$50,000,000+ Pokemon Collector Breaks Silence on Logan Paul, PSA Controversy, & Stolen Cards

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Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:30Speaker 01

  I have the biggest Pokémon card collection in the world.

• 0:35Speaker 02

  What's your most expensive one?

• 0:36Speaker 03

  The most expensive card is probably the pristine 10 first edition-based Charizard.

• 0:42Speaker 01

  My Charizard collection is listed right now for almost $50 million.

• 0:47Graham Stephan?

  We have some of the biggest investors here on the channel, and for some reason, your Pokémon card collection has outperformed all of them.

• 0:54Speaker 01

  Well, I know why. The reason is... I get 20 messages a day from all the big guys, Justin Bieber. They all want my cards. I bought a first edition-based Charizard for $700. Now it's worth about 500 grand. Logan came over just to visit. He ended up making a play for one of the cards.

• 1:16Speaker 02

  I know what you're thinking. This is stupid, right? You're paying a quarter million dollars for a piece of cardboard, and you're right.

• 1:21Speaker 01

  He said, "Gary, I'm a maverick." I said, "Okay, that's very bright."

• 1:27Speaker 02

  $60 million! $492,000!

• 1:32Jack Selby?

  What's the darkest side of the high-end Pokémon market that you've been aware of?

• 1:41Graham Stephan?

  Gary, thank you so much for coming on the Ice Coffee Hour. You've been called the Warren Buffett of Pokémon. I'm curious, what's the total value of your collection today?

• 1:50Speaker 01

  Well, you know, it's kind of interesting. I heard you and Logan talking about the number of the most premium cards I had or something. And humbly, I say you guys are way off.

• 2:03Jack Selby?

  Oh, no.

• 2:04Speaker 01

  Yeah. You were closer, though, with what you said. I think you said about 20 million, and that Logan was more, you know, 10 million or 12 million or something like that. So I know it's a bit of a general, you know, statement, but it's well over. Those amounts.

• 2:22Jack Selby?

  If someone offered you $50 million right now for your entire Pokemon collection, would you accept it?

• 2:27Speaker 01

  Wow, that would be tempting. That would be tempting. You know, I'm too old to need it. I don't need the money. And it's all eventually probably gonna go to our, you know, one of our charities in that. So that would be hard to say no on. So I'm gonna, I'm gonna say maybe on that one.

• 2:54Jack Selby?

  It's something to sleep on.

• 2:55Speaker 01

  Yeah, but, but it kinda hurts me to say that because I'm in no mind frame whatsoever to ever give those cards up. I know I gave one to Logan. You know, Logan bought one and Steve Aoki bought one. And you know that story with Steve Aoki?

• 3:11Jack Selby?

  Tell us.

• 3:11Speaker 01

  Logan came over just to visit, just to see, see my collection and all that. And you probably saw the video where he ended up making a play for one of the cards. He knew I wouldn't sell and I didn't. Then he took my son aside, Devin, and said, would your dad be offended if I, you know, tried to get one of the PSA 10 first edition base Charizards in that, you know, would your, would your, cause I know your dad doesn't want to sell nor need to sell anything. And Devin said, well, he would never sell the Beckett 10s. And he said, it's very unlikely he would sell anything out of his collection. And Logan said, well, would it, would he get offended? And Devin said, no, you know, he's easygoing. He doesn't care.

• 3:55Speaker 01

  You know, you can offer, but he won't, won't take it. And so that's how that happened, you know, with Logan, you know, like you saw, I had a moment of weakness.

• 4:08Jack Selby?

  Well, I saw he, he opened up a briefcase and had $150,000 cash in there.

• 4:13Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 4:13Jack Selby?

  Was he just seeing the cash in front of you?

• 4:15Speaker 01

  Absolutely nothing.

• 4:18Jack Selby?

  Do you regret selling Logan Paul a PSA 10 first edition base set Charizard for $150,000?

• 4:24Speaker 01

  I don't regret it at all. But, but I have to tell you one other thing. Steve Aoki, he had been trying for years to get me to sell him a card, right? And I never would. And so he called me and he said, you sold Logan one of your cards and I've been trying for, and I'm your friend and I've been trying for years to get you to sell me one and you won't do it. And that, and I went, ugh. I said, okay, I'll sell you one. So Logan bought his for the 150,000. I sold the one to Steve. Right after Logan purchased it, prices went up, right? Which is, I kind of anticipated.

• 5:05Speaker 01

  Uh, Steve, I hope he doesn't mind me saying this, uh, but he paid 172,000 for a second one. But then I used those dollars to purchase two more in those coming months. And had to pay more because after Logan purchased, the prices jumped. Had to pay more. So I came out quite a bit behind, maybe 20, 30, 40,000 behind. But I did purchase two more and I went back to having 12 of them.

• 5:36Jack Selby?

  You know what's crazy is we bring people on this podcast that are career investors. You know, Chris Camillo turned $20,000 into 20 million, probably more than that. Probably a hundred million at this point. Who knows? We bring on the genius entrepreneurs, business people, investors. And you've probably outperformed most of them because you bought Charzards. Tell me the point that you knew this would be a very viable investment opportunity. Like the exact moment.

• 6:05Speaker 01

  Well, that's actually a wonderful question because I did have a clue. And the only reason I had a clue is because I'm a lifelong collector. I started collecting when I was five years old in 1959. I would collect bottle caps with football players, pictures on the, you know, we'd snap off the bottle cap top and on the inside, there'd be a picture of a football player. And when I was five years old, I started collecting those. And I immediately had to catch them all. I immediately had to complete the whole set. And my father, remember I'm a little tiny kid, five years old, would take me to all the gas stations. I'd take a magnet and load it down the Coke machine.

• 6:48Speaker 01

  You know, where you, you know, knock off the top, right? And all the bottle caps in the bottom, run them, a magnet down below and pull up all the bottle caps until I could get them all. Well, from that point on, I, I've been a major completionist and very much so a collector and a love for collecting. And I can tell you that though, most of those bottle caps, I may not have today. You know how they got knocked off in boxes over the years? I have some, uh, I never gave them up. You know, I kept all my collections going back. You know, that's why I have five storage lockers in three different states with my collections

• 7:30Speaker 01

  inside. And honestly, 95% of them are worth absolutely nothing, except the memories, you know, that I have from each and every set and thing I collected.

• 7:44Jack Selby?

  What's the most valuable collection you have outside of Pokemon?

• 7:48Speaker 01

  I would say probably my science fiction magazines from the 1920s, my pulp magazines, science wonder stories. I would say those are probably the, the next most valuable because I got them in very good condition and I knew I was old enough and longtime collector. I knew how to protect them because pulp magazines were not made to collect. In the 1920s, they were made to read and throw away. So the paper was crumbly. It's hard to find one with a spine that doesn't have crumbles and, and all that in mind are amazing condition. So maybe those.

• 8:29Jack Selby?

  What you do kind of reminds me of Angel Investor. It's someone that just throws a bunch of money at a bunch of random things and one thing, that being Pokemon and maybe your sci-fi magazines or novels or whatever they are, those jump and you make your ROI on that. How much money have you spent buying all of these collectibles?

• 8:47Speaker 01

  You know, going back, I'm 72 years old. Going back to 65 years, back to when that little boy was collecting those bottle caps, there would be absolutely no way could I figure out how much I've spent over these 65 years on all my stuff. Again, I have five storage lockers filled with collectibles. And I would say the vast majority, I paid more than they would be worth today for that stuff. But it was stuff that, that I just wanted to complete and collect. And then when my boys, I have two sons that are probably your ages, right? I started collecting things

• 9:30Speaker 01

  with them and overpaying on most things. It wasn't the money. I never collected as an investment. You know, I, otherwise I would have sold, there were opportunities to sell my Pokemon cards 10 times over the last 26 years, probably 10 times, 27 years, 28 years now, almost. And yet I never sold them.

• 9:56Jack Selby?

  I understand you didn't do it from an investment perspective, but the way you look at investments is like, okay, well, how much money did I put in and what did I get out? And if what you got out is about $30 million, if you put in a million dollars, that's a 30x. Like, people can only, if you put money in Sandisk a year ago, that's the only way you could have 30xed. Okay, let's be honest. So, I'm curious, do you think it could be around a million dollars? I'm just trying to get a grasp of like, the returns that alternative investments can get, if you're doing it perfectly?

• 10:24Speaker 01

  I would probably have to say it would come out to less than a million dollars over all these years. Because remember, most of the things simply didn't, I started in the beginning of all of them. Except, we were talking about Magic the Addling, I missed the first two sets. But even those weren't that expensive in the very beginning. So I would say probably- Probably less than a million dollars.

• 10:49Jack Selby?

  What's the cheapest PSA 10 base set first edition Charizard you've ever bought?

• 10:55Speaker 01

  Maybe 700. I remember getting one in 2000 for 700.

• 11:02Jack Selby?

  Wow.

• 11:03Speaker 01

  Seven hundred dollars, $700 for a PSA 10. Remember back then, people were not grading. I'm the one who started the, the great PSA grading of Pokemon cards. Besides the ones that were brought over for the Japanese promos from Japan that went on the shop at home network and that. Besides those, the English ones, I was, I was the first one to start grading along with E Birdman, Eddie Brenner Schultz, him and I. Maybe you know, me and my friend Eddie have graded 76 of the 125 PSA 10 first edition base Charizards. We've graded 76. We have paperwork, old paperwork from PSA showing that.

• 11:46Speaker 01

  And you can check the pop report now and you'll see there's 124, 125 minus one, the one Logan cracked.

• 11:55Jack Selby?

  Yeah, that's like a 400x return. That's crazy. Who was selling it?

• 12:00Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 12:01Jack Selby?

  A very unfortunate person.

• 12:03Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 12:06Speaker 01

  But it's worked both ways because in the very beginning I did sell some, some stuff. And I had a, a young man, well, a man in his, in his 30s come up to me at a recent card show and showed me a card that he said I sold him 26 years ago. And it was a, it was a Shadowless PSA 10 Charizard. And he, he said, you know, Gary, you wouldn't remember me or you wouldn't remember this, but when I was young, when I was a kid, you sold me this card in a Shadowless PSA 10 in that, and which of course I wouldn't remember now. And he purchased that one for $350, he said.

• 12:48Speaker 01

  So, and now, now that card, you know, of course is.

• 12:53Jack Selby?

  What do you think that's worth? 175,000, 200,000 dollars?

• 12:57Speaker 01

  I would say over 100,000, but I'm not really exactly sure. I, I do have 10 PSA 10 Shadowless Charizards myself.

• 13:07Graham Stephan?

  Now, what I find remarkable is that you were on the podcast five and a half years ago.

• 13:11Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 13:11Graham Stephan?

  And I watched it back and a lot of what you said ended up coming true. You said at the time that the Pokemon market was a bit inflated because of Logan Paul's involvement in videos. And you said, wait two years and that is a good time to buy. And sure enough, that was 2022 at the bottom of the Pokemon market. So you're correct on that. The other thing you were correct about is that you said that you believed a BGS 10 Charizard would outperform real estate. You're also correct on that.

• 13:41Speaker 01

  Yes. Having been accurate with those estimates and guesses really are because I've been collecting for 60 years. I've seen the good things come and go, go up and down. And I've seen the staying power. I mean, I've seen everything from the Michael Jordan rookies, you know, the Fleer rookies, all the way up to the OJ Simpson rookies and what's happened, you know, with these things over time. And with Pokemon, from the very beginning, I didn't see it as an investment, but I knew it was a good investment for anybody who wanted to get involved in that

• 14:26Speaker 01

  because it had a few determinants that were unmistakable for anybody who's been collecting for that many years. They've seen so many things. And on the opposite side, I've seen like Beanie Babies, you know, the real bad one. I've seen how they developed, what happened to them. And that's information, you know, that you can use later, you know, in what you decide to collect or not collect. So I would just say it's because of my lifelong collecting gene that's always had me paying attention. And I knew, and you asked me today about Pokemon.

• 15:08Speaker 01

  And Pokemon, yeah, it's going to have spikes, but the bottom line has been steadily up for 27 years. Okay, it's been steadily up. And sure, you've had these things and these things, but it's been steadily up. And I've always believed that for 15 years after they produced their final set, that hobby is.

• 15:34Speaker 01

  Is a beautiful thing to experience, that's for sure.

• 15:38Graham Stephan?

  So since we are a bit of an investment podcast, I'm curious, since we filmed five and a half years ago, which card has had the best return? And really quick, I gotta say, every single business is asking themselves the same question. How do we make AI work for us? The possibilities are endless, but guessing is too risky and sitting on the sidelines is not an option either, because one thing is almost certain, your competitors are already making their move.

• 16:02Jack Selby?

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• 16:15Graham Stephan?

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• 16:29Jack Selby?

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• 16:42Graham Stephan?

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• 16:57Jack Selby?

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• 17:03Graham Stephan?

  The guide is free for you at netsuite.com/iced. Again, that is netsuite.com/iced with the link down below in the description. Thank you, NetSuite, for supporting the show. And now let's get back to the episode. So since we are a bit of an investment podcast, I'm curious, since we filmed five and a half years ago, which card has had the best return?

• 17:22Speaker 01

  You know, but a lot of it isn't just the card, it's the people involved. You know, what Logan Paul did with the illustrator, with that Pokemon illustrator. I mean, that's, I would say that's probably performed, you know, one of the best dollar wise. Character wise, Gangar, Gangar was never that big of a deal. You know, he was always kind of cool, but he was never, ever anybody's favorite. Now, half the hobby, he's their favorite. And so everything with Gangar on it is, has done incredibly well.

• 18:00Jack Selby?

  Why is that? Why did he just become so popular all of a sudden?

• 18:05Speaker 01

  That one, I wish I had the answer too. Characters like Pikachu, of course, and Charizard, they were givens. Lugia started off big, real big. You know, a lot of those guys ended up big, but Gangar was never, you know, that consequential until, you know, a few years ago, and it just took off. And I'm really not sure why.

• 18:27Jack Selby?

  You know, it's interesting. All of the Pokemon that you're saying are the Pokemon that when I was a kid and I was playing the games, I still play the games to this day, but when I was a kid, those are the ones I liked. Like, those are the ones. Gangar, I picked out and I was like, every single run, I have to have a Gangar. Like, I love Gangars.

• 18:42Speaker 01

  Oh, okay.

• 18:42Jack Selby?

  So maybe what you have to do is just like, look back on when you were a kid and the things that excited you. Everyone loves Alakazam, right?

• 18:49Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 18:50Jack Selby?

  Maybe there's some value to be seen in Alakazam cards. Whenever you do a run, everyone always wants to get the Abra. It's hard. It teleports away. Like, there's, that could be another one.

• 18:59Speaker 01

  Well, that's a good tip. That's actually a really good tip. You know, you asking me that question, now if it's something besides Pokemon, I'd look back to, you know, you know, what really rang my bell the most when I was younger, you know, when I was a kid or whatever.

• 19:17Speaker 01

  And why would my feelings be any different than the majority of the people around back then? So that could be, that could be a good thing. I mean, Gangar was a good card to use in your deck in that, you know, but, you know, now it's a, it's a collector's special, right? So.

• 19:37Jack Selby?

  Now, another thing that people recognize you from is being on Pawn Stars and having, I believe, one of the most viewed episodes ever in their history, selling your Charizard collection for $500,000, and they said no. I'm curious today, what do you think that would be worth?

• 19:52Speaker 01

  First off, that Pawn Stars segment, not the whole episode, but just our segment, has been viewed over 100 million times worldwide, if you can imagine that.

• 20:06Jack Selby?

  But if Rick bought it for 500 grand, what do you think it would be worth?

• 20:10Speaker 01

  The truth is, is that Rick would have flipped. He would have flipped it. You know, he would have bought it for 500,000 and then tried to get 550,000 as quick as possible.

• 20:22Speaker 01

  So he doesn't have any regrets and Chum Lee has has mentioned that many times, you know, that that there's no regrets. They didn't purchase my collection.

• 20:34Speaker 01

  You know, because it just would have been a several thousand dollars, you know, profit for them and it would have moved on from there. Now, did I want to sell it? Absolutely not. I was not interested in selling my Charizard collection. That's why I asked at the time, top retail, getting to your question, top retail at the time was probably about 500,000 and we knew Rick isn't going to pay 500,000 for anything, right? So what would that be worth today?

• 21:05Speaker 01

  I have those cards listed on eBay. A year and a half ago, I had it at 19 million and then I went up to 29 million. Now it's 49 million because I don't want to sell it. So actual value of those 132 cards I took in, maybe,

• 21:26Speaker 01

  maybe 31, 32,000.

• 21:30Jack Selby?

  What's the highest offer you've ever received for your entire Pokemon collection?

• 21:34Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's hard for people to offer on the whole thing. I can tell you this, I did sell 17% of my Charizard collection. I don't know if you know that. No, I did. There was a video made of it. You know, S M Pratt, Scott Pratt, he made a video where he flew out to knowing I was going to do that to a Russian friend of mine who wanted to purchase 17% of my Charizard collection. And, and this was a very like a best friend. And so I decided to do it, just like I had that weak moment with Logan. I had a weak moment with this. And so I sold 17% of it for.

• 22:22Speaker 01

  What was it like 90,000, something like that, 17%? He's done very well with it and but he doesn't get any of the cards, any of the collection until I pass away. Cause, cause, cause my, my share, you know, which is 83%. My share is all going to our charities. His share, he can do what, whatever he wants with, so.

• 22:48Graham Stephan?

  What's the highest offer someone has ever brought to you for your Charizard collection?

• 22:53Speaker 01

  Because I got a substantial offer for all of the English based ones, which amounts to about 80 cards or something. And I was offered about 17 million for that. But that was like in 2010.

• 23:09Graham Stephan?

  Wow.

• 23:09Speaker 01

  Something like that, so.

• 23:12Graham Stephan?

  That was the last big offer you've received?

• 23:14Speaker 01

  Well, that, that, that's the biggest offer. The, I don't think, uh, I've received any legitimate high offers for all of them, you know, since.

• 23:27Graham Stephan?

  Why do you think people are so obsessed with Pokemon again, all of a sudden?

• 23:30Speaker 01

  20 years of going to school and, and adulthood, beginning their jobs. You know, those kind of take a priority for the, for the kids of that, those ages of that era. Now those kids have got the money. Now they got the money. Now they want to buy back their memories, which is what I think we all want to do, you know, with our collections, real, real collectors. So maybe it's the, maybe it's the timing. Maybe it's the, you know, now that those kids have grown up, now they want to go backwards.

• 24:05Graham Stephan?

  When's the exact moment that you knew that this was going to be so big?

• 24:09Speaker 01

  You know, people ask me that all, all the time. They say, Gary, how were you so smart? How do you know to, to hang on to these and to, and to buy these and to save them? And I had no idea. You know, I wasn't smart at all. It's just that that's how my, my collections have always been. I've always bought what I wanted and what I enjoyed. Uh, I can tell you how my real passion started with Pokemon. Uh, but I, I wasn't smart at all. It's just that I was just following the pattern of my life, what I've always done. And again, the majority of the things I could tell you about went to

• 24:49Speaker 01

  absolutely nothing, went to zero in that. Did I ever get rid of them? No, they're still sitting there and they, they still mean just as much to me today, you know, as they did then. Uh, so I didn't know. Honestly, I didn't know.

• 25:04Graham Stephan?

  How were you able to amass such a large collection though? Were you going and trying to buy these individually? Were you just going to card shops? How were you able to get even first edition boxes?

• 25:14Speaker 01

  Right. Well, you know, I guess I was kind of fortunate being on the West Coast because Wizards of the Coast, uh, released, did all their releases from west to east, right? They, they released their, uh, first edition boxes without them being a, a huge big deal on the West Coast. And I was in California, living in California and, uh, already a hobbyist and already, uh, you know, a, uh, wanting to complete sets and in that. And then when I saw what Pokemon was doing, and also I knew that Pokemon transferred well from Japan. I knew everything transferred over well from Japan when

• 25:56Speaker 01

  it came to collectibles. Uh, I was pretty connected, you know, with card shops and things like that because I was a lifelong collector and a great customer in that. So when Pokemon came in, it, it didn't mean that it wasn't that big of a deal. Wizards made a very small quantity of first edition base, uh, because they didn't know how it was going to do. Didn't want to overprint and,

• 26:22Speaker 01

  And so they they released it and I pretty much had the pick of the litter, you know, back then and and I was already in my 40s. I was already a lifelong collector. I already, you know, knew what I was doing. And so I just got as many as I could and I ended up with a ton.

• 26:40Jack Selby?

  Let's talk about the Pikachu illustrator card, though.

• 26:43Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 26:43Jack Selby?

  What was the final price that it sold for?

• 26:46Speaker 01

  16 million. He got over 16 million for it for a PSA 10.

• 26:52Jack Selby?

  Do you think that over $16 million for this Pikachu illustrator card was too much money?

• 26:57Speaker 01

  Well, I can tell you this, there's not enough money in the world that I could have that would have justified me paying 16 million for that card. But remember, I have a long history, you know, in the hobby. So I know that chances are there's 39 of them. And one PSA 10, you know, that may have been a marginal 10, but you know, there's gray areas. You know, you can look at a card and say, well, this, oh, this is almost, you know, it hits that line, right? And you can go down or up, right? So there's only one 10.

• 27:40Speaker 01

  And I'm not, I'm not, certainly not going to say a ripoff because I believe the guy could turn around and get his money back today. So, so no, I don't think, definitely don't think it's a ripoff.

• 27:50Jack Selby?

  How much would it devalue that card if another PSA 10 came up?

• 27:55Speaker 01

  That would hurt.

• 27:56Jack Selby?

  Would it go down from 16 million to like 10 million? Or would it cut it down to like four?

• 28:01Graham Stephan?

  I would say like half. Because then if another comes out, then it's no longer one of a kind.

• 28:06Speaker 01

  It's the longer.

• 28:06Jack Selby?

  Is that how it works?

• 28:07Graham Stephan?

  I think the one of a kind aspect gets such a big premium where it's no longer like, oh, you don't have the only one.

• 28:13Jack Selby?

  Right.

• 28:14Speaker 01

  Yes, I that.

• 28:16Graham Stephan?

  Right? You're laughing, Jeff, but it's true.

• 28:18Jack Selby?

  Of course it's true. That's what I, you're like, well, it makes it less valuable because it's no longer one of one.

• 28:24Graham Stephan?

  Yeah, that's the idea of the. But, but, but there's a huge premium bump is, is the point I'm trying to make.

• 28:30Jack Selby?

  I agree.

• 28:31Graham Stephan?

  Uh huh.

• 28:31Speaker 01

  That one of one makes it pretty special. If it was no longer a one and one, it would devalue it. No question about it.

• 28:40Jack Selby?

  How much? But the market cap would, would, it would increase. It wouldn't go down to half and it's exactly the same market cap of PSA 10. You know, it might go illustrator. Do you like, there's a chance another one comes out and then all of a sudden each are worth four million. And all of a sudden, the market cap has.

• 28:56Graham Stephan?

  Yes, I do. Yeah, because personally, I think 16 was too much for the card. I think to me, it's probably an eight to 10 and a half million.

• 29:04Jack Selby?

  We had two people that were willing to pay 16 for it, which is kind of interesting.

• 29:07Graham Stephan?

  But those were institutional people who are going to try to fractionalize it. And that was their marketing expense because they got a ton of eyeballs on. That to me is worth six million bucks, free marketing. So the card could be worth 10 and then they put six million in marketing dollars behind it.

• 29:21Speaker 01

  Yeah, of course. I've talked to Logan about this and he was hoping to double his money. You know, he got in the area of five million. He was hoping to get 10 million. I don't know if he mentioned that on, I did watch your podcast with him. Which by the way, I thought was tremendous. Great podcast. And Logan came across tremendously. I had to text him.

• 29:45Graham Stephan?

  Oh, cool. Thank you.

• 29:46Speaker 01

  And tell him, Doug, and I said, you came across so well. I said, why?

• 29:50Graham Stephan?

  You told him that he did a good job.

• 29:51Speaker 01

  Oh, I told, but he not only did a good job, he did a tremendous job. And you guys were out of sight. I mean, I wish I would have been sitting right there when you interviewed him. So I could have heard the whole thing.

• 30:03Jack Selby?

  Thank you so much.

• 30:04Speaker 01

  But he was hoping to double his money. And you know, with Logan, you know, you get that effect, you know, the increase, you know, value effect, you know, because it is Logan.

• 30:17Speaker 01

  Now, the chances of another one coming out are, I don't think, I didn't think one would ever come out. And that one was a nine and they cross graded it, you know, and got a 10. It didn't have to, they didn't have to cross grade it when it was a nine. And then there would be zero 10s, right? But there's only 39, there's only 39 in the world. And they've all pretty much come out and they've all been graded and they've all graded less than 10. So if another one came out, I'd be shocked in that. But I want to give you a little context with the PSA 10 first edition based Charzards. When I did that Pawn Stars, that's 2016, 10 years ago.

• 31:02Speaker 01

  There were 123 PSA 10 first edition based Charzards.

• 31:09Speaker 01

  Today, there's 124 or maybe 125 knockoff Logan's. You know, in other words, the population has not increased in 10 years. And that in these, there were more than 39 made. You know, there, there was, you know, a thousand, you know, a thousand made. And, uh, so it's, I would not, I would not be afraid of something like that happening. If I were the one to purchase it from Logan.

• 31:43Speaker 01

  And I should tell you something else. The one that Logan bought for me, the PSA 10, your first edition base. I wanted that card when he got a 10 because I had at that time, the only two in the world. And now he got the third one. I wanted it really, really bad and I was willing to overpay for it.

• 32:02Speaker 01

  And, and he came, he came up and met me here, you know, about other stuff, you know, just family stuff and that. Uh, but I told him, I said, I want that card really bad. He said, Gary, you could offer to trade me your two Beckett 10 first edition base chargers for my one and I wouldn't do it. That card is going to my grave with me in that. And I know that can sound, you know, yeah, right, you know? But he did sell the illustrator. He's done a lot of transactions in these last five years or however long that's been. And he still has that card and he never talks about it. He never shows it.

• 32:47Speaker 01

  He, uh, that card is his personal holy grail in that. So, you know, that, that kind of tells you how hard, number one, how hard it is to achieve those grades, but number two, how much they can mean to a person. And they mean a lot. And that's why I liked your podcast with him so much because that all came across. His, his love and his passion for Pokemon came across. Has he had problems? Has he made mistakes and all that? Of course, you know, I mean, in my 72 years, I never made a mistake. Uh, so. But he's sincere when it comes to that. I want to tell you one other thing, just to get off the Logan thing after this.

• 33:32Speaker 01

  Uh, about because people don't know him very well. They know what he wants you to know. Right? And he plays things up and he, you know, it's all the wrestling, you know? I gotta tell you, an awful lot of it is just acting in that because I, I have seen how he really is. And just to give you one quick example, then then I can get off him. Uh, when he came to my house with about six, seven, eight people or something, he made sure that every single one did not use a curse word. He said, I don't want you cursing in front of Gary and that, you know, no, not that I even care, right? But just out of respect for some reason.

• 34:17Speaker 01

  Uh, because he's never heard me swear because I never have in that. But I don't object to anybody being who they are and doing what they want. Right?

• 34:26Graham Stephan?

  When's the last time you said the F word?

• 34:28Jack Selby?

  This episode is in partnership with Airbnb. Graham and I are literally always traveling for the podcast. And in fact, these past few weeks have been very brutal. We have worked so much. But there is light at the end of the tunnel. I'm actually going to both Thailand and Japan for the next three weeks with a couple of close friends. I cannot tell you how excited I am for that. The beaches in Thailand, to die for. The food in Thailand, amazing. And I'm telling you, it's going to be a blast.

• 34:51Graham Stephan?

  If you travel a bunch, you probably don't think twice about your home sitting empty. But when you're away, you could actually list your place on Airbnb instead of leaving it unused.

• 34:59Jack Selby?

  And if you've ever considered hosting, but weren't sure how you'd manage everything, the co-host network can help make it feel a lot more manageable.

• 35:05Graham Stephan?

  With this, you could partner with a local co-host who has hosting experience and help manage things like creating a listing, managing reservations, messaging guests, and helping make sure everything runs smoothly during their stay.

• 35:16Jack Selby?

  Honestly, it just feels like a practical way to make better use of a space while also bringing in a little extra cash while you're away. At one point I hosted my place on Airbnb. I kid you not, the guy that checked in was a fan of the channel. I've never said this before. It was a crazy experience, but the entire setup was very straightforward. Everything ran smoothly and it turned into a Genuinely great experience overall. If you're interested in hosting and you want a little help getting started, find a co-host at airbnb.com/host. Running a small business means wearing 100 different hats. And some of those hats, payroll, taxes, benefits, compliance, they're not fun hats. They're hats that eat up your time and hats that you have to deal with, and Graham does not.

• 35:52Graham Stephan?

  All right, Jack. Well, that's why we're partnered with Gusto. For those unaware, Gusto is the online payroll and benefit software built for small businesses. It's all-in-one, remote-friendly, and incredibly easy to use. So you could pay, hire, onboard, and support your team from anywhere.

• 36:07Jack Selby?

  I actually used Gusto way before we ever partnered with them. When I first set up my S corp and started working with Graham, I had no idea where to start. It was completely overwhelming. Fortunately, my CPA actually told me about Gusto, and they walked me through everything step by step, and I've been using them ever since.

• 36:22Graham Stephan?

  Gusto handles all of it automatically. We're talking payroll tax filing, direct deposits, health benefits, 401K, workers' comp, you name it. And they even give you direct access to certified HR experts if you ever run into a tough situation. Really, it's kind of like having a whole HR department right in your back pocket.

• 36:39Jack Selby?

  And switching is way easier than you'd think. Just transfer over your existing data, and you're up and running fast. Plus, you will not pay a single cent until you run your very first payroll. From there, it is one monthly price with unlimited payroll runs with no hidden fees and no surprises.

• 36:53Graham Stephan?

  If you're ready to join 400,000 other small businesses, try Gusto today at gusto.com/iced and get three months free when you run your first payroll. Again, that is three months of free payroll at gusto.com/iced. One more time, that is gusto.com/iced with the link down below in the description. When's the last time you said the F-word?

• 37:13Speaker 01

  I've never said the F-word.

• 37:15Graham Stephan?

  No, are you serious? Ever.

• 37:17Speaker 01

  Never have.

• 37:18Graham Stephan?

  Even in like a fit, someone cuts you off on the freeway? You're like, oh, just let it loose.

• 37:24Speaker 01

  No, I would even hate to tell you what I say because it's so corny.

• 37:28Graham Stephan?

  What do you say?

• 37:28Speaker 01

  But I don't say, I don't say though, yeah.

• 37:31Graham Stephan?

  That's what you say?

• 37:32Speaker 01

  No, no.

• 37:33Graham Stephan?

  What do you say when someone cuts you off? What do you say when someone cuts you off on the freeway and you're upset? What do you yell at them?

• 37:39Speaker 01

  I'm just silent and let my eyes turn red, I guess. I, you know, in my, in my day, in my day with my parents, we just simply didn't swear and weren't allowed to swear. And.

• 37:53Speaker 01

  And but again, now I make it to sound so corny because I don't care if people swear, right? It means it doesn't affect me in any way whatsoever. I just don't do it myself. And just the fact that he would, you know, go out of his way to make sure they didn't in front of me was just because he knew I didn't swear in that. But I didn't swear because it's just not a part of me. But I don't mind if he does, or you do, or but, you know, come to think of it, I've never heard either one of you two swear.

• 38:25Graham Stephan?

  We bleep it.

• 38:27Jack Selby?

  I mean, we're not generally big cursors. So and and one other thing, obviously, Logan is someone, unfortunately, where if you defend him, you just get completely excoriated and people hate you online.

• 38:37Speaker 01

  Right.

• 38:38Jack Selby?

  I'm not going to sit here and be dishonest. Like, my experiences with Logan, I have nothing bad to like, he, when we filmed our podcast with him before, during and afterwards, he was incredibly patient. He like, to me, showed great moral character. Like, he invited us into his home. He was very friendly, sharing, caring. And obviously, I tell people this that are already skeptical of Logan, like my friends or whatever. I'm like, yeah, he was great. Like, of course, you're gonna say that because you're filming a podcast with him. So he's gonna put his best foot forward. And he doesn't want you guys saying negative things about him online. I'm like, that sounds like guilty until proven innocent.

• 39:09Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 39:10Graham Stephan?

  No, but even in 2020, we met him, and I picked up a Pokemon card from him.

• 39:16Speaker 01

  Uh huh. Oh, I remember that. Yes.

• 39:17Graham Stephan?

  He was so cordial, so nice. And I even met him in 2016 at the gym, 24 Hour Fitness in Hollywood. Super nice. I went up to him because I had seen his videos just starting to pop up online. And he was so nice.

• 39:31Jack Selby?

  When someone invites me into their personal house, and we're standing in the kitchen, they're all talking on the island, and he's got a shirtless.

• 39:39Graham Stephan?

  And he's shirtless, yeah.

• 39:40Jack Selby?

  All right, well, you don't need to go that far because now people are gonna say, oh, you guys are not doing good. Yeah, but.

• 39:47Graham Stephan?

  And he's just mocking us.

• 39:48Jack Selby?

  Yeah. And his bird is there, and his bird poops on the ground, and his wife is walking around with the baby in her arms. It's like, that's just a normal, to me, everything I saw was like indicative of just a normal, happy family. And the bird poops. And I was like, oh, okay, yeah, let me, oh, no, no, don't, you don't worry about it. I'll clean it up. Like, I don't know.

• 40:06Speaker 01

  Well, you know, I could show you, I could show you my texts with him, right? I could show you my texts with him.

• 40:13Speaker 01

  The majority of them are baby pictures, just to give you an idea.

• 40:17Jack Selby?

  All right. So we got to circle back to the finance aspect of it.

• 40:19Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 40:19Jack Selby?

  Do you worry that the hobby is becoming too much of a business?

• 40:24Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think it's inevitable. You know, I just think that that's how things go. And I don't mind it at all in that. I mean, it's it's increased the interest. You have people going back on their collections that were worth next to nothing. Now they're worth money. Now they go to shows. Now they, you know, sell to younger people who don't have them. And I just think it's a it's a steady increase in interest and it's just a part of it. And I think it it helps. I know everybody talks about scalpers and I mean, I can't see myself waiting in line or anything, you know, or, you know,

• 41:07Speaker 01

  bowling over people trying to get a box and that. I can't see it. You know, I don't like seeing that, but that's all a part of the the cycle. And I think it's important to the hobby in that.

• 41:23Speaker 01

  So it doesn't it doesn't bother me. That doesn't bother me at all.

• 41:26Jack Selby?

  Let's take the average person out there, a viewer watching this right now. What cards should they buy if they want to get the highest return on investment?

• 41:34Speaker 01

  The newer sets are being printed.

• 41:40Speaker 01

  Just printed by crazy. They're doing, you know, extra runs and all that. I still think vintage, Watsi era. I still think are probably, I know right now you're going to pretty much pay for what you get and get what you pay for, you know, whether it's vintage or modern.

• 42:00Speaker 01

  Long term, I think vintage is going to outperform modern.

• 42:05Speaker 01

  Even though a lot of the modern sets, even though I'm not personally, you know, really up on them, but is there like 10,000 Pokemon now or something? I just simply don't have the time to, you know, to keep up. Plus they're doing four or five sets a year and having to do, you know, this, I don't have personally have time for that, but I know that they're overprinting most of them. And for good reason, you know, I mean, they're in the, you know, TPCI is in the business to make money, you know, they're, and so they're going to try to maximize, you know, their, their profits. And, uh, and they're doing a good job and still the demand is, is, uh, outperforming the, what's available. So.

• 42:48Jack Selby?

  But most viewers out there are going to look to see what you're buying. Okay. He's buying base set, PSA 10, first edition Charzards. They don't have the budget for that. So like, and they can't buy a part of it. Right. Or maybe they can, but, let's be real here. People want the actual card.

• 43:02Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 43:02Jack Selby?

  What cards should they be buying if they have a budget of say $10,000?

• 43:06Speaker 01

  Well, you know, something, something that has, uh, has I think outperformed the market steadily all these years are Pikachus and Charzards. In that.

• 43:17Jack Selby?

  So any Pikachu and Charizard?

• 43:18Speaker 01

  Pikachus and Charzards. Even stuffed animals, you know, a Pikachu even, I mean, I was at a, I was in Scottsdale, Arizona last week for a show. And, uh, this lady had these, uh, little tiny miniature,

• 43:38Speaker 01

  vintage Pokemon that were made with 3D, what do you call it? 3D print, printing thing? And that little tiny Eevees and little tiny Pikachus and all that, uh, in her hand. And I, I, I kept her for about a half hour going through everyone, trying to get the entire set, just like I always have done. In that, uh, but the Pikachus, there was only one left. Everybody was picking Pikachus even today. So I would say Charzards and Pikachus in these modern sets are probably the smartest.

• 44:13Jack Selby?

  And before what year?

• 44:15Speaker 01

  Even if you get the new set that just came out, or the first set 27 years ago that first came out, the Pikachu on both of them, I think are a good investment. I really do.

• 44:28Jack Selby?

  What do you think is the most undervalued card today?

• 44:31Speaker 01

  The base set trainers, I think, are undervalued because nobody, if you weren't collecting sets, you weren't collecting trainers. You weren't Super Energy Removal or Item Finder. Those guys had absolutely zero individual interest. But nowadays, people are going back and trying to complete those sets, and those cards were always the ones that were not treated the best. They were played and thrown around and not protected. You didn't waste a penny sleeve and a top loader on an item finder. So finding those in good condition, I think,

• 45:14Speaker 01

  is pretty much undervalued now.

• 45:18Jack Selby?

  And what do you think is the most overvalued Pokémon card?

• 45:22Speaker 01

  I mean, I would hate to say that. Illustrator. No, I don't really have an answer to that. They're, I mean, things are worth what they're worth, and what are people overlooking? Maybe a lot of the girl trainers are being overlooked in that. And then a lot of the guy trainers are kind of overvalued.

• 45:51Jack Selby?

  What is the most valuable card ever, in your opinion?

• 45:54Speaker 01

  I would say the first edition base Charizards.

• 45:57Jack Selby?

  Let's say outside of Pokémon, what's the most valuable card ever?

• 46:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, that T206 card is, I think, is, I remember when the King's owner, the Bruce McNaul and Wayne Gretzky, right? Those two, and they had their, I'd say that's probably the most valuable card. I can tell you kind of an interesting story. I went to UCLI. That was my school. I went to college there. And our crosstown rival, which you guys would know very well, was USC. Well, at the time, OJ Simpson was the running back and the Heisman Trophy winner, the number one pick overall and an incredible player.

• 46:45Speaker 01

  Again, I was already had some age on me and I was already a collector and I grabbed every single rookie card of OJ Simpson's I could find. I mean, I had handfuls of OJ Simpson, you know, TOPS rookie cards in that. And like, you know, the troubles he had in the mid 90s, my amazing valuable collection of OJ Simpson cards just went down to nothing. And that's why I've always appreciated Pokemon. You know, Charizard's never gonna, he's never gonna do anything, you know, bad, you know, that's gonna affect his value.

• 47:27Speaker 01

  With those, with those, it was safe in that. Even the Star Trek cards, I mean, I have all the Star Trek cards from the 70s and, you know, I collected all the way through the 60s, the 70s, completed all those sets, Addams Family, Munsters, all, every single one, I have at least two sets of everything that I know of, unless something slipped by without my ever hearing about it. I mean, that was, that was, you know, pretty bad when that happened with OJ Simpson. And so it kind of made me a little bit leery. I kind of got out of sports, you know, sports card collecting after that, especially being the junk era, you know, of the 90s, you know, with, with sports cards.

• 48:10Speaker 01

  And today I do collect some Shohei Ohtani cards in that. And, you know, which have done very well, you know, especially recently, just because he was a real phenomenon and another thing from Japan that transfers over well, you know, very well, very good.

• 48:29Graham Stephan?

  You know what I really wanted to collect were the old Mars Attacks cards from the 1950s.

• 48:34Speaker 01

  Love those, yeah.

• 48:36Graham Stephan?

  For some reason, I don't think they've ever gotten any appreciation, but I love the movie. I'm a fan of the, the cards.

• 48:45Graham Stephan?

  Danny Elfman, Tim Burton, all of that. And I think having those old cards in the 1950s would be incredible.

• 48:52Speaker 01

  Especially for you, because you actually have an attachment outside of that. You want that. It's not like you got it and now you love it. You want that, so.

• 49:03Graham Stephan?

  I'm thinking though.

• 49:04Speaker 01

  You should bring those in.

• 49:04Graham Stephan?

  If I'm interested in that, there's gotta be a whole bunch of other people who was like, oh, that's kinda cool. And I tend to think, cause this is what always happens to me. There's something I want and it's just a little too much for me to wanna buy it. I'll buy it and then it like 10x is in value. And I'll give you a few examples. Andre Jick came to me and this is early 2020. And he was saying, dude, I'm thinking about buying a first edition base set Charizard. I said, how much are those? I'm 50 grand. I was like, oh, wow, that's a lot of money. He's like, yeah, I'm not sure. And I was looking on eBay and I see a few listed 50, 55. And I'm like, that's a car. I'm good. And then now they're worth 500 grand.

• 49:45Graham Stephan?

  And then I started looking and saying, okay, well, if these cards have shot up in value for the PSA 10s, the one that I think is undervalued at the time was the PSA 10 Japanese base set. And I said, why wouldn't that be worth a significant amount of money too? Because that was before the English. That was even earlier as a PSA 10.

• 50:03Speaker 01

  That's the rookie card.

• 50:04Graham Stephan?

  That is the card. And I remember they were selling on eBay for $2,000. And I wanted to buy one under $2,000, so I feel like I could get a deal. And I was bidding on one on the drive home and I got to 1,900 on eBay. And I typed in like 1975, so I can get it under two grand. And it sold for like 1980. Someone sniped it at the end for an extra like $5 above me. I was pissed off. And then I said, okay, what's the one better than that? It was the no rarity symbol PSA 10 Japanese Charizard. And those at the time were selling for 20,000, 25,000 dollars. And I thought to myself, why are they selling so cheap? And I looked at the pop reports, I saw how rare they are, but I'm like, that's, that's a car.

• 50:49Graham Stephan?

  I'm not gonna do it. And now they're worth, I don't know how many hundreds of thousands of dollars.

• 50:54Speaker 01

  The no rarity one is out of sight.

• 50:56Graham Stephan?

  Yes.

• 50:57Speaker 01

  And even the base, the regular base one, what are they selling for?

• 51:01Graham Stephan?

  10 to 15K. So I tend to think, I'm like, early to a lot of these things. And if I'm looking at these Mars Attacks cards that are so obscure, I can't help but think, is this just another mistake that I'm making by not buying them?

• 51:17Speaker 01

  Right. Well, I know they were popular when I was a kid. You know, they were popular. Were they Pokemon popular? No, but nothing's ever been, right? You can't gauge things against Pokemon, what's happened with them. But, uh, I mean, they're great cards. I don't have them myself. You know, I think they started before I started collecting cards. I think my first card set was 1964, maybe, and that was, uh, Munsters, if I remember right.

• 51:45Graham Stephan?

  What do you think is the biggest mistake that you made when building your collection?

• 51:48Speaker 01

  Probably my lack of interest in Japanese cards in the very beginning. I, I had opportunities to buy all the trophy cards. I mean, I would say maybe two, three dozen of the rarest promo, Japanese promo cards, go through my hands at one time or another in 1998, 1999, 2000. They went through my hands. I had them and I just didn't have an interest in them. Uh, I wish I would have shown more of an interest in the Japanese releases in the very beginning. Yes, I, you can imagine what I would have if I had done that.

• 52:22Graham Stephan?

  What do you think is the biggest lie that people tell themselves about investing in Pokemon?

• 52:26Speaker 01

  Maybe overspending on modern sets, on newer sets. You know, it's not like there's, uh, there's only 15,000 produced, you know, like 27 years ago. I mean, now there's a million produced and all those cards are going to be coming out. You know, they're all going to be making it out there in the future. Uh, may, maybe, uh, putting too much reliance on an, on an uptick in value of the modern sets.

• 52:57Graham Stephan?

  And I'm curious for your own collection, how do you make sure it stays safe?

• 53:01Speaker 01

  Well, I have, uh, like, like I've told you, five storage lockers. Three of them are security storage lockers, you know, where there is no getting in and out. I, I only have one safe deposit box, interestingly enough, uh, with the very, very most valuable cards. Uh, my storage lockers, uh, are, everything is secure. My house, I keep almost nothing at home, you know, in my house. Plus I have security gates, special security gates and cameras everywhere. If they did, because I do have some non-Pokémon things that mean a lot to me.

• 53:41Speaker 01

  And, um, so I, I don't have any concern about, you know, anything. It's a good question because people are robbing stores, they're breaking glass and they're, you know, they're, they're doing all this because the value has increased so much. It's, it's worthwhile for thieves to go after them. I have absolutely zero concern of that happening to me.

• 54:06Jack Selby?

  Also, you have PSA identification where if your cards were stolen, people would be able to know exactly when those cards were being resold on the market.

• 54:13Graham Stephan?

  It's not necessarily that though, but what if there's damage? Or like a mega fire breaks out or something like that? Is there no insurance?

• 54:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, no, there's no insurance. There's no insurance that would be any good anyway. I know companies try to tell you differently, it's not true. But based on what Jack said, uh, I had two cards stolen. I was at a show in, uh, Denver, Denver, Colorado. And I brought cards for the kids to hold, you know, when they take pictures with me and that, they can hold the card and almost none have ever seen one in person. But this time in Denver, I brought a BGS 9.5 first edition base Charizard and a BGS 9.5 Shadowless Charizard in that. Those are the two cards I brought to let the kids hold on to and look at and take pictures with them. And, um,

• 55:08Speaker 01

  Don't ask me how they got stolen. Those two cards got stolen at the time. We're talking, you know, over 50,000. In value.

• 55:19Speaker 01

  I never told anybody. I did contact the police and told them. I never mentioned it on a podcast. I never said a thing. Twan, my wife, was the only one who even knew it happened. And it, uh, it just broke my heart that it would happen. Uh, six months later, I got a phone call from a friend of mine, apparently not really, you know, kind of a friend in Los Angeles, who I had my phone number, so I must have had a, uh, transaction with him in the last couple of decades or something. And, uh, he said, Gary, uh, these two, he sent pictures. He said, you know, did these cards used to be in your collection?

• 56:03Speaker 01

  And I said, I said, yeah, those were the two cars that were stolen from me in Denver, Colorado, six months ago. He said, well, I just bought them. A, a guy, a, a store in New Jersey contacted me. And, uh, I, you know, I just bought them. And, uh, and they're shipping them to me overnight, already shipped. I said, I said, don't plan on getting them. You know, I said, it's not, uh, you know, very unlikely you're going to open the box. It's going to be nothing in there or something. Uh, that next morning, they came in. He opened them up and they were in there. And I'll tell you the ironic part of it.

• 56:46Speaker 01

  Uh, I said, he called me. I said, you really got them? I said, yeah, those, those were my cards. So he said, well, I want you to have them back. And so I said, okay. Uh, I contacted PayPal. Actually, he contacted PayPal. I contacted the police department. They got together in three days. Uh, I had, uh, he drove up, gave me those two cards. He got his money back from PayPal. It was tens of thousands. I can't remember how much it was. The ironic part of it is one of those two cards had my autograph on the slab on the plastic and Chum Lee's autograph on the plastic.

• 57:32Speaker 01

  All the thief would have had to do was.

• 57:36Speaker 01

  Take him out and no one ever would have known this. This thief was such an idiot that he, that he did not take him out of the slabs. And so people fortunately know my collection, right?

• 57:49Jack Selby?

  Was the person that sold your friend these two cards, the person that stole the cards from you?

• 57:55Speaker 01

  They wouldn't tell. I did try to find out. I did try to find out. They wouldn't tell me.

• 58:01Jack Selby?

  If that's the, like, you mean they being the police or like you reached out to this card shop in Jersey?

• 58:06Speaker 01

  No, I reached out to the, back to the police and tried to find out what, you know, what the story, but because of the investigation and, and it was a large amount. I, there was no way for me to find that out, whether it was this, that store, somebody sold that store it. Because either way, if somebody sold it to them, they took a big hit in that. When I got the cards back and I, I gave a real, real nice bonus to the guy who was honest. He never had to say a word to me, right? Every time I would look at those two cards. At any point, even if it was pictures on the internet or every time I saw, I would get a, a feeling in my stomach, kind of a sick feeling in my stomach.

• 58:50Speaker 01

  Uh, because it reminded me of, of that horrible thing that happened and, uh, I understand maybe I'm too, too sensitive in that, but that, you know, it's how I am. Every time I saw him, I would just feel sick to my stomach. So I ended up selling those two cards back to that guy.

• 59:10Jack Selby?

  Wow.

• 59:11Speaker 01

  For pretty much the price he had paid before. But then I got the cash. So, you know, I, I came out okay. Of course I wish I had those two cards today because they'd be worth a lot more today, but, but yeah, that, that's what, that's the one time I was, I was stolen, you know, that I got robbed and how it happened. I don't know.

• 59:32Jack Selby?

  If someone has $10,000 today and they want to invest in Pokemon cards, what cards should they buy?

• 59:38Speaker 01

  I think the PSA 9s, I think are gaining a lot of credibility, you know, these days, especially after seeing so many of those PSA 9s can be cross graded into 10s in that, like with the Illustrator, Logan's Illustrator and that.

• 59:58Speaker 01

  I would say, I would say PSA 9 base set is what I would start working on. PSA 9 hollow, base set hollow is what I would start.

• 1:00:10Graham Stephan?

  So I'm curious, as a long-term collector, how do you separate something that is going to be around for a long time and be collectible for a long time versus something that's just hype today? Although really quick, I just want to say that when Jack and I first started the Ice Coffee Hour, we had to figure out everything ourselves, from the best cameras to use, the best editing equipment, how to find guests. Every day was a brand new challenge. That is why if you're starting or growing your own business, you know how valuable today's sponsor is, and that would be Shopify.

• 1:00:37Jack Selby?

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• 1:01:08Jack Selby?

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• 1:01:21Graham Stephan?

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• 1:01:44Jack Selby?

  The link is also down below in the description. Thanks again to Shopify for sponsoring this episode.

• 1:01:48Graham Stephan?

  So I'm curious, as a long-term collector, how do you separate something that is going to be around for a long time and be collectible for a long time versus something that's just hype today?

• 1:01:58Speaker 01

  Well, again, I think it has to do with our, you know, with our young people, with the kids. You know, what they love is collecting is retrieving memories. And the better the memories, the better the item's gonna do in the future. I think a good example outside of that is the 1990's Beanie Babies. You know, that was all of our mothers and, you know, little kids didn't collect their Beanie Babies. I might have a few, right?

• 1:02:33Speaker 01

  But two things that went wrong, since I mentioned Beanie Babies, is number one, the disreputable ownership of that company. Because as soon as something did great, you know, they would print, print, print, print, print, get all the money as fast as possible. Even with like the Princess Diana, you know, beanies, you know, which were valuable in that the fella did the same thing with that. But now, now we're talking about, you know, adults, adult collecting in that. If they were things that were around or of interest to us as kids, those things are safe.

• 1:03:10Graham Stephan?

  Do you ever think Beanie Babies will be worth money in the future?

• 1:03:12Speaker 01

  Never. It never deserved to be. And it's all because of the ownership. Beanie Babies could have been, you know, real close to on par with Pokemon. They really could have been, because it was a terrific idea. You know, just little stuffed animals or stuffed animals are tremendous thing for kids and everybody. Little ones that are collectible was a tremendous idea. Unless you're a greedy owner of it, you know, like the fella was. And, I mean, he didn't care that you pay, you know, 2,500 for a Princess Di Beanie. And then, you know, the prize of your collection, you love it, you talk about it, you splash photos everywhere.

• 1:03:57Speaker 01

  And then all of a sudden, he does another thousand of them. You know, that takes your 2,500, you know, way down. Pokemon never did anything like that. They never reprinted. You know, some of these modern sets are starting to reprint because of the scalper situations in that, because of the... Because they want the kids to get them in their hands, you know, for a reasonable price. But I mean, they never did anything like that. So.

• 1:04:26Graham Stephan?

  We asked you five and a half years ago, when was a good time to buy? And you said, wait two years. What's your answer today? Because Pokemon saw that huge swing up.

• 1:04:35Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:04:35Graham Stephan?

  Should you wait to buy?

• 1:04:37Speaker 01

  Well, I would certainly wait until after 20, halfway through 2027. And that's so for the next year, there's going to be enormous, you know, buzz and everything over the 30 year, you know, anniversary. That's going to attract a lot. So I, right now, I think things are overpriced. I, I think that's going to continue, you know, for the next year. I, I don't think the availability is really that far off. It doesn't really match to me. I think if you wait a year, wait until summer 2027.

• 1:05:18Speaker 01

  You know, put those dollars, you know, aside, you know, get your 10%. You know, and then you're gonna use those dollars in a year. You know, something like that I would do.

• 1:05:27Graham Stephan?

  Got it. Well, in terms of grading, I'm really curious. Since you helped grade 76 of the last 126 PSA 10 first edition base set Charizards. What was it like in the early days? Because I did hear that it was easier to grade a 10 back then than it is today.

• 1:05:44Speaker 01

  Yeah, there's so much going on with, with PSA. I can tell you,

• 1:05:52Speaker 01

  I never spent more than $7 to grade a card. All my PSA 10 first edition base Charizards, $7 to grade. Every single, I mean, I can even show you this. I don't know if they show prices, but I can show you all my submissions going back for years. And it's thousands and thousands and thousands of cards. I never paid over $7 for one, for one grade. Until a year ago, where I sent some in, went through this upcharge thing. They have, and ended up having to pay hundreds more in that. So.

• 1:06:34Speaker 01

  That was very fortunate. I was able to grade a ton of cards you wouldn't grade today because price in bulk is prohibitive, you know, it's so high.

• 1:06:46Graham Stephan?

  What do you think is the difference between a lot of the grading companies? Because we see PSA, BGS, we see CGC, TAG. Walk us through like what the differences are between these and like, is one better than another? Because I see honestly CGC getting significantly less for the same card than something like PSA.

• 1:07:05Speaker 01

  CGC, I have a soft place in my heart for. They helped me with some charity stuff I was doing. And when they didn't have to, when I feel they were more of a benefit to our charity than I was to them. In that Matt Flynn.

• 1:07:27Speaker 01

  I mean, he was, he was just, you know, so, so, so nice to me. Because I, now, yes, for him, he would get his, he would get the cards with their title on it. He had Collecticon put on the back. And I would give them away to all the kids at Collecticons, gave away thousands of them, right? But he never charged me a nickel for any of them because he was interested in autism charities and that. And so what PSA has been going through, I would not grade a card through PSA anymore. I just wouldn't, not until they make a change.

• 1:08:10Speaker 01

  Can you imagine you have your, let's say you get the Magic the Gathering cards? And or you get, you know, these other Pokemon cards that you love and you send them in and you're so excited to get the cards back. And six months later, you still don't have them. I mean, I've sent things in where I can't even remember what I sent in. Well, what fun is that, you know? The anticipation of the grade and that is the fun part.

• 1:08:37Speaker 01

  I would not grade a card through PSA and not only that, but on,

• 1:08:42Speaker 01

  I, I, I'm going to say with confidence. Now, I wouldn't do this because of my age, but with confidence, I can say that if they turned it over to me, within four months, I would have the turnaround time down to 30 days. And I would have the price per card for bulk back down to $15. I say that with confidence that I personally could do that. Would that affect the bottom line? Yeah, it would affect the bottom line some, but long-term, you can't always think short-term. You know, long-term, it would pay off. And it, but I, I honestly believe that I could do that.

• 1:09:25Graham Stephan?

  But why do you see such variance between the same card between two grading companies? Like I see a CGC PSA 10 Charizard selling for 100 grand, but the PSA one is like 250.

• 1:09:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's the reputation, you know, PSA is, is the, for resellers. You know, that's where the bucks are.

• 1:09:45Speaker 01

  Is it always going to be that way? Not if they keep doing what they're doing. You know, they're really, and I guess you know, they purchased Beckett and they purchased SGC. Unless they make a change, that's all going to change. And what I think CGC, I think is, is a nice alternative. The best alternative, I think, is TAG. You can't be more transparent than scanning cards and putting them on your website in that. Plus the guys, again, you know, with my heart, I love the guys that are running TAG, especially Jesse and CJ in Canada. I mean, tremendous people, great ideas, really, really, really care about Pokemon and care about the hobby.

• 1:10:32Speaker 01

  TAG is growing and it'll continue to grow, but I think that transparency is huge.

• 1:10:38Jack Selby?

  When do you recommend grading a card? And if you are going to recommend any card company, I'm guessing it would be TAG?

• 1:10:44Speaker 01

  I sent in some cards to TAG for the first time, showing that I really care about this because I know within 30, 40 days, I'm going to get those cards back. And, and I know every single card I sent in, I'm so happy about, you know, nothing major, just fun stuff.

• 1:11:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, I would definitely recommend TAG today and PSA better make a change. Otherwise, if I had money in PSA, it would be out today.

• 1:11:17Jack Selby?

  How do you know when to grade a card?

• 1:11:19Speaker 01

  Well, I guess that's what you're grading it for. If you're grading it for resale, then then the sooner the better, because I believe we're at a pretty good high in the market right now. The problem is, you do it now, six months from now, they could be, you know, you know, much lower. And now you're losing money because of grading time. Now, if you're a collector, I think anytime is good. Because if you're, if you're trying to complete a set, you know, to Japanese base set to put on the wall or something, you can wait, you know, you can wait for that. So,

• 1:11:56Speaker 01

  so it really depends what you're doing it for.

• 1:11:58Jack Selby?

  One thing I brought up to Logan when we had him on the podcast was regrading, because I see a lot of videos pop up in my feed of someone receiving a card. They're like a regrading artist and they get the card, they like push the sides down, they clamp it. They even can like paint on the card sometimes. And I think to myself, why do I not invest in a PSA seven? PSA six? And then just wait for the card repair to get involved with AI or whatever it is that takes it to the next level. Hold on to this card until card repair becomes immaculate and then just get it regraded as a PSA 10 and sell it then.

• 1:12:34Speaker 01

  The most I ever did with cards, you know, many times in binders, cards are curved, right? And I would put those cards between glass in that and leave them there for a couple of weeks, you know, so they would flatten out. Then I could put them back in the binder and they wouldn't be, you know, curved in that. So I used to call that, those two pieces of glass, my Pokemon hospital. Which is kind of like altering cards, right? But when I got them, when I pulled them, they were flat. Then put them in a binder for some reason, the hollows curve. Put them back to curve. But with what they're doing now, my concern is, is it long term? You know, you can fix those sides.

• 1:13:18Speaker 01

  I've seen these for three decades. What's happened to these cards?

• 1:13:24Speaker 01

  The curve comes back or maybe the correction they're making comes back. Or the painting that they're doing that matches the paint can be determined. Or in the future, maybe it would be determined, you know, uh, you know, with a special light or something.

• 1:13:40Jack Selby?

  It's true, AI is going to get better on both sides.

• 1:13:42Speaker 01

  Yeah, on both sides. That's what I mean.

• 1:13:45Jack Selby?

  And it's also probably grade dating as well. And what I wonder is like, is a PSA, because you said, Graham, it's easier to get a PSA 10 a decade ago than it is today. Cause they've gotten more strict. So then does it make it more or less valuable to get something that was PSA 10, 10 years ago? Cause it could suggest the card is actually in worse condition. But at the same time, you know, it hasn't been tampered with.

• 1:14:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, uh, I, I would think the condition of the cards were better back then.

• 1:14:15Speaker 01

  Outside of grading them in that, because they were closer to the time when they were pulled, right? You know, back then we pulled them, graded them right away in that. So they were, uh, these are the same cards we're talking about 20 years later. So why would a card 20 years later, uh, if it's pulled out of a pack today compared to 20 years ago? Pulled out of a pack, why would this one be better? You know, they wouldn't be, they'd be the same in that. But if I had to answer that honestly, I would say overall, they were easier on grading back then. Mainly because I don't think they took the time to. They weren't that big of a deal back then. Remember, I was paying $7 a card, right?

• 1:15:00Speaker 01

  Maximum. Some submissions, I was paying $4.50 a card, I remember, in that, instead of minimum 25 today.

• 1:15:09Graham Stephan?

  How many cards come out of the pack as a PSA 10?

• 1:15:13Speaker 01

  Maybe a third.

• 1:15:15Graham Stephan?

  Wow.

• 1:15:15Speaker 01

  Out of 11, if it was a base set, you know, 11 cards, maybe three, you know, something like that.

• 1:15:22Graham Stephan?

  And in terms of regrading, when you were on our podcast the last time, you had mentioned you had the only two BGS 10s?

• 1:15:30Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:15:30Graham Stephan?

  And a third popped up?

• 1:15:32Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:15:32Graham Stephan?

  And you were confused, who had the third?

• 1:15:34Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:15:35Graham Stephan?

  Turned out Logan Paul had the third?

• 1:15:37Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:15:37Graham Stephan?

  That he bought from you as a PSA 10, and he cracked it and regraded it. And you had mentioned that you had tried to regrade this card in the past?

• 1:15:48Speaker 01

  I did.

• 1:15:48Graham Stephan?

  And it never came back, but Logan was able to regrade?

• 1:15:52Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:15:52Graham Stephan?

  Do you have any idea what happened?

• 1:15:54Speaker 01

  Well, I know why. The reason is, I don't have 20 million followers. That's the reason why. Because that card was gray area. You know, nine, maybe nine, maybe 10. It was, it was right. It was a gray area card. I gave him like eight of them to pick one. Which one do you want? You know, here's eight of them. Pick which one you want. He went and he looked, and he looked, and he looked. He never once turned the card around to look at the back. He looked at the fronts of all eight of them, and he said, "This is it. You know, this one is redder."

• 1:16:34Speaker 01

  The color was more redder, so I never turned around to see if there's a little white speck here, or a little white speck here, which some 10s do, of course. But then he, uh, he cracked it, you know, with his 10 snips, right? And he did it all by himself, had never cracked a case before. One little plastic shard could hit it?

• 1:16:55Graham Stephan?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:56Speaker 01

  And it cost him a hundred thousand or something, uh... But then he, uh, when I took mine in, they were for reviews or they were for crossovers. In other words, I went with Lee Steinfeld, uh, Leonhart.

• 1:17:11Graham Stephan?

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:17:11Speaker 01

  And I, cause he's in Dallas and Beckett was in Dallas. And so him and I took about 20 cards over to see if we could cross grade any to a Beckett 10. They didn't cross any of them over. Uh, but that one that Logan got, he, instead of trying to cross it over, he cut it out and sent it in. And, uh, did it deserve a 10? Yeah, I think it deserved a 10 if, if he didn't do any damage to it when he cracked it.

• 1:17:38Graham Stephan?

  So you could have done that, but you didn't want to crack open the case?

• 1:17:43Speaker 01

  Boy, cracking, cracking open a PSA 10, especially a valuable first edition base. No, I, I'm not that stupid.

• 1:17:54Graham Stephan?

  How would you do it?

• 1:17:55Speaker 01

  I asked Logan, I said, how, how, I said, how could you cut it? He said, Gary, I'm a maverick.

• 1:18:03Graham Stephan?

  I knew, I literally thought he was going to say, I'm an athlete.

• 1:18:06Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:18:06Graham Stephan?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:07Speaker 01

  That's it. That's what he said. He said, Gary, I'm a maverick. I said, okay, not very bright, but because you don't do that. You know, you can't, you can't do that. You just paid 150,000 for this card and now, so.

• 1:18:24Graham Stephan?

  And there was also a chance that he could have pulled it out and it got a nine.

• 1:18:28Speaker 01

  Oh, absolutely. It, I think it was maybe more likely. Yeah. But he took it to Beckett and Beckett, you know, him and his, because it was a marginal 10. I'm not saying it wasn't a 10. I believe it was, but it hit that gray area.

• 1:18:47Graham Stephan?

  Were you upset that he got that?

• 1:18:49Speaker 01

  Another great question. He didn't talk to me for two months after that.

• 1:18:56Speaker 01

  Because he was afraid I'd be upset about it. And finally, he came up to visit. We met at the D Brew's Warehouse. You know, just brought stuff to mess around with. And he said, Gary, I was really afraid that you that that, you know, you'd be mad that I cracked it and I got the Beckett 10. And I told him, I said, I couldn't be more happy for you than that. I said, I tried to cross it over. I never, ever, ever would have tried again. But I tried to cross over myself, didn't work. You did it. You're a friend. I'm, I'm happy for you in that. And he said, oh, I'm so glad to hear it.

• 1:19:39Speaker 01

  He said, I've been avoiding talking to you because I was afraid of how you'd feel about it. Once again, in my opinion, showing, you know, the character, you know, that he has, so.

• 1:19:52Graham Stephan?

  Do you find that some celebrity cards, though, just grade a little higher?

• 1:19:57Speaker 01

  I do.

• 1:19:58Graham Stephan?

  Like, do they ever know at PSA that like, hey, this is, just throwing out a name, this is Justin Bieber's PSA 10 Charizard. It would be real nice to give him a 10. It's maybe a nine, but let's give him a 10. Or like, yo, this is Drake's Venusaur. Let's, uh, let's be real generous with this one. Like, does that happen?

• 1:20:21Speaker 01

  I do believe so. I hate to say it.

• 1:20:24Graham Stephan?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:25Speaker 01

  But had you asked me a year ago, I would have been more reluctant to say that. But with the way it's been going at PSA, that how disappointed I am in them, in that that wouldn't, that wouldn't surprise me at all. Because if Joe Blow puts a card on internet, you know, on, on Instagram, you know, and shows off, oh, I got a 10 on this, you know, maybe 80 people see it, right? If Justin Bieber does it.

• 1:20:53Speaker 01

  80 million are gonna see it.

• 1:20:54Graham Stephan?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:55Speaker 01

  If, if, would I be tempted myself to give a, you know, better grade or to go a little bit higher with Justin's card than with Joe Blow's card? Yeah, I would. So I, I do believe that, yes.

• 1:21:09Graham Stephan?

  So in terms of what PSA's response to that was, there was a whole podcast that I watched recently where a grader said that for vintage cards, it comes in and you have no idea whose name is attached to it and it passes through several people. And it's like the general consensus between four to five people that come to a grade on the card. That's what they said.

• 1:21:32Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:21:33Graham Stephan?

  So I tend to believe that it's not like Justin Bieber could submit a five and it'll come back a 10. But if it, if it's a nine where it's a little dicey, then that might push it. But what do you say to the fact that they say, no, multiple people look at this card independently and it's a general consensus? It's not just some dude who's having a good day or a bad day. It was like, ah, it's a 10.

• 1:21:58Speaker 01

  I would say it would not be hard to fandom that Justin Bieber's card would skip a few of those steps and maybe go straight from the grader to the, to the last, to the last person and get the, you know, the better grade.

• 1:22:18Graham Stephan?

  And what about for the average person who's submitting cards to PSA? How much of that is just luck or getting the right guy? It's Friday, he's getting off early for a long weekend. He's in a great mood and he's got a raise and he's like, you know what? This card is a 10.

• 1:22:36Speaker 01

  The hu, the human, the human side of it, I definitely think plays a part in that because there are cards on the fringe. You know, you're gonna have a dead lock, beautiful, pristine 10 and you're gonna have a, a weak nine, right? But some of those are gonna be on the borderline between nine and 10 and now it's up to the, that grader to up it or down it, right?

• 1:23:03Speaker 01

  I think most of us feel like we don't get the benefit, you know, the up of it. I don't think I ever got a break. I don't think anybody ever knew which cards were Gary's back those that many years ago. Maybe today if I did, because now they do all know me. Plus they they do my autograph and but back then, you know, I definitely got no breaks, but I was always fairly satisfied with my results in that.

• 1:23:33Jack Selby?

  What's the darkest side of the high-end Pokemon market that you've been aware of?

• 1:23:39Speaker 01

  I would say a lot of the lot of the negativity that there is these days. There's times I don't even want to go on YouTube in that to see what's going on in that because there used to be, you know, like one real negative influencer, you know, like Michael Rattle, Rattle Pokemon, you know, who I respect, who I respect a lot. You know, I think he does a good job and I think he's actually good for the hobby. But now there's been a number of people that have followed him, you know, to to try to achieve some type of success that that call their, you know, their followers broke Timmy's

• 1:24:23Speaker 01

  and, you know, I've worked too many years to try to promote the hobby and the positive side. And there's so much negativity now with the scalpers, with negative influencers, with, you know, stores, you know, stores being broken into. There's too much and it affects me. It really does affect me unlike ever before. So I think that's the dark side of the hobby. The hobby has just gotten so big and so valuable that it brings out, you know, all this, all this stuff in that and.

• 1:25:06Speaker 01

  And it's disappointing to me.

• 1:25:09Graham Stephan?

  Yeah, one thing I was confused about is in our last podcast, you had mentioned Arita's signature on the Charizard. And I had no idea how big of an issue that would turn into. You had mentioned that his signature doesn't add value to the card. And that if he were to sign the card itself, it would devalue the card. And people called that out as disrespectful.

• 1:25:30Speaker 01

  Yes, especially the one girl. For those that don't know, Mitsuhiko Arita, he is a Pokemon artist, and he has been for many years, still does today. And he drew that original Charizard, that base set Charizard.

• 1:25:46Graham Stephan?

  So how did you handle that pushback against his signature?

• 1:25:53Speaker 01

  I was kind of not new to life, but I was new to the internet stuff and the effect that things could have. And so I spoke out about the negativity. You know, when I saw, when I saw that, I responded, which I have learned since serves absolutely no purpose and only makes things worse in that. But I responded with truth, you know, with facts, you know, saying that I was not disrespecting Arita. I was simply saying that Arita's signature that at the time he was charging $30 for

• 1:26:35Speaker 01

  on a plastic case is not going to add value to a million dollar card. And if it did, what, $50 increase or something? That's all I was saying. And that is 1,000% true then and now. And yet I was, I was accused of disrespecting, you know, Arita. And, and I made it clear that that, that that was silly and that the girl was a kook, you know, for saying something like that, right? I just acted the way I would in real life, right? Again, I don't swear, but kook, I go that far.

• 1:27:11Graham Stephan?

  So Jack and I were having a debate.

• 1:27:13Speaker 01

  Uh huh.

• 1:27:14Graham Stephan?

  How much would it devalue the card if he signed the card itself?

• 1:27:20Speaker 01

  Okay, now I'm not saying that. I'm not saying that if he signs directly on the card that that would devalue it. I don't think it would.

• 1:27:28Graham Stephan?

  You don't?

• 1:27:29Speaker 01

  No. His, his signature on the case absolutely means nothing.

• 1:27:35Graham Stephan?

  But then why wouldn't you just have him sign every single first edition Charizard that's ungraded?

• 1:27:41Speaker 01

  Generally, my, my feeling, my feeling is that his signature helps the value of any card that isn't gigantic in value. Right? His, but then again, now he charges 100, 150 for a signature. And understandably, he's got to make a living, right? I totally get it. But I think you would have to pay a lot of money if you brought him a stack of Charizards to sign them all. But I think it would help the value on them. Absolutely.

• 1:28:12Graham Stephan?

  I would almost.

• 1:28:13Speaker 01

  And I'm not, I'm not disrespecting them either.

• 1:28:15Graham Stephan?

  Well, I, I could say, cause I'm not in the Pokemon world, I tend to think it would devalue the card.

• 1:28:19Speaker 01

  Really?

• 1:28:20Graham Stephan?

  Just purely because you, you have a surface of something, let's say like an original vintage card.

• 1:28:26Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 1:28:26Graham Stephan?

  The signature on the card itself, when a signature is so prevalent, I can't see helping that. If anything, I think that would debase the, from, from a value perspective. I think on a newer card, like when Steve Aoki signed my Snorlax.

• 1:28:39Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:28:39Graham Stephan?

  I think, sure, that might, to a certain degree, because it's a Snorlax. But I think if, if it were something of substantial value, I think you would look at that and say, well, now it's been defaced.

• 1:28:50Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:28:51Graham Stephan?

  It's like signing, I said to Jack, it's like signing a Mona Lisa. It's like Elon Musk could sign the Mona Lisa, and I don't think that would help the value of the Mona Lisa. But do you think, cause we were talking about this too, is there any other signature on a Pokemon card that would increase its value? Like if Elon Musk signed a Pokemon card, if Steve Jobs signed a Pokemon card? Like what signatures out there would increase the value?

• 1:29:17Speaker 01

  I increase the value.

• 1:29:19Graham Stephan?

  But if you signed a PSA 10 Charizard.

• 1:29:21Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:29:22Graham Stephan?

  You, you think that would increase the value of that card?

• 1:29:26Speaker 01

  Yeah, I, I think when, when you start getting to higher values, maybe not at all or not as much. Uh, me, I have signed first edition Charizards, but I have no idea what value has happened, you know, with those.

• 1:29:40Graham Stephan?

  The card itself?

• 1:29:41Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Numerous times.

• 1:29:43Graham Stephan?

  Old or new?

• 1:29:45Speaker 01

  Old ones. Yeah. Original, base set, first edition Charizards.

• 1:29:49Graham Stephan?

  Do you ever tell them like, yo, you might not want, like, you might want me to sign this card? It's, it's a, unless it's like a PSA one, like.

• 1:29:57Speaker 01

  I don't think I ever have. I don't, I don't think I've ever tried to discourage. I, I have never, uh, in my life, uh, charged for a signature. Okay. I, I, everything I do is free.

• 1:30:10Graham Stephan?

  Yeah.

• 1:30:11Speaker 01

  In that, uh, have I ever advised that? I don't think I've ever said this is going to hurt the value. I just don't think too much along, along those lines, I guess. I, uh, like, would Logan sign a illustrator? Right? I think with unrelated people signing cards, I don't think those necessar- if they're value, value cards of any type of value. I don't think that that would help at the very least. I think that could hurt. Elon Musk signing a first edition base Charizard, I can't see that being a good thing. Uh, certainly his signature PSA would authenticate.

• 1:30:56Speaker 01

  My signature, every single grading company authenticates. They all have me in their files. Uh, and it helps the value of almost everything I sign for the people, which you can go on eBay and see right now. Cause I don't charge for it, right? Uh, but that's for lower value cards. So.

• 1:31:18Graham Stephan?

  Yeah. You know what does help? I'm going to tell you. Kabuto King. When he signed that first edition Kabuto, I think it sold for $50,000. Was it $50,000?

• 1:31:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:31:30Graham Stephan?

  His signature increased the value and that was a one on one.

• 1:31:33Speaker 01

  Good for him. Jeez.

• 1:31:35Graham Stephan?

  For those unaware, by the way, he is collecting every single first edition Kabuto. And said those were like underappreciated cards and he has a collection of like 2,000 of them.

• 1:31:44Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:31:44Graham Stephan?

  And you could submit your first edition Kabuto and he will give you back a non-first edition signed.

• 1:31:51Speaker 01

  I think it was an excellent marketing strategy. I really do.

• 1:31:58Jack Selby?

  But I don't think he's marketing anything. I think he just genuinely likes the Kabuto.

• 1:32:02Speaker 01

  He's trying to get them and the population of what's available is definitely going down because he's trying to get them all. I just think it's a great idea, what he's doing on a marketing business level. On a personal level,

• 1:32:26Speaker 01

  there were an awful lot of Kabuto's made, so I don't know how that would affect it.

• 1:32:31Jack Selby?

  Another thing that came up that I'm really curious and I wanted to ask you about is I saw this video, Graham and I were talking about this before this podcast, where you were unboxing a base set and you're pulling it out of the side of the box. And then I read the comments and everyone in the comments are like, holy cow, he's trying to devalue these cards when he's pulling it out. And I looked at the video and it does look like transparently, it looks like when you're pulling it out, you're being rather aggressive. Like, I would not be surprised if something could have happened based off the way you were unboxing it. And I'm curious, what was what was the idea behind or lack of idea, I guess? Or what was, what do you respond to those that are saying that?

• 1:33:11Speaker 01

  Yeah, I got absolutely murdered over that.

• 1:33:14Jack Selby?

  Yeah.

• 1:33:14Speaker 01

  Absolutely murdered over that. And

• 1:33:20Speaker 01

  this is a good place to explain the story. It was during a podcast with Steve, Steve Aoki, and

• 1:33:32Speaker 01

  he was selling the card, the packs out of that box. They wanted to preserve the box, though, and the best way to do that is to slice the side and then hopefully gently take the packs out. And then when you're finished, you have an empty box with the shrink wrap almost perfectly around it, keeping it, which is, I've done that. I have some boxes like that, right? The problem was I was being rushed, you know, behind the camera, right? The guys were saying, you know, you know, hurry up, you know, get them out of there and that. And I got a little bit flustered and.

• 1:34:14Speaker 01

  And so I quickly, you know, tried to get them out, which made it look absolutely horrible. And, and I admit that, and I'm terribly sorry I had to do it like that, but I was being directed to because Steve was getting them, selling them. I had to get the, get them out of there. It wasn't easy to fit them out, out of that thing. The good part of it is, we graded those, Steve graded those as part of what he was doing. And, uh, we got 40, I think it was 48% 10s. Wow. So they were all, they were unaffected by my apparent mishandling of them.

• 1:34:56Speaker 01

  They were totally unaffected, uh, which was a good thing. Cause nobody who received those packs complained about anything. They were all very, very happy, but did it look bad? It looked absolutely terrible.

• 1:35:10Jack Selby?

  When you watch that, when you watch that video. Yeah, I'm sure it hurts you also as an investor of like, like these cards.

• 1:35:17Graham Stephan?

  Yeah. Well, people said that you did that to like, keep the value of your collection high.

• 1:35:23Speaker 01

  That is not.

• 1:35:23Graham Stephan?

  Then now you have all the 10s.

• 1:35:25Speaker 01

  As if I care, you know, and there might, the odds are that there might be a Charizard inside that box in between other cards. That wouldn't be affected by that anyway. Uh, oh, I know. That's absurd. That, that was a silly one.

• 1:35:40Jack Selby?

  Well, I don't think it's absurd. I think it like, it makes the, like you said, the incentives are aligned in the same way that PSA would happily grade Justin Bieber's card a 10, not like a nine. Cause like it's more publicity. The same thing goes for like, if you own a bunch of these things, it would make sense when you're pulling it out to like, to scratch up the card. So I wouldn't say it's absurd, but I also understand your perspective of like, if you're sitting up there and you're getting rushed and you have all of these things going on, like obviously it's, it's going to be extremely hard to be it's very attentive and sensitive to the cards.

• 1:36:10Speaker 01

  It's not absurd that somebody would do it. Right. It's very absurd that I would do it. That that's that's kind of what I meant because I have fifty-two PSA tens and I was in and I've had those fifty-two PSA tens for twenty years. I'm not selling them. I don't care about value. I never even look at the pop reports.

• 1:36:32Jack Selby?

  I agree. I mean, you could have you could have made a lot of money, more money in Pokemon, or at least got some cash and like lived a lavish life. So it's it. I a hundred percent agree. It does not sound like you're doing it for the money whatsoever. And when I watched that video for the first time, I'm like, look, knowing everything I know about Gary.

• 1:36:46Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:36:46Jack Selby?

  This was this was not planned out.

• 1:36:48Speaker 01

  But not everybody knows me.

• 1:36:50Jack Selby?

  Of course.

• 1:36:50Speaker 01

  And so they might think something like, and if I looked at it with a neutral eye, I would think, how cringey is this?

• 1:36:58Jack Selby?

  Exactly, yeah.

• 1:36:59Speaker 01

  I would have felt the same way as they do.

• 1:37:02Jack Selby?

  Are you still the number one collector of Pokemon in the world?

• 1:37:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, I don't think there's any question about that because uh, the majority of my my collection, my Pokemon collection from Watsies are very

• 1:37:20Speaker 01

  unknown to

• 1:37:23Speaker 01

  to anybody in that. Maybe there's one or two people in the world that know kind of what my collection really looks like. And the reason the reason I don't have, yes, the Charizards, those I did put out there on the Pawn Stars. Uh, but my collections I don't put out there because I've always tried to help the hobby and I think that would hurt the hobby. If people if people knew how many of such and such I had, it could affect uh, market values in that. And so I'm, and the last thing I would want to do is hurt the hurt the hobby. I would rather burn those

• 1:38:04Speaker 01

  than put them out there and hurt, you know, him, him, him and her, you know, uh, the value of their cards. So

• 1:38:13Speaker 01

  yeah, it's very very much a fact. I have the most valuable Pokemon collection in the world. There's absolutely no question about that at all. And someday, someday, you know, maybe that that'll get out. You know, I'm kind of fortunate. My family lives forever. They all live in their nineties and hundreds. I'm gonna last easily another twenty years or more.

• 1:38:39Speaker 01

  I'm not, uh.

• 1:38:42Speaker 01

  I don't want to do anything between now and then to hurt the hobby.

• 1:38:45Graham Stephan?

  Would you sell me a PSA 10 Shadowless Charizard?

• 1:38:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, I won't. I won't.

• 1:38:52Graham Stephan?

  Is there a price or something we could work out?

• 1:38:54Speaker 01

  No, no. Don't think I don't get asked all the time.

• 1:39:00Jack Selby?

  What about any other non Charizard card?

• 1:39:04Speaker 01

  If I needed the money, if there was a health issue or a family member health issue, or if I needed the money, I would sell everything I own, you know, for, you know, for someone's, you know, a family member or something like that. I'm, you know, fortunately, I'm not in that position where I have to, you know, would have to sell anything. So I have bulk stuff that I'll sell to friends. I have sold bulk stuff that means absolutely nothing to me in quantity, but only to good friends.

• 1:39:46Graham Stephan?

  You're not a good friend. You're an average.

• 1:39:48Speaker 01

  Well, no.

• 1:39:48Graham Stephan?

  You're an average friend.

• 1:39:49Speaker 01

  But he wouldn't want boxes and boxes and boxes of bulk from me. But TCA Gaming, Rusty, I sold him a ton of bulk in that. And because he's a lifelong friend of mine and, and he's one of the most, you know, precious people in the world as far as I'm concerned.

• 1:40:11Speaker 01

  Zack Browning from Gen. Men Pokémon, him, I sold a ton of bulk to also in that. And those are the only two sales I've made, at least that come to mind right now,

• 1:40:29Speaker 01

  that, that I've given up in that it was only to friends and it was only cards I didn't care about.

• 1:40:36Graham Stephan?

  And where do you see the hobby heading over the next 10 years?

• 1:40:40Speaker 01

  Well, I certainly think the hobby is very, very safe. And maybe more than safe. You know, I don't see, you know, from 1999, that progression is just constantly going up. And it's going to go up for at least the next 15 years, I believe. You know, when our 15 year olds and our 10 year olds are 25 and 30. It's totally safe. And, uh, you know, it's Pokemon's unprecedented. You know, there's, uh, there's been little tips, little cues here and there business wise over the last couple of decades. Yes, but overall it's unprecedented. Number one media franchise in the history of the world, right?

• 1:41:24Speaker 01

  But there's little determined, you know, little determined things, things that you can go by. The hobby is as safe as can be, in my opinion, for the next 10, 15 years easily. And it's probably going to go a lot longer than that. I mean, uh, you know, why do people still talk about Jordan's 1986 rookie? Why do people talk about Mickey Mantle's 1952 rookie? Why do people talk about, you know, you know, cards going back, you know, the early baseball in the late 1800s?

• 1:41:55Speaker 01

  If I were to say a hundred years from now, you'll be talking about Pokemon, or God willing, any of us are gonna, are gonna be. I wouldn't be exaggerating. Pokemon is safe.

• 1:42:07Graham Stephan?

  So this I bought in 2020. It was during one of Logan Paul's box breaks and I ended up getting a pack for $11,000 so I could make a YouTube video on it. And he pulled this Garados and I was too slow to send it to PSA and then they got inundated. And then the wait went to like six months to a year and I just held on to it ever since. But this is the card. I want you to tell me honestly what you think this would grade.

• 1:42:31Speaker 01

  You know, something, something really interesting about that time period. You did not grade it for that reason, right? You did not grade it for that reason. Well, there's tens of thousands of people that are not grading anything for that reason. They don't want to wait six months for it, you know, they, or they'll send it to a different company in that. So that's one of the problems with PSA. I did get some calls from Joe Orlando years ago that PSA wanted me to be involved with PSA. But I, you know, I didn't.

• 1:43:11Speaker 01

  It's a thick, huh? A thick stamp? A thick stamp one?

• 1:43:17Graham Stephan?

  I'm really nervous because I don't know what you're gonna say.

• 1:43:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, can I take it out?

• 1:43:20Graham Stephan?

  Ooh. I've, I, it, it, literally, it's never been taken out before and I'm like so nervous.

• 1:43:28Speaker 01

  Well, I, I.

• 1:43:28Graham Stephan?

  It went straight from Logan's hand into the sleeve and it's been in the sleeve ever since.

• 1:43:33Speaker 01

  Right, okay, well, well, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna take it out. It kind of takes one of the areas, the surface.

• 1:43:41Graham Stephan?

  Yes.

• 1:43:41Speaker 01

  Slemishes that you can't see, but I, I can see enough already to, to see it's not a 10.

• 1:43:49Graham Stephan?

  Why, why would you say that?

• 1:43:50Speaker 01

  Okay, the, the top to bottom centering on the front is a little bit, it might be within their 60, 40 parameters. It might be, but these days that doesn't seem to matter to them, you know, those numbers. So, and then on the back, the,

• 1:44:12Speaker 01

  it's actually really, really nice, the corners and edges, the one little tiny white dot on the top left. But it's not unusual

• 1:44:23Speaker 01

  on these to see more than that wrong with it.

• 1:44:31Speaker 01

  Okay, not because it's you. You want honest opinion.

• 1:44:33Graham Stephan?

  Honest opinion.

• 1:44:34Speaker 01

  I think it is absolutely a very solid nine.

• 1:44:40Graham Stephan?

  Okay, but you don't think there's, you don't think there's any chance of it a 10? Or you think like, hey, this is probably a nine?

• 1:44:50Graham Stephan?

  You could be honest with me. I'm not going to be.

• 1:44:52Speaker 01

  It is such a solid nine, you can't take away any possibility of a 10 because it's too strong of a nine. And strong nines do get tens. So that's what I would say.

• 1:45:04Graham Stephan?

  But it's probably a nine?

• 1:45:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's probably a nine.

• 1:45:07Graham Stephan?

  Okay.

• 1:45:07Speaker 01

  But it's a, it's not just a nine, it's a good nine.

• 1:45:11Graham Stephan?

  Okay.

• 1:45:11Speaker 01

  Now, TAG uses, uses a something where they tell you how strong of a nine it is, or how strong of a 10. Is it in the top 10%, top 20% of nines, top 50% of nines? This, in my opinion, would come out to be a very strong nine. Does that take away any chance for a 10? Absolutely not. It could absolutely be graded a 10.

• 1:45:37Graham Stephan?

  Would you send it to CGC, Beckett, or PSA?

• 1:45:41Speaker 01

  I would not send anything to PSA these days, nothing.

• 1:45:48Speaker 01

  CGC? I would send it to TAG. Because it's fun. You know, it, it kind of puts the fun back in grading because you're going to see your car, you're going to see the, the pictures they take of it, the in-depth. If they say something's wrong, they're going to show you where it is. And that's fun to see.

• 1:46:08Graham Stephan?

  Okay.

• 1:46:08Speaker 01

  You know? Plus, it's, it's good to know, you know, where, why did they dock it? PSA is not going to tell you why they docked it. And is this card in better shape than Logan's?

• 1:46:25Speaker 01

  Illustrator 10. This card is in better shape than his 10. So for what that tells you.

• 1:46:34Graham Stephan?

  Anything is possible.

• 1:46:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:46:37Graham Stephan?

  Okay.

• 1:46:37Speaker 01

  I mean, I would not be surprised if I got a 10 because in my opinion, it's a very strong nine.

• 1:46:42Graham Stephan?

  Okay. For some of these.

• 1:46:44Speaker 01

  And there's Logan's.

• 1:46:45Graham Stephan?

  Yeah, signature on the back.

• 1:46:46Speaker 01

  Is that on the?

• 1:46:47Graham Stephan?

  It's on the plastic sleeve.

• 1:46:49Speaker 01

  It's on the sleeve inside. Okay. He sent me a whole bunch of security things that he signed. Told me, put them on anything I want.

• 1:46:59Graham Stephan?

  Oh, that's fun.

• 1:47:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, very nice.

• 1:47:01Graham Stephan?

  Now, for some of these restoration services, though, why wouldn't I just send it to them? They fix that little spot on the card and then they like maybe shave down a little like at the top or something like that. Like if they're getting good enough, like why wouldn't they just be able to do that by like just a fraction of a like a millimeter?

• 1:47:18Speaker 01

  Did I say anything earlier about are those reparations? Would they come back?

• 1:47:26Graham Stephan?

  Maybe.

• 1:47:27Speaker 01

  Did I mention that?

• 1:47:28Graham Stephan?

  Yeah, you did.

• 1:47:28Speaker 01

  I did. Oh, okay. Because there is a there is a chance that some of those things that they're correcting will go bad again, will go back.

• 1:47:36Graham Stephan?

  Yeah.

• 1:47:36Speaker 01

  And I would have to know that before I did that.

• 1:47:42Speaker 01

  I wouldn't. I wouldn't send it to have them repair anything.

• 1:47:48Graham Stephan?

  Cool. Thank you. I also I also brought as a thank you to all the channel members, my entire Pokemon collection.

• 1:47:54Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 1:47:55Graham Stephan?

  For you to review.

• 1:47:56Speaker 01

  Oh, hello.

• 1:47:57Graham Stephan?

  If you want to see that, it's a big thank you to all the channel members. We'll have that up for you as well.

• 1:48:00Speaker 01

  I want to see it. Yes.

• 1:48:02Jack Selby?

  To end this off, we have some one word answer questions we've prepared for you. So you just answer with one word. It's rapid fire questions. Let us know what you think.

• 1:48:12Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:48:13Jack Selby?

  If Logan Paul never entered Pokemon, what would a PSA 10 base set Charizard be worth?

• 1:48:20Speaker 01

  200,000.

• 1:48:21Jack Selby?

  What card do rich people secretly buy that normal collectors cannot afford anymore?

• 1:48:27Speaker 01

  Everything comes back to base set Charizards. That's the card everybody wants. That's. And if the people who can afford them, that's in that value range.

• 1:48:39Jack Selby?

  What's the closest thing that Pokemon has to insider trading?

• 1:48:42Speaker 01

  It's kind of like if you asked me, you know, some of these questions today where.

• 1:48:49Speaker 01

  What I I could move the needle a bit, right? Uh, and the whole reason you're asking me that is kind of like you're collaborating with me that where you and I are going to really pump up this card or something.

• 1:49:01Graham Stephan?

  Like Mars Attacks. Some guys buy the whole Mars Attacks collection.

• 1:49:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, leave leave out the Mars Attacks. Otherwise, they're going to be too expensive for you and I to fight over.

• 1:49:11Graham Stephan?

  About it.

• 1:49:13Jack Selby?

  Lastly, we got to ask you about your charity. I'm curious, what are the recent developments of it? What are the main goals in the future? And what would you like to share about it?

• 1:49:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, you know, I I think the the greatest story is from the past, you know, from, uh, how did that become a priority of mine? It has been my entire life in that. And, uh, I'm going to tell you a story of how it started for me, my interest in the charity work. Uh, back in the in the late 60s, when I was in my mid teens in that, I was very involved in, uh, drugs, in psychedelics and, you know, things that were around for it was common, you know, back then. And, uh, and I got very sick and I quit.

• 1:50:07Speaker 01

  And just to jump ahead for a second, I've been sober to this day. Not a drink, not a drug, nothing, you know, for, uh, 50 years.

• 1:50:19Graham Stephan?

  Wow.

• 1:50:19Speaker 01

  I sick 55 years now, 57 years. Uh, but because of that, I got involved in helping other young people that were on the streets. I was from Hollywood, right? You know, Sunset Boulevard and in that and, uh, got got involved in Narcotics Anonymous. And, uh, you know, uh, you know, went went through my my treatment and did well. And and I met a a lady that maybe you wouldn't, you would know of her maybe, but not, um.

• 1:50:56Speaker 01

  She was an Academy Award winning actress in 1949. And she was the voice of the devil in Exorcist. And that her name was Mercedes McCambridge. She did a lot of work with me with Senate Subcommittee and things like that. Me as a teenager and her as an Academy Award winning actress. We did a lot of things together and and she drove at home. How important it was that I do well and how important it is that I help others do better. In that it also affected. My entire life, I've been early for everything in that.

• 1:51:40Speaker 01

  And I learned that from her also. She would come to the house to get me. She would come early, park on the street and sit there until it was exactly the time to get to the door to come and get me. And she made it clear to in her that in her opinion, the most important thing you can be is on time. Most important thing. Obviously, there's, you know, extenuating circumstances, but still I learned that from her. Plus, I learned the value of charity and how the charity isn't for other people. The charity is for yourself. The charity is for what what kind of person you you are and that that you're going to

• 1:52:22Speaker 01

  turn into and the benefits that you're going to experience, you know, because of it. And so my my entire life, I've been interested in charities. Chris Camillo, who you have had on your podcast numerous times. One of the best examples of charity that I can think of, at least since the beginning, was from him. He walked up to me at a card show years ago.

• 1:52:55Speaker 01

  I didn't know him, never heard of him. He apparently knew of me. He walked up to me in the lobby of a hotel with a box and he said, Gary, this is for you and your charity. At the time, it was, uh, it was Brain Health and Autism with Steve Aoki. And then he said, Gary, this box is for you, for your charity, anything you want to do with it. And walked away. A guy I'd never even saw, I'd never heard of him before, right? A first edition base Pokemon box.

• 1:53:34Speaker 01

  Even six years ago, that was worth a ton of a hundred thousand or something.

• 1:53:39Graham Stephan?

  That was two fifty.

• 1:53:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, see that? See that? And, I mean, even now I get misty thinking about it, right? I think it just, you know, makes me think, just makes me, uh, see the positive side of everything that we're doing and what this is all about. And, uh, and that ended up growing into Pokemon Saves the World that we were all involved in together. And now, you know, to get to present day, uh, my, my wife, Twan, honestly, she doesn't need to work, right?

• 1:54:22Speaker 01

  She's fifty, you know, I hope she doesn't mind me saying that. But, uh, she doesn't need to work. But she is a special education teacher, has a master's in special education and goes in every day, comes home with bite marks and, you know, things like that. But she absolutely loves working with disabled children in that. And again, she doesn't need to do that, right? And, uh,

• 1:54:53Speaker 01

  And then our, our work with Steve and then, you know, through our charity, our autism charity, we also have an autistic daughter, an 11-year-old daughter who has autism in that. So it's, uh, all the shows I go to, my interest in Collecticon, the dollars that came out of that and have come out of that steadily is all gone into our autism charity, Autism Instruct. And, and so it's, uh, it's pretty much been our whole life, this last at least 10 years, it's been a part of my life for my entire life. And you asked about

• 1:55:33Speaker 01

  the future, uh, as, as long as I can, I'm going to be there for that because it's good for me.

• 1:55:41Jack Selby?

  Well, that's a very noble cause.

• 1:55:43Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:55:43Jack Selby?

  We appreciate that a lot. Um, viewers, if you do want to learn any more about any of the stuff we've spoken about on this podcast, your information will be linked down below.

• 1:55:53Speaker 01

  Great.

• 1:55:54Jack Selby?

  And of course, for the members, we are going to be reviewing Graham's portfolio. Thank you so much.

• 1:55:58Graham Stephan?

  Portfolio Pokemon collection. Jack's so used to portfolio.

• 1:56:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, well.

• 1:56:03Graham Stephan?

  Portfolio Pokemon.

• 1:56:04Speaker 01

  It might qualify.

• 1:56:05Jack Selby?

  Yeah.

• 1:56:05Speaker 01

  It might qualify.

• 1:56:06Jack Selby?

  Graham's Pokemon portfolio.

• 1:56:08Graham Stephan?

  We'll see. You tell me.

• 1:56:09Jack Selby?

  So you guys will see Graham's $30 in his Pokemon portfolio.

• 1:56:13Graham Stephan?

  Poikimon.

• 1:56:14Jack Selby?

  Poikimon portfolio. Thank you guys so much for watching. Of course, we would not be here if not for you guys. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Thank you, Graham. Thank you, Gary. Until next time.

• 1:56:22Speaker 01

  Thank you.