Why Breakers are the reason there will never be “the next PMG”

[Nicks_basketballpc]

Here’s my thought and frustration with breaking and also just the way the hobby cycle happens with each new release of a product. I was reminded of it this past week with the release of this years Flawless.

Every time a new release comes out of a product, either a new year of an existing product or a completely new product, everyone gets really excited looking into checklists and finding out what the “chase card” is for the product. Sometimes the release is even accompanied by some content from the company even highlighting these chase cards. The rare 1of1 triple logoman type cards that should be almost mythical level of rare… and then it never fails that within a few days after release I’m scrolling Instagram and I just see hit after hit of these cards being pulled by breakers and shared through the community of how great the pull is and how much money that card might be worth and who and when is going to put it at auction.

Cards lose their allure when you just always see them. Not only do you always see them but we see them almost instantly. The rarest cards get cycled through a breaker and posted and auctioned and maybe even sold twice before the next big product even gets released. Because of the speed at which these cards are pulled on live stream from “high profile” breakers a card can’t even help but fall into a pump/hype cycle which has a drop off almost as drastic as it’s rise. The lifecycle of these cards as being the next PMG can then only last as long as it takes for the next batch of cards to be released.

As much as we all love to see the big cards get posted and find out where they are, there is just no way for a card to get and keep the appeal that they should have when the window from release to being pulled is sometimes 24 hours or less.

Now part of my theory is that breaking has a negative impact on this cycle as well because sometimes a product can be opened at an alarming rate of cases and cases in one night. Individuals don’t have the chance to slowly buy and open. You can’t even often find a box at an lcs or online to buy (if you can even afford it) because these large platforms are buying in bulk. I have an issue with people not opening up their own packs and boxes in general because I think that’s an integral part of the collecting process that has been lost unfortunately. This also makes people much less likely to have the passion and love for the cards they get because they had so little to do with acquiring the card in the first place.

So will there be a next PMG? I don’t think so. Not until rare cards can stay rare and illusive long enough for collectors to buy and open the packs to find them slowly.

[siuwongkee]

I am not in a way to comment. I just come back to the hobby. I collected very briefly in 97-98. I have been baffled with the direction of my collection. From my research, let's use Tim Duncan as an example, a 1997 Skybox Team Skybox Star Rubies recently sold on ebay at $4400 and a Panini Black 22-23 was sold on Ebay at fix price at $4000. So generally speaking, a good 97-98 parallel = 1/1 parallel modern days = 1/5 relics modern day.

I cannot lie, looking at, for instance all parallels from Prism of Tim duncan definitely looks pretty nice; but so does looking at 3 team skybox Tim duncan star rubies. Modern relics beg the question like my 1998-1999 UD jersey cards. When supply is unlimited, maybe 1/1 auto logoman will carry some weights. But when we have it year over year, they become one of one of many.

PMG, E-x2001 now and future, Star Rubies, if we read the prices of them, only 1998-99 star rubies are sold more than the year of 97-98. (1997 PMG 1997, e-x2001 are selling at a higher premium than 1998 pmg, ex-century) So we see how the paradigm shift from the junk wax to limited parallel was impacting the card price. (But the magic decrease from year to year.)

So if you ask me, will we ever have another set as memoriable as PMG. I guess the most important part is, first, the design of the card. (Which skybox was doing great) Secondly, cards MUST be truly scarce. Thirdly, it MUST BE an one off. Because like Panini Flawness is scarce, but it is a yearly product. Imagine Panini does a 75th set, all new designs card, only 1 set of parallel. (no auto or patch if you want a cool design) It will become memoribale. (But will Panini willing to let's sell a box of card at $700, with print runs as low as Flawless? Just for the benefit of collectors?)

Put things like this. I do not think it is how we see the big cards easily that make them less appealing, it is just there are just too many of these 1 of 1 big cards in the market and we then beg the question why your 2010 logoman is more scarce than my 2017 logoman. And the magic is lost, unlike PMG, you see it you are like, "Darn, what a great card!"

[Smalltown]

So will there be a next PMG?

I kinda hate this type of question in general (no shade at you posting it). Everyone is always looking for the next PMG, the next Cabbage Patch Kid, the next Pokemon etc. Truth is these all tend to happen when no one is actually expecting them to be next. The PMG was the "right card" for the right time and is now wrapped in heavy nostalgia and greed.

So whenever the group think starts telling me something is "the next" I just want to say:

[Nicks_basketballpc]

I agree about hating the question. I don’t think I did a great job in my title actually. That’s one of the points I was trying to make is that I maybe didn’t make well enough is that you can’t have a card be the next of something special and be so coveted when every new product that comes out gets immediately compared to something that grew in popularity organically over 20+ years of collectors searching for it. I think I was trying to sound sarcastic in calling something the next pmg because it annoys me but probably should have just left that part out

[Ryansrefractors]

I think you’re 100% right, I’ve gotten so numb to flawless as a whole and logomans because they are legit posted every single day and changing hands all the time. The collectors aren’t the ones buying and hoarding these cards. And also it doesn’t help that the product is released in the same fashion year after year, it’s not a one off product like you are saying.

I hear what people are saying that there will never be another PMG as it happened organically and was extremely scarce for the time. We won’t know what the next “Pmg like” card will be until 10 years from now when we find ourselves never seeing the certain card anymore and no one is letting go of it. But for todays purposes majority of cards even vintage and 90s are exchanging hands every other week so nothing is truly scarce right now until it falls into the super collectors hands that aren’t looking to flip.

[timmy_d_21_pc]

The rate at which 90s scarce cards are changing hands has slowed down dramatically since 2020. These scarce 90s cards are finding their place in peoples PCs. I can only speak on 90s because that’s all i know. Ultra modern cards are a little different story.

As for another pmg set it’s just going to be whatever the hobby decides. It could even be and probably will be an ultra modern set. We just have yet to see one thought out enough and done correctly. Fanatics has a chance to really make the hobby about the collector and if they do that there’s a better chance of people actually wanting to collect cards again, which means cards aren’t changing hands as often. Which equals potentially another pmg like appreciated set.

[kickitfwd]

Yea I think many of the popular modern inserts (Downtowns, Colorblasts, Kabooms, Blank Slates, etc) are cool but everything just gets really diluted when they release the same stuff year after year. The rookie year ones will always be a chase but if a player doesn't have a rookie year version it makes me question whether or not I want to go after the card still cause how many different versions of basically the same card are gonna exist when its all said and done?

[siuwongkee]

So will there be a next PMG?

I kinda hate this type of question in general (no shade at you posting it). Everyone is always looking for the next PMG, the next Cabbage Patch Kid, the next Pokemon etc. Truth is these all tend to happen when no one is actually expecting them to be next. The PMG was the "right card" for the right time and is now wrapped in heavy nostalgia and greed.

So whenever the group think starts telling me something is "the next" I just want to say:

I do think you can make a set memoriable. But will it become ANOTHER or even BETTER than PMG, well, the answer is we never know. I am not in a position to talk about sports cards. But for PTCG, we have a 2018 PSA 10 Lillie JP full art going for more than 30k us when en version is selling at 4k. Why? Because the MARKET is telling collectors, it is the go to card. And keep those bull shit like we have 100m pokemon collectors and only 4xx Lillie PSA10 and people buy the saying and the card becomes the modern 1999 Charizard.

So in the end. Demand and Supply is always the FIRST criteria making certain cards and sets memoriable. (But it is never the sufficient condition for that) There are many reasons we cannot predict and control. (Some people do try to manipulate that, if you check the price of 90s parallel of Tim Duncan, it seems some people were trying so)

For a set to be the next something. I believe buyers cannot control that but sellers can. Like I said. If Panini makes a 75th NBA set with all new design, with very very very very very limited print runs, and never do it like every year, it will BECOME something. Not necessarily the next PMG. But it will always have a place in history for NBA cards. The question is, will they do it? Just like, MTG can make the Lord of the rings set become even more iconic by limiting, other than the 1/1 ring. Every rare card is under 1000 in print run. (It is believed that Alpha MTG approximately had a 1200-1500 rare print runs) The question is, why do they care? For sellers, they do not need another PMG (maybe they want to but profit always comes first) for us, in the end, we can guess but it is unlikely we will guess right. Because it is likely where most of us are not looking.

[Peterfox16]

I think the biggest issue isn’t breakers as much as it’s the way the internet has changed the perspective of what’s rare. In 1997, seeing a PMG in person was near impossible unless you lived near a major show. Now if there’s a popular set with a card /10, you can hop online and usually find a copy in the early days of the release.

The other big variance now is the sheer number of cards with low production runs. It seems any given set panini releases has several parallels /100 or less.

I think the next PMG is out there, the hobby just hasn’t decided what it is yet.