The most played episodes among Podcast App listeners.

1. 1
   Number 1: Adapt or Get Left Behind + Mark Wahlberg Gets Into Cards + Are Old-School LCSs in Trouble?

   The hobby is changing. The question is whether everyone in it is willing to change with it. Jeremy is joined by David Chase and Leighton Sheldon for a wide-ranging conversation about the evolution of the sports card hobby, beginning with news that Mark Wahlberg is getting further involved in the card business. Is celebrity involvement good for the hobby? Does it even matter? And should collectors care who's entering the space as long as they're doing honest business? That leads into a bigger discussion about Fanatics, product allocation and the future of the traditional local card shop. What happens when longtime shops no longer fit the vision manufacturers have for the modern hobby? Is there something worth preserving about the dusty old-school LCS, or is adapting simply part of doing business? Leighton also weighs in on the vintage card show circuit, including why the Philly Show may be one of the best places in the country to actually buy vintage, how it compares with Strongsville and the National, and what separates each show. Plus, Mikey Singer joins Jeremy to preview the upcoming Sport Card Expo in Calgary, the continued expansion of the Expo across Canada, the growth of the Toronto show and what collectors can expect when the Expo arrives in Jeremy's backyard. A conversation about change, nostalgia, business and finding your own way to enjoy the hobby, regardless of what happens around you. Subscribe to Sports Cards Live on YouTube and wherever you listen to podcasts. Take the Hobby Spectrum Assessment and find out where you fit in the hobby at thehobbyspectrum.com. Discover cards across the hobby's auction platforms with AuctionWire.ai. Track the market and research your cards with Card Ladder. Use promo code SCL. And check out Pops & Comps, available now on Amazon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

   September 13, 2026·50min
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2. 2
   Number 2: Why the Last Comp Isn’t the Whole Story + Hidden Fees & Taxes + What Is Your Card Worth?

   What is a sports card actually worth? Jeremy Lee, David Chase, Chris HOJ and the very wordy Josh Adams finish the night by digging deeper into one of the hobby's most deceptively complicated questions: how do we determine value when buying and selling cards? The conversation begins with more insight into Card Ladder and the effort to maintain the integrity of sales data. Chris explains why the goal isn't simply to fix individual questionable sales, but to identify the underlying systems that allowed a problem to occur and improve those systems for the future. From there, the discussion turns to something every collector encounters: the difference between a reported comp and the actual economics of a transaction. A marketplace may report the final price paid for a card, but that number doesn't necessarily reflect what the seller received after commissions and fees. It also doesn't capture everything the buyer may have spent on sales tax, shipping, financing or other transaction costs. Jeremy shares how financing part of a major card purchase pushed his actual cost basis well beyond the publicly reported sale price. So which number represents the card's true value? Jeremy revisits a question he and Chris discussed years ago: why should the buyer have all the power in determining value? For highly liquid cards, recent comps may provide an obvious answer. But with truly scarce cards, shouldn't the owner's willingness to part with the card matter just as much as what a buyer is willing to pay? And as David points out, value can also depend on how long a seller is willing to wait for the right buyer to arrive. The panel also returns to vintage non-sports and the possibility that rising prices could eventually send a large supply of previously raw cards into PSA. How dramatically could populations change once cheaper grading tiers become available, and how long will collectors have to wait before the true supply becomes visible? Then, as tends to happen four hours into Sports Cards Live, things get a little less serious. Is chess a sport? What about poker, darts, billiards, professional wrestling, auto racing and competitive eating? Does something have to involve physical exertion to qualify as a sport, and is being an athlete necessarily the same thing as participating in a sport? Plus, Josh Adams names the 1990s card he'd most like to see consigned to 90s Auctions, and the panel puts the finishing touches on a four-hour-and-15-minute edition of Sports Cards Live. Subscribe to Sports Cards Live on YouTube and wherever you listen to podcasts. Take the Hobby Spectrum Assessment and learn more at thehobbyspectrum.com. Discover cards across multiple auction platforms with AuctionWire at auctionwire.ai and use promo code SCL for 60 days free. Check out Card Ladder for sports card sales history, market data and research. And pick up Jeremy Lee's book, Pops and Comps: Truths, Insights, and Psychology Behind the Numbers That Drive the Sports Card Market, available on Amazon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

   September 11, 2026·43min
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3. 3
   Number 3: Can You Trust Your Comps? + Fake Sales & Green Check Marks + The Hobby’s “Dummy Tax”

   How much should you actually trust the comps you're using to buy and sell sports cards? Jeremy Lee, David Chase, Joe Poirot, Chris HOJ and Josh Adams dive deep into one of the most important issues in today's data-driven hobby: understanding what the numbers actually mean before allowing them to influence your decisions. The conversation begins with a viewer claiming there are too many fake sales appearing on Card Ladder. Chris explains how Card Ladder handles potentially unpaid, staged or otherwise questionable transactions, why sales initially appear as they happen, how marketplaces subsequently provide information about unpaid items, and what collectors should actually take from the green verification check marks appearing beside certain sales. But even a verified sale doesn't answer every question. Was it truly an arm's-length transaction? Was the card an unusually strong or weak example for the grade? Was there something about the seller, provenance or bidding that made the result unusual? That leads into a detailed discussion about Card Ladder Value and one of its most misunderstood characteristics. How can a lower-grade card have a higher estimated value than a higher-grade example? Chris explains the methodology behind CL Value, why each card and grade is treated independently, how the applicable market index is used to adjust an older sale, and why Card Ladder deliberately avoids creating a black-box algorithm that simply assumes a higher grade must always be worth more. Eye appeal makes the problem even more complicated, particularly with vintage cards where two examples carrying the exact same numerical grade can command dramatically different prices. David calls attention to the hobby's “dummy tax,” the price collectors and dealers can pay when they use data without understanding it. Jeremy also raises the opposite danger: knowledgeable buyers or sellers potentially weaponizing a valuation tool against someone who doesn't understand how the number was generated. Throughout the discussion, Chris returns to one central principle: don't outsource your judgment. A comp, an estimated value, a green check mark, an asking price and a current auction are all pieces of information, but none should replace your own research and understanding of the card. Plus, the group discusses stale comps, half grades, confidence levels, market manipulation around The National, why older sales may become more trustworthy with time, and whether there could ever be a truly “perfect” sports card valuation tool. Subscribe to Sports Cards Live on YouTube and wherever you listen to podcasts. Take the Hobby Spectrum Assessment and learn more at thehobbyspectrum.com. Discover cards across multiple auction platforms with AuctionWire at auctionwire.ai and use promo code SCL for 60 days free. Check out Card Ladder for sports card sales history, market data and research. And pick up Jeremy Lee's book, Pops and Comps: Truths, Insights, and Psychology Behind the Numbers That Drive the Sports Card Market, available on Amazon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

   September 10, 2026·44min
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4. 4
   Number 4: Seven-Figure Cards From Thin Air + Could Baseball Trigger a Downturn? + The $5 Million Showdown

   How big is the Shohei Ohtani effect on the sports card hobby? Jeremy Lee, David Chase, Joe Poirot, Chris HOJ and Josh Adams dig into a phenomenon that may extend far beyond Ohtani's own cards. Chris reveals that the monthly dollar volume being spent on Ohtani is now on par with or even exceeding Michael Jordan, traditionally the biggest name in the Card Ladder database. But what happens to all that money after an Ohtani card sells? The panel explores how enormous gains on Ohtani cards can inject fresh capital back into the hobby as sellers redeploy their profits into other players, sports and eras. Ohtani's pursuit of baseball immortality can also lead collectors backward through history to Babe Ruth, Barry Bonds and other all-time greats, creating a potential ripple effect throughout the market. Then comes a provocative question: if manufacturers can put an Ohtani Logoman autograph into a new product and potentially create a seven-figure card almost on demand, should collectors be concerned? David questions what scarcity means when manufacturers can continue producing new one-of-ones, patches and premium Ohtani cards year after year, while Jeremy asks whether some of the traditional rules used to analyze the sports card market still apply. The conversation returns to the possibility of an MLB work stoppage. Could a lockout reduce demand while simultaneously increasing supply and become a catalyst for a market correction? Would modern baseball take the biggest hit, or could the absence of daily baseball storylines also reduce interest in vintage legends who benefit indirectly from today's stars and their accomplishments? Vintage non-sports isn't necessarily safe either. David explains why the recent explosion in prices could eventually unleash a wave of previously ungraded cards once lower-cost grading tiers become available, potentially changing population reports dramatically. Finally, the panel tackles two monster basketball cards: the LeBron James and Kobe Bryant Exquisite Dual Logoman autograph versus Cooper Flagg's Debut Patch Autograph. Which sells for more, and what does the fact that we're even comparing them tell us about today's sports card market? Plus, can we ever truly know whether a massive public sale represents an arm's-length transaction, and how much verification should the hobby expect before treating it as a legitimate comp? Subscribe to Sports Cards Live on YouTube and wherever you listen to podcasts. Take the Hobby Spectrum Assessment and learn more at thehobbyspectrum.com. Discover cards across multiple auction platforms with AuctionWire at auctionwire.ai and use promo code SCL for 60 days free. Check out Card Ladder for sports card sales history, market data and research. And pick up Jeremy Lee's book, Pops and Comps: Truths, Insights, and Psychology Behind the Numbers That Drive the Sports Card Market, available on Amazon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

   September 09, 2026·40min
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5. 5
   Number 5: Is the Hobby Smarter This Time? + Which Cards Get Crushed? + The Hobby Never Sleeps

   If the sports card market eventually turns, will every card get hit equally? Jeremy Lee is joined by David Chase, Joe Poirot, Chris HOJ and Josh Adams for a wide-ranging hobby roundtable about what the next market cycle could actually look like and whether collectors are better prepared for it this time. The panel debates whether the hobby has really gotten smarter since the last major downturn or whether there is simply more money in the market today. If collectors suddenly need liquidity, do they sell their best and most valuable cards first because one transaction can raise the necessary cash, or do they protect those cards and work from the bottom of their collections instead? That leads to one of the biggest questions of the episode: high supply versus scarcity. Could cards with enormous populations face significantly more downside if sellers flood the market, while scarce cards, low-numbered issues, one-of-ones and important vintage cards prove more resilient because demand only has to compete for a limited number of available copies? The conversation also turns to the return of football, basketball and hockey. After an unusually hot summer for retired players, vintage cards and 1990s issues, what happens when current athletes begin generating daily headlines again? Does hobby attention shift back toward active players, and could that create buying opportunities elsewhere? The group also discusses whether there is even such a thing as a hobby offseason anymore. Collectors are connected to auctions, marketplaces and their watchlists 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Does it still matter what night an auction ends, or has technology permanently changed collector behavior? Plus, David wonders whether the traditional November and December buying opportunity will return this year, Chris looks at historical fourth-quarter market performance, the panel considers how a potential baseball work stoppage could affect modern baseball cards, and Joe explains why rising prices have him returning to one of the simplest collecting principles of all: finding cards with great aesthetics and character. Subscribe to Sports Cards Live on YouTube and wherever you listen to podcasts. Take the Hobby Spectrum Assessment and learn more at thehobbyspectrum.com. Discover cards across multiple auction platforms with AuctionWire at auctionwire.ai and use promo code SCL for 60 days free. Check out Card Ladder for sports card sales history, market data and research. And pick up Jeremy Lee's book, Pops and Comps: Truths, Insights, and Psychology Behind the Numbers That Drive the Sports Card Market, available on Amazon. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

   September 08, 2026·43min
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