A couple of days ago I saw a post about 2018 Stadium Club baseball from Dime Box Nick. I was blown away by many of the images in his post. I made the decision to go ahead and attempt completing a set. I’m not much into modern cards anymore and don’t care for baseball, but it’s how collecting started for me and it will always hold a fond place in my heart. I’m passively working to complete the Gypsy Queen set from last year, but didn’t care for this year’s look.
I’ve been a proponent of buying retail (blasters or packs) if you want to put a set together at the lowest price per card. The caveat to that is that you have to buy more blasters/packs than if you buy a hobby box. Likely this leads to more multiples and whether it means completing the set more cost effectively is debatable.
SEARCH 2018 STADIUM CLUB ON EBAY
Quick math on the cost per card tells me that 2018 Stadium Club blasters (40 card for $20) and the hanger packs (12 cards for $6) comes out to 50 cents a card. As a guy that started collecting when an entire pack was 35 cents, this feels high. However, I just looked at Blowout cards and a hobby box is $75. You should receive 128 cards in a box, which comes to 59 cents a card. The listed regular price for a hobby box is $100, making the cards 78 cents a pack. WOW!
Other math tells me that if you are LUCKY, it’s going to take you three boxes ($225) to put the set together through hobby boxes. Let’s call a spade a spade, though. Collation likely won’t allow you to complete it in three boxes.
Moving on to blasters, if every card was a base (you’ll see in the video below this obviously isn’t the case) and collation was perfect, you’d still need eight boxes ($200). How many retail stores have eight blasters you can even buy? Likely the answer in none. I open two in the video below and each of those was purchased in a different store.
LINK: OTHER PACK AND BOX BREAKS
I didn’t do the math until just now. I suppose if I wanted a set, I should have just bought the dang set. It would be cheaper. You can purchase a complete set on eBay for less than $50. To me this begs the question…many of us grew up completing sets and it’s something we enjoy, but is it worth an extra $150? (Vote in my poll/see result)
Anyway…in the video below I open a couple of 2018 Stadium Club blasters and few retail packs. Let me know what you think either here, or on the YouTube post.
If you shop online and haven’t signed up and used ebates yet, you’re missing out. I also use it on eBay to get money back from purchases there. Between referrals and cash back, I’ve gotten over $215 in a little more than a year. FREE CARDS!
If it makes the math better, I got my boxes for $75 each. And they’re even lower with that vendor now.