ATLANTA — Joe Davis says it charted the course for his life. He was 7 years old.
“It was 1976. The first cards I opened.”
He’s talking about baseball cards. He started out with just a few, and nearly 50 years later, he owns about a million.
“It’s all about the condition,” Davis said.
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The cards in his J&J Sports Cards shop in Loganville are professionally graded with scores from one to 10.
The higher the grade, the higher the price. Last week, a 1954 Henry Aaron rookie card from when he played for the Milwaukee Braves fetched an enormous price.
“Oh, it’s incredible. We buy collections all the time, but I never see people walk in with mint condition mid-(19)50s cards,” Davis said.
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It’s about as close to perfect as any very old baseball card can be. It sold at an auction for $720,000, a record for an Aaron card.
“In the current market, the current baseball card market, the high-end market, I think it’s worth every penny of it,” Davis said.
Davis owns three of those Hammerin’ Hank rookie cards himself, but they’re not worth quite enough to retire on.
“The grade of three I have is about a $4,000 card. The four is about a $5,000 dollar card. Not exactly $720,000, because it’s all about condition,” Davis said.
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