1989 Upper Deck Ken Griffey Jr Rookie cards explode in price
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Unfortunately for collectors, most of the cards they picked up in 1989 are barely worth the cardboard they're printed on, hence the "Junk Wax Era" moniker. However, a notable outlier is the Upper Deck Ken Griffey, Jr. rookie. A card that remains scorching hot atop a rubble heap of late 1980s and early 1990s hobby detritus filling monster boxes, screw-down holders, and binder shelves by the millions if not billions.
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Just how much is this card going for today? As with everything in the Hobby, the only perfectly accurate answer is "It depends." Specifically, it depends primarily on condition, with gem mint copies assigned a grade of PSA 10 carrying the highest premiums. That a gem mint Griffey should cost a bit, of course, is hardly a surprise. What is a surprise, however, is just how much the card has continued to increase in value over the past year.
According to Card Ladder, PSA 10 copies of the Griffey card have more than doubled in value over the past 12 months, with the bulk of the increases coming in the last 3-4 months alone. Though past performance is never a perfect predictor of future value, the sharp upward trajectory of the graph is at least suggestive of an extraordinary fact. If current trends continue, the Griffey may be just a month or two away from regularly topping $5,000!
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That's great news for collectors holding onto to one or more of the 4200+ PSA 10 Upper Deck Griffey rookies out there. Of course, it's also bad news for collectors still hoping to add this modern grail to their collections. The silver lining is that they can still grab a PSA 9 card of Griffey for only around $300, at least for now. As with the gem mint upgrade, the PSA 9 has been a card on the rise as well, also doubling in value over the past year.
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In some sense, these Griffey cards are doing today exactly what collectors thought they would do more than three decades ago. What collector back in 1989 didn't expect their Griffey collection to someday pay or college or fund an early retirement? Only today there's just one major difference. For the flood of new collectors looking to nab this card for the first time, they may well be dipping into their college funds or delaying their retirements to make it happen!
Jason A. Schwartz is a collectibles expert whose work can be found regularly at SABR Baseball Cards, Hobby News Daily, and 1939Bruins.com. His collection of Hank Aaron baseball cards and memorabilia is currently on exhibit at the Atlanta History Center, and his collectibles-themed artwork is on display at the Honus Wagner Museum and PNC Park.