Welcome to Baseball Card America, a new monthly newsletter from your friends here at Baseball America, covering the latest news and trends in the baseball card and collectibles world.

My name is Seth Mates, and I am the lead collectibles writer here at BA. I have been collecting baseball cards for almost four decades; in fact, my first “job,” at just 9 years old, was sorting huge stacks of the then all-new 1988 Topps into team order for five bucks an hour in store credit at Basket Catch Collectibles in Brooklyn, New York.

(And for the record, that five dollars an hour in 1988 would be about $13.75 now, while a complete set of 1988 Topps that would have cost about 20 bucks in 1988 would now cost … about 20 bucks.)

As a fan, I always knew Baseball America was THE best resource for prospect news and analysis. But it wasn’t until I started here at BA in early 2022 that I fully realized just how much the prospect reporting done by the experts here could be such a huge boon to my collection (and to my wallet).

Two quick examples:

It was in early 2022, shortly after I started here, that BA’s Josh Norris told us at a staff meeting that he had just seen the best prospect hitter he was going to see that year, a then-unknown Milwaukee farmhand named Jackson Chourio.

Around that same time, I started hearing the buzz about Air Force pitcher Paul Skenes — who was about to transfer to LSU — and the potential impact he could make in the 2023 draft.

I jumped on both the Chourio and Skenes baseball card trains early, and both have worked out in my favor, as you might imagine.

Baseball Card America will be coming your way monthly starting in mid-April with similar insights and analysis from BA’s team of experts.

And before that time comes, we wanted to share a few recent BA pieces that might help your collection now.

To start, BA collectibles writer Matt Pajak has been scouting on the backfields at Spring Training looking specifically for off-the-radar prospects that might be worth investing in for the longterm …

Matt did a similar story last year, and among the prospects on his list were Bryce Rainer and Tyson Lewis, both of whom have seen the average prices of their Bowman 1st auto at least double in the past year.

Spoiler alert for this year’s list: Even with all of the Tigers attention currently focused on BA’s No. 2 overall prospect, Kevin McGonigle, and No. 6 prospect, Max Clark, Matt still thinks that Rainer is a Detroit prospect worth taking a long look at.

And another name from this year’s list that we can share is White Sox farmhand Caleb Bonemer, who brings a solid mix of plate skills, power and speed.

And then on the other hand, there are hot young prospects (specifically 2025 draftees) that you might want to pump the brakes on a bit, at least for now …

The idea for this story started on a phone call I had with Matt a few months ago just after 2025 Bowman Draft came out.

Bowman 1st autos of last year’s No. 1 pick, Eli Willits, were selling for STUPID money on the secondary market. And it wasn’t just him.

Collectors are always looking for the next big thing, and you can’t get much bigger than the No. 1 overall pick in the draft. But having heard the conversations for a year on the strength (or overall lack thereof) of the 2025 draft class, I was asking Matt more about the longterm viability of Willits as an investment.

What I meant specifically was that, as good as Willits is, his projections don’t show him putting up the elite statistics in the longterm that would ensure a heightened value in the hobby.

That’s not to say that he would be a failure as a player, not at all; remember always that teams do not draft for crazy stats, they draft for longterm contributors who can help in myriad ways that don’t always show up in box scores.

So Matt decided to take a look at the realistic longterm viability of the top 2025 first-round picks, and he came away with some really interesting insights on six players whose current sales prices might not be sustainable.

These links only begin to scratch the surface of what BA has to offer in terms of information to better inform your prospect collecting. We’ll dive in much more in future editions of Baseball Card America, and you can always check out BA’s baseball card homepage for the latest stories and to take a deep dive into hobby news, analysis and more.

For now, to celebrate the first edition of Baseball Card America and the kickoff of the 2026 season, we have an exclusive offer if you want FULL SUBSCRIBER ACCESS to everything BA has to offer …

Right now, here’s a look at a few upcoming baseball card releases:

(As always, release dates are subject to change! Be sure to check BA’s baseball card homepage for the latest info.)

Here are some recent baseball card and collectibles headlines making news at Baseball America:

What do you think of BA’s card coverage? What do you want to see more (or less) of? Any overall thoughts on anything? Email me at [email protected] and let me know what you think.

Thanks for reading, tell all your friends to sign up — and happy hunting!

Seth

(Please keep in mind that BA will always bring you the best in prospect and collectible analysis that we can, but none of this should be taken as actual investment advice, and as always, proceed accordingly and responsibly!)