El Cardquistador

It started innocently enough—a late-night comparison between two titans of the “Junk Wax” era. I was looking at Bo Jackson’s 1989 Score Supplemental card alongside his iconic 1990 Score “Bat & Pads” masterpiece.

The “Bat & Pads” card is the definition of a hobby legend. It’s the card every kid in my generation stayed up dreaming about. It is visually loud, culturally massive, and arguably the most famous image of the decade. But because it was the “it” card, it was produced in massive quantities. Today, it’s everywhere—beautiful, iconic, but endlessly replaceable.

The 1989 Supplemental? It’s quieter. It was tucked away in a small boxed set, overlooked by the masses at the time. It is somewhat harder to find in volume.

I had a point to make about scarcity and value. I wanted to highlight the “hidden” gem over the “obvious” one. But in a moment of social media-induced adrenaline, I didn’t write a nuanced essay. I posted four words: “Chase this. Not that.”

And then, a moment later, the realization hit me hard I just did what I tell other collectors not to do.

The Pedestal of the Hot Take

My entire collecting identity is built on a few core principles. Find value where others aren’t looking. Find joy in the ignored and the overlooked. Most importantly: Let me collect what I like, and you go collect what you like. Don’t let anyone—including me—tell you what deserves a spot in your box.

In a moment of clarity, I could see what that post should have been. I should have said that I believe this is the better pickup for my collection. Same player, same era, same story—but with real scarcity at a similar price point. For my money, that’s a better value proposition. That is an invitation to consider, not a command to follow.

But that’s not what I posted. I posted the hot take. The declarative statement. The kind of collecting prescription I’ve spent years pushing back against.

The Nuance We Lose in the Scroll

I did it because I was excited. I did it because I wanted to spark conversation. In the spontaneity of a digital feed, the nuance got compressed into a binary choice that contradicted everything I stand for.

Here’s the thing about principles: they’re easy to hold when you’re writing thoughtfully and editing carefully. They’re harder when you’re scrolling, posting, and reacting. When the excitement of discovery makes you want to shout “LOOK AT THIS” so loudly that you forget to add “…but you do you.”

By telling people to “not” chase the 1990 Score Bo, I was dismissing the very magic that brings people into this hobby. For many, that card is the hobby. Whether there are five copies or five million shouldn’t matter if that’s the card that makes you feel like you’re ten years old again.