Customer Reviews

Standard Catalog of Baseball Cards: The Hobby's Biggest and Best Price Guide

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

This is, bar none, the best baseball card reference of them all. For vintage (defined by them as pre-1981, a pretty good break point) cards, the small information blurb on each set is great, and the card by card breakdown (including the best error and variation compilation out there) is fantastic. I collect cards mainly from the '60s on back, so this is the part that's most important to me. It also has the best compilation of regional cards I've ever seen. The pricing has always seemed to me to be a bit low (i.e., if you use it as a guide for buying cards, you'll rarely get them at the prices listed in here), but I think that's because Beckett prices are more of a driver of the market for pre-1980 cards (see below for more on this). Still, it's a good reality check on your collection's true value.

For modern cards, it's certainly comprehensive. Even with the ridiculous amount of sets and subsets and parallel sets and subset parallels and other detritus made each year, they pretty much keep up. The big plus here is that the pricing is MUCH more realistic than Beckett. For example, I put together a complete master set of 2000 Ovation (I guess I was bored that year) and did it for - no exaggeration - about 10% of Beckett price. Lo and behold, I looked it up in a later year's SCD Standard Catalog, and the prices were 10-20% of those in Beckett. This SHOULD be your guide when buying modern cards. You're paying way too much otherwise.

My only complaint (as a vintage collector) is, guys, WHEN are you going to separate the vintage and modern sections? At 1800+ pages, with only about 500 devoted to vintage cards, it's getting to be a chore to lug the thing around when I don't care about 75% of it. Other than that, this is the one reference you SHOULD have whether you're new to baseball card collecting or an old kid like me.

If you're looking for a one-volume price guide -- this is the one. Period. Forget about Beckett.

An excellent and quite comprehenwive listing of baseball cards and their values. In fact there is only one set I know of, reviewed by Mr. Lemke a year ago in Sports Collectors Digest, that was not included in the catalog. Still, I would recommend it most highly.

The 2007 Standard Catalog of Baseball Cards has the greatest breadth of any of the baseball card valuations that I've seen on the market, including Becketts. It gives approximate worth for diverse cards in Near Mint, Excellent and Very Good condition, and includes quite a range of cards from the old tobacco cards to card brands that are yet existent. There are numerous items that I'd never heard of, but have stumbled upon, and this catalog has helped 'ballpark' their worth. That being said, there are cards that I have not found within the catalog, but this has been a relatively rare occurence and has not significantly impacted my pursuance of this hobby. There is some occasional disagreement with Beckett's, which perhaps reflects a degree of relativity in value/pricing issues for cards considered by such books, but its diversity of information and almost biblical visage are impressive!

The book is better than most, of course, but it doesn't list many cards. For example, in the 2005 issue, there were cards listed, but in the 2007 issue, those cards were removed for some reason. Plus, in my initial issue, the pages were out of order in about 100 page increments. Thank goodness Amazon replaced it for me and the second issue was correctly paged.

Was eagerly anticipating receipt of the book, but only received an empty envelope and a note from the USPS indicating that the envelope was empty. Don't know if I was more upset that the seller did not ship the book by a reliable method, or, that I received such a stupid note from the USPS. Maybe, I'll try to purchase this catalog from another vendor.

To the seller's credit, they immediately issued a full credit to my credit card.

I ordered this for my baseball card collecting husband and am very disappointed because the pages are not in order. There is a very large section of pages out of sequence. It makes it very difficult for my husband to rate and price his cards. I would love to return this defective book for a correct one! Then perhaps my confidence in ordering through Amazon would be restored.
Thank you!
Regina Bartels