[music playing]
COREY HARRISON: What have you got here?
I got a Mickey Mantle rookie card from 1951
signed by the man himself.
COREY HARRISON: That's pretty cool.
So where'd you get it?
Actually, I bought it off a friend.
He had it with a bunch of other cards in his garage.
And I went through the cards, and I picked this one
along with about five others.
OK, I mean, you picked a really good one.
Yeah.
I have a signed Mickey Mantle rookie card from 1951.
Some auctions have sold this card for 45,000.
I'm looking to get about $20,000 for the rookie card
because I have three kids in college.
If I'm able to sell the card, I'll use the money
for those college costs.
Mickey Mantle, he's in the top 10 best baseball players
of all time.
I mean, he was a 20-time All-Star.
That's insane.
Yeah, I would say so.
When it comes to Mickey Mantle,
he started his career off as a Yankee,
and he left his career as a Yankee.
Funny little fact about him, his rookie year,
they brought him up to replace Joe DiMaggio.
And the crowd booed him for three years.
Right, yeah.
And in his rookie year, he's chasing down a fly ball
and trips over a sprinkler head and messed up his knee so bad
that it followed him his entire career.
But 536 home runs, three triple crowns, seven World Series,
I mean, you don't get a better baseball career.
Right, yeah.
He was up there with Babe Ruth, I would say, yeah?
COREY HARRISON: Absolutely-- definitely the number
one switch hitter of all time.
Teams hated him because he would hit home runs on both sides.
I think he came within a foot of being the only person to ever
knock it out of Yankee Stadium.
MATT: Right.
Mind if I take a look at it?
Yeah, sure.
Ooh, backs a little rough.
MATT: Yeah, it's got some adhesive residue.
The guy that had it probably had it scrapbooks.
COREY HARRISON: Sounds like something
people would do in the '50s.
MATT: Yeah.
What are you looking to do with it?
I aim to sell it.
COREY HARRISON: OK, any idea of what you want to get out of it?
Yeah, I need 20k.
OK, I've got some serious condition issues with it.
And one of my problems with Mickey Mantle
is he had a pretty long career after baseball.
And he made more money signing autographs than he
ever did playing baseball.
Yeah, he signed a lot.
But he didn't sign many of those rookie cards.
That's for sure.
No, there wasn't very many of those rookie cards
out there for him to sign.
I will give you that.
Let me give my buddy Dan a call.
This is what he does.
He grades these things for a living.
Yeah, go for it.
Hang out, and I'll be right back, OK?
OK, I'll wait.
[ka-ching]
1951 Bowman signed Mickey Mantle rookie card.
That's nice, very nice.
Back in the '50s, '60s, people didn't look at cards for value.
They pretty much bought the packs of cards for the gum.
I would do the same thing, yeah.
Yeah, so Mantle is the key guy you want on a rookie card.
A lot of these have surfaced in recent years
because collecting autographs on rookie cards
has become real popular.
Do you know how many of these signed rookie cards there are,
actually?
They're not easy cards to come by.
So they are in demand.
But people look for those rookie cards
to be in a real nice shape.
Do you have a loop where I could look at this under?
COREY HARRISON: Yes, I do.
Perfect.
Whoa, yeah, that's pretty hammered.
One thing that concerns me is that it looks
like the top of the card's been cut where it might have had
a bunch of fray that they wanted to remove
just to make it look better.
The back definitely has some rough residue.
As far as the grade's concerned, PSA is going to grade
it from a scale of 1 to 10--
so 1 being poor, 10 being GEM-MT.
And then unfortunately, with an altered back,
they would never assign a numerical grade to the card.
So you're looking at below 1, which would be below poor.
What's something like this worth?
Everything's based on condition.
Right.
There are signed rookie Mickey Mantle
cards from this year that have gone for 40 to 60,000.
But they are clean.
Corners are sharp.
The service is beautiful.
But like I said, rookie cards are in high demand,
signed rookie cards.
As far as this card's concerned, the autograph's really nice.
So Corey, in my opinion, I think this
is worth retail about 10 grand.
Wow.
I was thinking less than that.
I was thinking more than that.
Its condition is everything, man.
Dan, I appreciate it.
You're welcome.
OK, thanks a lot.
Great, nice to meet you.
Likewise.
I know you had hopes and dreams at 20,000,
but I'm looking around 7.
Wow, 7.
That's kind of way off between 20.
You know what?
I can down to 17.
I'm not going over 7, man.
7 is going to be the most I could pay for it.
I have to trust Dan.
He's been in this business a long time.
This is what he does.
If he tells me 10, if I buy it from you at 7,
possibly I make 3 grand.
Right.
We do 15?
7.
You're not going to bump up not even a nickel, huh?
I won't at all.
I think I'm going to have to walk, man.
I'm always here. Bring it back--
- All right. - --if you decide to.
OK, thanks.
Yeah, I was pretty bummed out that we couldn't make a deal.
It looks like back to home plate.
See if I can get another decent hit somewhere else.