Once upon a time, boxing was more popular than Football. The 1948 Leaf Boxing Set celebrates boxing in its boom years and offers collectors a knockout of a collectible!
Welcome back to our Sport Card Collecting 101 Class! Sport Card collecting and speculating can be a lot of fun; especially when you are collecting your favorite sport. As our “course” branches into other sports, remember a few “themes” that have been running throughout all the “classes” in our course.
Let's Review...
First, be aware the cards you covet have counterfeit or “reprinted” versions. Know the difference! Buying cards on eBay is a hard “no” for me. It should be a hard “no” for you too! The Jeweler's Loupe is your BFF! Finally, have fun. The challenge and satisfaction is in completing the set or finding a treasured card in the set. Make the challenge and the satisfaction of finding a good deal the focus!
The 1948 Leaf series of releases is an outstanding product to consider for collecting or investing. Our last blog focused on the baseball set, but should you be on the lookout for the boxing set as well?
The 1948 Leaf Boxing Set Has Everything A Collector Desires!
I say Yes! First, the cards have that same awesome Andy Warhol-like appearance to them. Second, there are some pretty big household names in the set. Finally, sets can be put together with some good hunting and fun! So, it is pretty easy to put together (except for that darn Rocky Graziano short print!) and sport card enthusiasts make this a must-have in their full-set collection. Full-sets in mid-grade condition go for about $6,000...without the Rocky Graziano card!
The set features the same production pitfalls that many of the card sets produced up to this time. Centering and material quality result in hard-to-find high-grade copies. The ink and surface printing will also have flaws because the set is so color heavy. So, even if you find a high-grade single of a boxer you never heard of, grab it!
If You Pull a Rocky Graziano, You Might Be Able to Retire!
Jack Dempsey leads off the set as card #1. Jack Johnson card #17, Max Schmeling card #32, Joe Lewis card #48, Rocky Graziano card #50, and Jake LaMotta card #102 are some of the notable names in the set. The set is loaded with iconic boxers that have transcended time. The Jake LaMotta, Jack Dempsey, and Joe Lewis cards can fetch over $10,000 each in the grade 9 tier.
Rocky Graziano causes a lot of pain for set seekers. It is an extremely limited short print in the set. It is the only short print in the set. There are no recent sales on eBay of this card! It is Boxing’s equivalent to the Honus Wagner T-206 card. The highest-graded version of this card, a 6.5, sold for nearly $90,000 last year. Given how hot the sport card market it is, a high-grade sample of this card may earn close to 1 MILLION DOLLARS.
Ugg! Be Careful Of The Dreaded C Word!
Once again, counterfeiting is an issue. This set, like all the other sets reviewed in class, has some counterfeiting issues. In fact, the whole set has been “reprinted” and is offered on eBay for $199. At times, some eBay listings attempt to sell these reprints as authentic cards from the original 1948 set.
Overall, this is an awesome set and offers a rare opportunity for the collector or investor to dive into a “fringe” sport and come away with a quality investment. Batches of singles sometimes come available at estate auctions or at sport card-specific auctions. These two options are your best bet to getting a cache of any pre-1950 sport cards.
