As my generation approaches middle age, we’re going to have to start answering for some of the things we’re responsible for. Example: ruining baseball cards.
It’s not all our fault. The Baby Boomers, as always, deserve some blame. They were the ones who started the nonsense, paying insane amounts for cards from their youth. And they were the ones who opened baseball card shops back in the 80s and enabled those of us who were kids then.
But we were the first generation to, as kids, get stupid about our cards. At some point we lost the youthful joy of opening a pack, searching through it, and then taking our favorites with us everywhere we went. We were the first kids to stick them in plastic sheets and individual holders. We obsessed about each card’s condition, freaking out if we bent a corner or marred the surface. And we tolerated the late 80s explosion in the price of cards.
The result was we turned it into an adult hobby, one that required a steady income rather than a weekly allowance to fund.
What’s the point? This is an interesting little film about the current state of card collecting. I love the guy that owns the shop. And I couldn’t help but think that if John Rocker was still playing, he would cringe at the thought of these people potentially collecting his cards.