs (at $6 to $10 each) in the hopes of being the one who finds the "golden ticket", so to speak. An entirely manufactured "collectible". That it's autographed by Trout is really irrelevant. The appeal is to own something that "no one else does".

When I was a kid I had a couple of shoe boxes full of cards from the '50s and early '60s, but I don't think I owned a Mantle rookie, though I had some of his other early cards. Every once in a while, a couple of years ago when I was more into the hobby, I would see a card in the glass display case of a card shop - maybe Maris, Musial, Spahn or Yogi - priced at 70 or 80 bucks and cringe a little, 'cause I remembered that particular card from back in the day. I gave away my cards to a couple of neighbor kids when I was 15 or 16 after my mother pointed out that I "never played with them anymore".

[Captdon]

What's also funny is that to a true collector, a 1956 Joe Smith card is worth a fortune. He needs it to fill out the team. Who saved that?

[Daily Bread]

I had read a story that Mantles 1952 rookie card was high numbered card that as a result was produced late in the season . Topps destroyed most of his cards because it was the way they kept kids and collectors interested in making purchases trying to get that special card . Topps would take all excess cards in the warehouse and store shelves and in those days , at least in 1952 , they were dumped in the ocean to keep up any values on cards . Mantles cards were a high number and last produced so many ended up in the Atlantic . It was his first year and they hadn't fully understood his potential .
He was a phenom on a spectacular team .

[Standing Wolf]

I remember back in '98, during the big McGwire-Sosa home run competition, McGwire's single rookie card - a 1985 Topps, showing him in his Team U.S.A. jersey - had been short-printed, making it relatively scarce. Collectors were paying upwards of $300 for it. Sosa, on the other hand, had at least seven rookie cards - in other words, at least seven different sets featured him in his rookie year - and the scarcest one was only worth a few dollars. Just a few years later you could (and still can) buy a McGwire rookie card for thirty bucks.

My fondest memory of McGwire involves watching him hit into an 8-2-6 triple play against Randy Johnson at Bank One Ballpark.

[Daily Bread]

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