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

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Iced Coffee Hour

Episode Title: $50,000,000+ Pokemon Collector Breaks Silence on Logan Paul, PSA Controversy, & Stolen Cards
Date: June 15, 2026
Hosts: Graham Stephan & Jack Selby
Guest: Gary (“The King Pokémon”), renowned Pokemon collector

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Overview

This episode features a deep dive into the high-stakes world of elite Pokemon card collecting with Gary, owner of the most valuable Pokemon collection in the world (estimated at $50 million+). The discussion covers big-money transactions (notably with Logan Paul and Steve Aoki), investment wisdom from decades in collectibles, market controversies, grading nuances, PSA criticism, theft, and the philanthropic vision driving Gary’s passion for the hobby.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Gary’s Collection & Its Value

• Gary owns the world’s largest collection of premium Pokemon cards, including multiple PSA 10 and Beckett 10 1st Edition Charizards.
• Collection Value: Has publicly listed his Charizard collection for nearly $50 million; total offers for subsets have approached $17 million over a decade ago (22:49).
• Most expensive card: Pristine 10, 1st Edition Base Charizard (00:33).

Notable Quotes:

• “My Charizard collection is listed right now for almost $50 million.” — Gary (00:33)
• “If someone offered you $50 million right now for your entire Pokemon collection, would you accept it?” — Jack (02:19)
• “That would be tempting… I don’t need the money. It’s all eventually probably going to go to our… charities… So I’m going to say maybe on that one.” — Gary (02:24)
• "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." — Gary (97:02)

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2. Celebrity Transactions: Logan Paul, Steve Aoki, and Price Spikes

• Logan Paul and Steve Aoki both convinced Gary to sell them a PSA 10 1st Edition Charizard, sparking a price jump in the market. Logan's effect (buying for $150,000) prompted prices to rise so much that Gary had to pay more to refill his stock (04:20).

Stories:

• Logan tried to buy a card, Gary refused at first, but relented after Logan spoke to Gary’s son; Logan's cash (“seeing the cash meant absolutely nothing”).
• Steve Aoki, after hearing of Gary's deal with Logan, bought one for $172,000—shortly after Logan’s purchase increased prices (04:20).
• Logan cracked Gary’s PSA 10 and successfully regraded it Beckett 10, making it one of three in existence (76:48–78:43).

Notable Quotes:

• “He said, Gary, I’m a maverick. I said, okay, not very bright.” — Gary on Logan Paul's risky approach (00:50, 77:52)
• “I don't regret it at all.” — Gary regarding selling to Logan Paul (04:20)
• On Logan keeping the card: “That card is going to my grave with me... that card is his personal holy grail.” (30:12)

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3. Market Success & Investment Philosophy

• Gary’s philosophy: Collect for joy and completion, not for pure investment. Nearly all of his collectibles (besides Pokemon) are valued for memories, not returns (06:02, 08:44).
• Outperformed traditional investors by starting early and holding long-term (05:33, 09:53).

Investment Lessons:

• “If what you got out is about $30 million and if you put in a million dollars, that’s a 30x.” — Jack (09:53)
• “It would come out to less than a million dollars over all these years.” — Gary (10:22)
• Gary’s only regret: Lack of early investment in Japanese trophy cards (51:45).

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4. Grading, PSA, and Market Controversy

• Gary pioneered Pokemon card grading with PSA, grading over half of the existing 1st Edition Base Charizard PSA 10s (10:52).
• Strong criticisms of PSA: slow turnaround, rising costs, and implied allegations of grader favoritism for celebrity cards (65:41, 79:54–80:51).
• Endorses TAG for transparent, quick grading and CGC for charity support (66:42, 67:03).
• “Would I be tempted myself to give a... better grade... with Justin Bieber’s card?... I do believe that, yes.” — Gary candidly on grading bias (80:17)
• “I would not grade a card through PSA anymore. I just wouldn’t. Not until they make a change.” — Gary (67:03)

Market Manipulation:

• Addressed the “dark side” of the market: toxicity, influencer negativity, theft (83:36–85:06).
• “There is so much negativity now… with scalpers, with negative influencers, with… stores being broken into.” (83:36)

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5. Collecting Advice for Listeners

• For investors with $10,000: focus on Charizard and Pikachu (vintage or modern), or start building a PSA 9 Holo set (41:31, 43:03, 59:34).
• Trainers from Base Set are underappreciated and undervalued (44:25).
• Modern sets are overprinted; long-term value is likely with vintage (41:31, 52:23).

Critical Timing:

• Market is overheated due to upcoming 30th anniversary; recommends waiting until summer 2027 for the best value entry (64:23).

Notable Quotes:

• “For the next year there’s going to be enormous buzz and everything over the 30 year anniversary... I think if you wait a year... something like that I would do.” (64:33)

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6. Signature Controversy & Card Restoration

• Mizuhira Arita signatures: Boost value on lower-value cards (case or surface), but don’t meaningfully impact “million dollar” Charizards. If signature is directly on a high-end card, value impact is ambiguous (85:26–89:22).
• Signed cards from unrelated celebrities (e.g., Elon Musk) unlikely to add value (88:47–90:07).
• Card restoration/artificial enhancement: Gary is wary; concerns about long-term durability and future detection methods (72:31, 107:14).

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7. Security & Thefts

• Story of two high-value Charizards stolen at a Denver show, later recovered thanks to the honesty of a fellow collector and PayPal’s intervention (54:18–58:03).
• Storage: five storage units in three states (08:44, 52:58), high-end cards in bank deposit box, strong security measures (52:98).

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8. The Role of Nostalgia and Collecting for Passion

• Biggest driver in Pokemon’s resurgence: Millennials now have adult money and wish to “buy back their memories” (23:27).
• “Collecting is retrieving memories, and the better the memories, the better the item’s going to do in the future.” — Gary (61:55)
• “I was just following the pattern of my life, what I’ve always done.” (24:06)

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9. Philanthropy and Giving Back

• Gary’s collection and future proceeds are directed toward autism and brain health charities, inspired by recovery and early mentorship (109:10).
• Wife is a special education teacher; their daughter is on the autism spectrum (111:08).
• “My entire life I’ve been interested in charities... my, my entire life I’ve been interested in our in charities.” — Gary (111:08)
• Significant charitable acts in the hobby, including Chris Camillo donating a first edition base set box worth $250,000 (111:06).

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Memorable Quotes & Moments (with Timestamps)

• “He said, Gary, I’m a maverick. I said, okay, not very bright.” (00:50, 77:52)
• “Never said the F word.” — Gary, on his personal ethos (37:10)
• “Out of 11 cards, if it was a base set, maybe three (would be PSA 10s).” (75:12)
• “It is such a solid nine, you can’t take away any possibility of a ten because it’s too strong of a nine, and strong nines do get tens.” — Gary assessing Graham’s Gyarados (104:39)
• “Charity isn’t for other people, charity is for yourself. The charity is for what kind of person you are and that you turn into…” (111:08)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Intro of guest & collection size/value: 00:03–02:19
• Logan Paul, Steve Aoki, celebrity purchases: 03:08–05:33
• Investment returns & philosophy: 05:33–11:52
• Market cycles & what to buy: 17:18–19:33; 41:23–44:13
• Security/thefts: 54:02–59:00
• PSA grading controversy & alternatives: 65:23–72:31
• Signature & restoration debates: 85:06–91:14; 107:14
• Charity and life’s mission: 109:10–115:38
• Quickfire questions (one word): 108:09–109:01

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Episode Tone & Final Thoughts

The conversation is candid, passionate, and occasionally self-deprecating ("I'm not very bright" quips). Gary’s love for collecting and giving back permeates every response. He’s honest about mistakes, market realities, and his disillusionment with certain grading companies, but radiates deep warmth for the Pokemon community and nostalgia culture.

Final Word:
For serious collectors and casual fans alike, this is a masterclass in both the joy and business of collecting, taught by a true pioneer whose “wealth” is ultimately measured in memories and positive impact, not just rare cards.

Transcript

[Graham Stephan]

So good, so good, so good.

[Gary]

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[Graham Stephan]

What's your most expensive one?

[Gary]

The most expensive card is probably the pristine 10 first edition based Charizard. My Charizard collection is listed right now for almost $50 million.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

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. 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. He said, gary, I'm a maverick. I said, okay, not very bright.

[Graham Stephan]

$16,492,000.

[Jack]

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

[Graham Stephan]

Gary, thank you so much for coming on the iced coffee hour. You've been called the Warren Buffett of Pokemon. I'm curious, what's the total value of your collection today?

[Gary]

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. Oh, no. 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.

[Jack]

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

[Gary]

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 going to 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.

[Jack]

It's something to sleep on.

[Gary]

Yeah. But but it kind of 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.

[Graham Stephan]

Tell us.

[Gary]

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. Because I know your dad doesn't want to sell nor need to sell anything. And Devin said, well, he would never sell the Beckett tens. And he said, it's very unlikely he would sell anything out of his collection. And Logan said, well, would he get offended? And Devin said, no, you know, he's easy going. He doesn't care. 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.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

Yes.

[Graham Stephan]

Was it just seeing the cash in

[Gary]

front of you meant absolutely nothing.

[Jack]

Do you regret selling LOGAN PAUL A PSA 10 first edition base set, Charizard for $150,000?

[Gary]

I don't regret it at all. But I have to tell you one other thing. Steve Aoki, he had been trying for years to get me to sell them 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 Steve, I hope he doesn't mind me saying this, 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.

[Jack]

You know, what's crazy is we bring people on this podcast that are career investors. You know, Chris Camillo turned $20,000 into

[Graham Stephan]

20 million, probably more than that, probably

[Jack]

100 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 charizards. Tell me the point that you knew this would be a very viable investment opportunity. Like the exact moment.

[Gary]

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 and I'd take a magnet and load it down the coat machine, you know, we, you know, knock off the top, right, and all the bottle caps in the bottom, run 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, I never gave them up. You know, I kept all my collections going back here. That's why I have five storage lockers in three different states with my collections 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.

[Jack]

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

[Gary]

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 long time 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 all that in mind are amazing condition. So Maybe those what you do kind

[Jack]

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?

[Gary]

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 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.

[Jack]

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, and if you put in a million dollars, that's a 30x. Like people can only drink. If you put money in SanDisk a year ago, that's the only way you could have 30x. 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, I would

[Gary]

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 Gathering. 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.

[Jack]

What's the cheapest PSA10 base set, first edition Charizard you've ever bought?

[Gary]

Maybe 700. I remember getting one in 2000 for 700W. $700. $700 for a PSA10? Remember back then people were not grading. I'M the one who started 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 the first one to start grading along with E. Birdman, Eddie, Brenna Schultz, him and I maybe, you know, me and my friend eddie have graded 76 of the 125 PSA 10 first edition based charizards. We've graded 76. We have paperwork, old paperwork from PSA showing that. And you can check the pop report now and you'll see there's 124, 125 minus one. The one Logan cracked.

[Jack]

Yeah, it's like a 400x return.

[Graham Stephan]

That's crazy. Who was selling it?

[Jack]

A very unfortunate person.

[Gary]

Yeah, but it's worked both ways because in the very beginning I did sell some stuff and I had a young man 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 shadowless PSA 10 Charizard. And he said, Gary, you want to 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. Which of course I wouldn't remember now. And he purchased that one for $350. He said, and now, now that card, you know, of course is.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

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

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

Yes.

[Graham 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.

[Gary]

Yes. Have 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 O.J. simpson rookies. And what's happened, you know, with these things over time and with Pokemon from the very beginning, I, 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 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 develop, what happened to them. And that's information, you know, that you can use later, you know, in, in, 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 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 per is a beautiful thing to experience, that's for sure.

[Graham 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? Now, 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.

[Jack]

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[Graham Stephan]

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[Graham Stephan]

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[Graham Stephan]

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[Gary]

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

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

That one I wish I had the answer to 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 Gengar 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.

[Jack]

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 Gengar I picked out. And I was like, every single run I have to have a Gengar. Like, I love Gengar. 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? 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.

[Gary]

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

[Graham Stephan]

So 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?

[Gary]

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

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

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. So he doesn't have any regrets. And Chum Lee has mentioned that many times, you know, that, that there's no regrets. They didn't purchase my collection, 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? 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 31, 32,000.

[Jack]

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

[Gary]

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 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, 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. Because 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.

[Jack]

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

[Gary]

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

[Jack]

That was the last big offer you've received?

[Gary]

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

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

20 years of going to school 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.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

You know, people ask me that all the. All the time. They say, gary, how were you so smart? How do you know to hang on to these 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. I can tell you how my real passion started with Pokemon, but 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 Absolutely nothing went to zero went to 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. So I didn't know. Honestly, I didn't know.

[Graham 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 are you able to get even first edition boxes?

[Gary]

Right. Well, you know, I guess I was kind of fortunate being on the west coast because Wizards of the coast released, did all their releases from west to east, right? They, they released their first edition boxes without them being a huge big deal on the west coast. And I was in California, living in California, and already a hobbyist and already, you know, a wanting to complete sets 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 it came to collectibles, 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 didn't mean that it wasn't that big of a deal. Wizards made a very small quantity of first edition base because they didn't know how it was going to do, didn't want to overprint. And so they released it. And I pretty much had the pick of the litter back then. And I was already in my 40s, I was already a lifelong collector. I already knew what I was doing. And so I just got as many as I could and I ended up with a ton of money.

[Jack]

Let's talk about the Pikachu Illustrator card though.

[Gary]

Yes.

[Jack]

What was the final price that it sold for?

[Gary]

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

[Jack]

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

[Gary]

Well, I can tell you this. There's not enough money in the world that I could have that would have justified me paid 16 million for that card. But remember, I have a long history in the Hob, 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, those gray areas, you know, you can look at a card, you can 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. And I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna. Certainly not gonna 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.

[Jack]

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

[Gary]

That would hurt.

[Jack]

Would it go down from 16 million to like 10 million or would it cut it down to like 4 people are half.

[Graham Stephan]

Because then if another comes out, then it's no longer one of a kind.

[Gary]

Of. Is no longer.

[Jack]

Is that how it works?

[Graham 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, right?

[Gary]

Yes, I. That right.

[Graham Stephan]

You're laughing. D. But it's true.

[Jack]

Of course it's true.

[Gary]

That's what I.

[Jack]

You're like, well, it makes it less valuable because it's no longer one of one.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Jack]

I agree. Uhhuh. I.

[Gary]

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

[Jack]

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, illustrator, do you like there's a chance another one comes out and then all of a sudden each are worth 4 million and all of a sudden the market cap.

[Graham Stephan]

Yes, I do. Yeah. Because Personally, I think 16 was too

[Jack]

much for the card.

[Graham Stephan]

I think to me it's probably an eight to ten and a half million dollar card.

[Jack]

There were people that were willing to pay 16 for it, which is.

[Graham Stephan]

Yeah, but those are institutional people who are going to try to fractionalize it and that was their marketing expense because they got a ton of eyeballs on it. That to me is worth 6 million bucks. Free marketing. So the card could be worth 10 and then they put 6 million in marketing dollars behind it.

[Gary]

Yeah, of course. I've talked to Logan about this and he was hoping to double his money. You know, he got it in the area. 5 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, oh, come on. And tell him doggone. I said, you came across so well. I said, why?

[Jack]

You told him that he did a good Job.

[Gary]

Oh, I told him he did. 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.

[Jack]

Thank you so much.

[Gary]

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. 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 tens, 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 base charizards. When I did that pawn stars, that's 2016. 10 years ago there were 123 PSA 10 first edition base charizards. Today there's 124 or maybe 125 knockoff logans. 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 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. And I should tell you something else. The one that Logan bought for me, the PSA 10 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. I was willing to overpay for it. And he came up and met me here about other stuff, just family stuff in that. 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 based 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. That card is his personal holy grail in that. So that kind of tells you how hard, number one, how hard 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 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, 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, 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 got to 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 I can get off him. 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, 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.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Jack]

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 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.

[Graham 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.

[Jack]

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.

[Graham 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.

[Jack]

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 [e-mail] host. Running a small business means wearing a hundred 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.

[Graham Stephan]

All right, Jack. Well, that's why we're partnered with Gusto. For those unaware, Gusto is the online payroll and benefits 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.

[Jack]

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.

[Graham 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.

[Jack]

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.

[Graham Stephan]

If you're Ready to join 400,000 other small businesses businesses, try Gusta today at Gusto.com ICED and get three months free when you run your first payroll again. That is three months of free [e-mail] 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?

[Gary]

I've never said the F word.

[Jack]

No?

[Graham Stephan]

Are you serious? Ever?

[Gary]

Never have.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

No, I would even hate to tell you what I say because it's so corny, because what do you say? But I don't say, though.

[Jack]

Yeah, that's what you say.

[Graham Stephan]

What do you say when someone cuts what do you say when someone cuts you off on the freeway and you're upset? What are you yelling at?

[Gary]

I'm just silent and let my eyes turn red. I guess in my day, in my day with my parents, we just simply didn't swear and weren't allowed to swear. But again, now I make it 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 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.

[Graham Stephan]

We bleep it.

[Jack]

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

[Gary]

Right?

[Jack]

I'm not gonna sit here and be dishonest. Like, my experiences with Logan, I have nothing bad to say. 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 going to say that because you're filming a podcast with him. So he's going to 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.

[Gary]

Yes.

[Graham Stephan]

Even in 2020, we met him and I picked up a Pokemon card from him.

[Gary]

Oh, I remember that.

[Graham 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.

[Jack]

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 shirtless, by the way. Shirtless. Yeah.

[Gary]

Yeah.

[Jack]

All right, well, you don't need to go that far because now people are going to say, oh, look at you guys. Yeah, yeah, but. And his bird is mocking us. Yeah, right? 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 then he's 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.

[Gary]

Well, you know, I could show you. I could show you by texts with him. Right? I could show you my text with him. The majority of them are baby pictures, just to give you an idea.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

Yes.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

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 increased the interest. You have people going back on their collections that were worth next to not 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, bowling over people trying to get a, a box and that. I can't see it. You know, I, I, I, I don't like seeing that. But that, that's all a part of the, the cycle, and I think it's important to the hobby in that. So it doesn't, it doesn't bother me. That doesn't bother me at all.

[Jack]

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?

[Gary]

The newer sets are being printed, just printed like 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 long term, I think vintage is going to outperform modern, even though a lot of the modern sets, even though I'm not personally, you know, really up on them. What 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, and they're doing a good job. And still the demand is, is outperforming the what's available. So.

[Jack]

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 charizards. They don't have the budget for that. So like. And they can't buy a part of it, right? Maybe they can. But let's be real here. People want the actual card. What cards should they be buying if they have a budget of, say, $10,000?

[Gary]

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

[Jack]

So any Pikachu and Charizard, Pikachus and

[Gary]

Charizards, 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 this lady had these little tiny miniature vintage Pokemon that were made with 3D. What do you call it? 3D? Printing. Printing thing. And that little tiny Eevees and little tiny Pikachus and all that in her hand. And I kept it for about a half hour going through everyone, trying to get the entire set, just like I always have done in that. But the Pikachus, there was only one left. Everybody was picking Pikachu's even today. So I would say Charizards and Pikachus in these modern sets are probably the smartest.

[Jack]

And before what year even, even if

[Gary]

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

[Graham Stephan]

What do you think is the most undervalued card today?

[Gary]

The base set? Trainers, I think are undervalued because nobody, if you weren't collecting sets, you weren't collecting trainers. You know, you weren't super energy removal or item finder. You know, those guys had absolutely zero individual interest. So. But nowadays, nowadays people are going back and trying to complete those sets and those cards were always the ones that were not treated the best. You know, they were, you know, played and thrown around and not protected. You know, you didn't waste a penny sleeve and a top loader on a, on an item finder. So finding those in good condition, I think is a, is a pretty, is pretty much undervalued now.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

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

[Jack]

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

[Gary]

I would say the first edition base

[Jack]

Charizards, let's say, outside of Pokemon. What's the most valuable card ever?

[Gary]

You know, that T206 card is, I think is. You know, I remember when the King's owner, the Bruce McNall and Wayne Gretzky. Right, those two, when they. And they had their, you know, I'd say that's probably the most valuable card I can tell you. Kind of an interesting story. I went to ucla. You know, that was my school. You know, I went to college there. And our crosstown rival, which you guys would know very well, was USC. Well, at the time, O.J. simpson was the running back and the Heisman Trophy winner and the number one pick overall and an incredible player. Again, I already had some age on me and I was already a collector. And I grabbed every single rookie card of O.J. simpson's I could find. I mean, I had handfuls of O.J. simpson, you know, Topps rookie cards in that and like, you know, the troubles he had in the mid-90s. My amazing valuable collection of OJ Simpson cars 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 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. Addam's 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, you know, pretty bad when that happened with O.J. 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. 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.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

Love those. Yeah.

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

[Gary]

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 I'm thinking, though, you should bring those in.

[Graham Stephan]

If I'm interested in that, there's gotta be a whole bunch of other people who is like, oh, that's kind of cool. And I tend to think, because this is what always happens to me, there's something I want and. And it's just a little too much for me to want to buy it, I don't buy it. And then at like 10x's 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. 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.

[Gary]

That's the rookie card.

[Graham 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 1900 on eBay, and I had 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. Just 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. It was $25,000. 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 a car I'm not gonna do Now. They're worth I don't know how many hundreds of thousands of dollars.

[Gary]

The no rarity one is out of sight.

[Graham Stephan]

Yes.

[Gary]

Yeah. And even the base, the regular base one, what are they selling for 10 to? Yeah, I know.

[Graham Stephan]

Okay. 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?

[Gary]

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, 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 Munsters, if I remember right.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

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. I wish I would have shown more of an interest in the Japanese releases in the very beginning. Yes. You can imagine what I Would have if I had done that.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

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

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

Well, I have 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, with the very, very most valuable cards. My storage lockers 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 Pokemon things that mean a lot to me. And so 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. It's worthwhile for thieves to go after them. I have absolutely zero concern of that happening to me.

[Jack]

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

[Graham Stephan]

Necessarily that, though. But what if there's damage or like a mega fire breaks out or something like that? Is there no insurance?

[Gary]

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, I had two cards stolen. I was at a show in 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 don't ask me how they got stolen. Those two cars got stolen at the time we're talking, you know, over 50,000.

[Graham Stephan]

Yeah.

[Gary]

In value. I never told anybody. I did contact the police and told them. I never mentioned it on a podcast. I never said a thing. Tuan. My wife was the only one who even knew it happened. And it just broke my heart that it would happen. 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 transaction with him in the last couple decades or something. And he said, gary, these two. He sent pictures. He said, you know, did these cars used to be in your collection? 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 guy, a store in New Jersey contacted me and I just bought them and they're shipping them to me overnight. Already shipped. I said, don't plan on getting them, you know, I said, it's not very unlikely you're going to open the box. Going to be nothing in there or something. 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. I said, he called me. I said, you really got them? I said, yeah, those were my cards. So he said, well, I want you to have him back. And so I said, okay. I contacted PayPal. Actually, he contacted PayPal. I contacted the police department. They got together within three days. 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. All the thief would have had to do was take him out. No one ever would have known this thief was such an idiot that he did not take him out of the slabs. And so people fortunately know my collection. Right.

[Jack]

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

[Gary]

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

[Jack]

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

[Gary]

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 it was a large amount, I. There was no way for me to find that out, whether it was that store, somebody sold that store. Because either way, if somebody sold it to them, they took a big hit in that when I got the cards back and 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 feeling in my stomach, kind of a sick feeling in my stomach because it reminded me of that horrible thing that happened. And I understand maybe I'm too sensitive in that, but that'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 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 cars 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.

[Jack]

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

[Gary]

I, I think the, 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 tens in that like with the Illustrator, Logan's Illustrator and that I, I would say, I would say a PSA 9 base set is what I would start working on. PSA 9 hollow base set Holo is what, what I would start.

[Graham 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 is just hype today. Although really quick, I just want to say that when Jack and I first started the Iced 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 shopping.

[Jack]

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[Graham Stephan]

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[Jack]

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

[Graham 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?

[Gary]

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

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

Never and never deserved to be. And it's all because of the ownership. Beanie Babies could have been, could have been, you know, real close to on par with Pokemon. It really, 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 fellow was. And I mean he, he didn't care that you pay, you know, 2500 for a princess Di beanie. And then you know, the prize of your collection, you love. You talk about it, you splash photos everywhere. And then all of a sudden he does another thousand of them. You know, that takes your 2,500, you know, 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 for a reasonable price. But I mean, they never did anything like that.

[Graham 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. Should you wait to buy?

[Gary]

Well, I would certainly wait until after 20, halfway through 2027. So for the next year there's going to be enormous buzz and everything over the 30 year anniversary. That's going to attract a lot. So right now I think things are overpriced. I think that's going to continue for the next year. 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, 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.

[Graham 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 A10 back then than it is today.

[Gary]

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

[Graham 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, what is one better than another? Because I see honestly, CGC getting significantly less for the same car than something like PSA cgc.

[Gary]

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, I mean, he, he, he was, he was just, you know, so, so, so nice to, to me because I now, yes, for him, he would get his. He would get the cards with their tight. Their title on. He had Collecticon put on the back and I would give them away to all the kids at Collecticons get with 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. 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. 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. I would not grade a card through psa. And not only that, but on. 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, but I, I honestly believe that I could do that.

[Graham 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.

[Gary]

Yeah, it's the reputation. You know, PSA is, is the. For resellers, you know, that's where the bucks are. 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. Tag is growing and it'll continue to grow, but I think that transparency is huge.

[Jack]

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

[Gary]

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

[Jack]

How do you know when to grade a card?

[Gary]

Well, I guess it's what you're grading it for. If you grade it for resale, 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. So it really depends on what you're doing it for.

[Jack]

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 feedback 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 7, PSA 6, 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 onto this card until card repair becomes immaculate and then just get it regraded as a PSA 10 and sell it then.

[Gary]

The most I ever did with cards, you know, many times in binder's cards are curved, right? And I would put those cards between glass in that and leave them there for a couple weeks, you know, so they would flatten out. Then I 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 them. But with what they're doing now, my concern is it long term. You can fix those sides. I've seen these for three decades. What's happened to these cards? 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, you know, with a special light or something.

[Graham Stephan]

It's true.

[Jack]

AI is going to get better on both sides.

[Gary]

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

[Jack]

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 because 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? Because it could suggest the card is actually in worse condition, but at the same time, you know, it hasn't been tampered with.

[Gary]

Yeah, well, I, I would think the condition of the cards were better back then 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. These are the same cards we're talking about, but 20 years later. So why would a card 20 years later, 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? Maximum. Some submissions I was paying $4.50 a card. I remember in that instead of minimum 25 today, how many cards come out

[Graham Stephan]

of the pack as a PSA 10?

[Gary]

Maybe a third.

[Graham Stephan]

Wow.

[Gary]

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

[Graham 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.

[Gary]

Yes.

[Graham Stephan]

And a third popped up.

[Gary]

Yes.

[Graham Stephan]

And you were confused. Who had the third?

[Gary]

Yes.

[Graham Stephan]

Turned out Logan Paul had the third that he bought from you as a PSA 10. And he cracked it and regrade it. And you had mentioned that you had tried to regrade this card in the past.

[Gary]

I did.

[Graham Stephan]

And it never came back. What Logan was able to regrade. Do you have any idea what happened?

[Gary]

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. 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. The color was more red or signed. Never turned around, see if there was a little white speck here or a little white speck here, which some tens do, of course. But then he cracked it, you know, with his tin snips, right? And he did it all by himself. Had never cracked a case before. One little plastic shard could hit it. Cost him a hundred thousand or something. But then he. When I took mine in, they were for reviews or they were for crossovers. In other words, I went with. With Lee Steinfeld, Leonhardt and I, because 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. But that one that Logan got, he, instead of trying to cross it over, he cut it out and sent it In. And did it deserve a 10? Yeah, I think it deserved a 10 if. If he didn't do any damage to it when she cracked it.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

Boy, cracking. Cracking open a PSA 10, especially a valuable First Edition base. No, I. I'm not that stupid.

[Graham Stephan]

How would you do it?

[Gary]

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

[Jack]

I knew. I literally thought, he's gonna say, I'm an athlete. That's.

[Gary]

Yeah, yeah, that's it. That's what he said. He said, gary, I'm a maverick. I said, okay. Not very bright, 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.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

Oh, absolutely. It's. 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.

[Graham Stephan]

Were you upset that he got that?

[Gary]

Another great question. He didn't talk to me for two months after that because he was afraid I'd be upset about it. And finally he came up to visit. We met at the Debrews Warehouse. You know, just brought stuff to mess around with. And he said, gary, I was really afraid that you. That, you know, you'd be mad that I cracked it. And I got the Becket 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 happy for you in that. And he said, oh, I'm so glad to hear. 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.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

Like, do.

[Graham Stephan]

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 9, but let's give him a 10. Or, like. Like, yo, this is Drake's Venusaur. Let's. Let's be real generous with this one. Like, does that happen?

[Gary]

I do believe so. I hate to say it, 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, how disappointed I am in them, and 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, 80 million are going to see it.

[Graham Stephan]

Yeah.

[Gary]

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

[Graham 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.

[Gary]

Yeah.

[Graham Stephan]

So I tend to believe that it's not like Justin Bieber could submit a 5 and he'll come back a 10, but if it. If it's a 9, 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, it's a 10.

[Gary]

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

[Graham 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 just got a raise, and he's like, you know what? This card is a 10.

[Gary]

The human side of it, I definitely think plays a part in that, because there are cards on the fringe. You know, you're going to have a dead lock, beautiful, pristine 10, and you're going to have a week nine. Right? But some of those are going to be on the borderline between 9 and 10. And now it's up to the, that grader to up it or down it. Right. 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. Yeah, 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.

[Jack]

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

[Gary]

I would say a lot of the, a 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 like one real negative influencer like Michael 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 timmies. And you know, I've worked too many years to try to promote the hobby and the positive side. And there is so much negativity now with the scalpers, with negative influencers, with, with, you know, stores, you know, stores being broken into. There's too much and it, 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, and it's disappointing to me.

[Graham Stephan]

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.

[Gary]

Yes, especially the one girl. For those that don't know, Mitsuhiro 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.

[Graham Stephan]

So how did you handle that pushback against his signature.

[Gary]

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, 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 Areta's signature, that at the time he was charging $30 for 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 1000% true then and now. And yet I was accused of disrespecting, you know, a Rita. And I made it clear 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.

[Graham Stephan]

So Jack and I were having a debate. How much would it devalue the card if he signed the card itself?

[Gary]

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. You don't? No. His signature on the case absolutely means nothing.

[Graham Stephan]

But then why would you just have him sign every single first edition charizard that's ungraded?

[Gary]

Generally 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.

[Graham Stephan]

I would almost.

[Gary]

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

[Graham Stephan]

I could say because I'm not in the Pokemon. I tend to think it would devalue the card just, just purely because you, you have a surface of something, let's say like an original vintage card. The signature on the card itself. When a signature is so prevalent, I can't see helping that value. If anything, I think that would devase the. From. From a value perspective. I think on a newer card, like when Steve Aoki signed my Snorlax Yeah, 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.

[Gary]

Okay.

[Graham 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, because 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, if Steve Jobs signed a Pokemon card, like what signatures out there would increase the value? Value.

[Gary]

I increase the value.

[Jack]

But if you sign PSA10Charizard.

[Gary]

Yes.

[Jack]

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

[Gary]

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

[Graham Stephan]

The card itself.

[Gary]

Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Numerous times.

[Graham Stephan]

Old or new?

[Gary]

Old ones. You know, original base set, first edition chargers.

[Graham Stephan]

Do you ever tell them like yo, you might not want, like you might want me to sign this card. Unless it's like PSA want like I

[Gary]

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

[Graham Stephan]

Yeah.

[Gary]

In that 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 like would Logan sign an Illustrator. Right. I think with unrelated people signing cards, I don't think those necessary. If they're value cards of any type of value. I don't think think that that would help. At the very least I think that could hurt Elon Musk signing a first edition based Charizard. I can't see that being a good thing. Certainly his signature PSA would authenticate my signature. Every single grading company authenticates. They all have me in their files and it helps the value of almost everything. I sign for the people which you can go on ebay and see right now because I don't charge for it. Right. But that's for lower value cards. So.

[Graham 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?

[Gary]

Yeah.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

Good for him.

[Graham Stephan]

For those unaware, by the way, he is collecting every single first edition Kabuto and said those are like underappreciated cards and he has a collection of like 2000 of them and you could submit your first edition Kabuto and he will give you back a non first edition signed.

[Gary]

I think it was an excellent marketing strategy, I really do, but I don't

[Graham Stephan]

think he's marketing anything. I think he's just trying to get him.

[Gary]

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. On a marketing business level. On a personal level, there were an awful lot of caboodos made, so I don't know how that would affect it.

[Jack]

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 like, what was the idea behind or lack of idea, I guess, or what was. What do you respond to those that

[Gary]

are saying that, yeah, I got absolutely murdered over that? Yeah, absolutely murdered over that. And this is a good place to explain the story. It was during a podcast with Steve, Steve Aoki, and 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. 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, you know, get them out of there in that. And And I got a little bit flustered and. And so I quickly, you know, tried to get them out, which made it look absolutely horrible. 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 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 we got 40. I think it was 48% tens. Wow. So they were all. They were unaffected by my apparent mishandling of them. They were totally unaffected, which was a good thing because nobody who received those packs complained about anything. They were all very, very happy. But did it look bad? It looked absolutely terrible.

[Jack]

Like 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.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

That is so silly that it's.

[Graham Stephan]

Because then now you have all the 10.

[Gary]

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. Oh, I know that's absurd that. That was a silly one.

[Jack]

Well, I don't think it's absurd. I think it, like, it makes the entire. In. 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 9, because it gets 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 to. 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 these things going on, like, obviously it's. It's going to be extremely hard to be ex. Very attentive and sensitive to the cards.

[Gary]

It's not absurd that somebody would do it. It. Right. It's very absurd that I would do it. That's kind of what I meant because I have 52 PSA 10s and I wasn't. And I've had those 52 PSA 10s for 20 years. I'm not selling them. I don't care about value. I never even look at the pop reports.

[Jack]

I agree. I mean, those. You could have made a lot of money, more money. In Pokemon or at least got some cash and lived a lavish life. So it's. I 100% 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, right, this was. This was not planned out.

[Gary]

But neither knows me, of course, and so they might think something like. And if I looked at it with a neutral eye, I would think, how cringy is this?

[Jack]

Exactly.

[Gary]

Yeah, I would have felt the same way as they do.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

Yeah, I don't think there's any question about that because the majority of my collection, my Pokemon collection from wotcs, are very unknown 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 I don't advertise the Charizards, those I did put out there on the Pawn Stars. 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 knew how many of such and such I had, it could affect market values in that. And so I'm in. The last thing I would want to do is hurt the hobby. I would rather burn those, then put them out there and hurt, you know, him, him, him and her, you know, the value of their cards. So, 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 90s and hundreds. I'm going to last easily another 20 years or more. I'm not. I don't want to do anything between now and then to hurt the hobby.

[Graham Stephan]

Would you sell me a PSA 10 shadowless Charizard?

[Gary]

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

[Graham Stephan]

Is there a price or something we could work out?

[Gary]

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

[Jack]

What about any other non Charizard card?

[Gary]

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.

[Jack]

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

[Gary]

But he wouldn't want boxes and boxes and boxes of bulk for 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, one of the most, you know, precious people in the world as far as I'm concerned. Zach Browning from Gem Mint, Pokemon, 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 that I've given up in that it was only to friends and it was only cards I didn't care about.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

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 you know, it's Pokemon's unprecedented. You know, there's, there's been little tips, little cues here and there, business wise over the last couple decades. Yes. But overall it's unprecedented. Number one media franchise in the history of the world. Right. 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, 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, cards going back, you know, the early baseball in the late 1800s. If I were to say 100 years from now you'll be talking about Pokemon or God willing, any of us are going to be. I wouldn't be exaggerating. Pokemon is safe.

[Graham 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 Gyarados 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 onto it ever since. But this is the card. I want you to tell me honestly what you think this would grade.

[Gary]

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 at psa, wanted me to be involved with psa, but I, you know, I didn't. It's a thick. Huh? A thick stamp. A thick stamp. 1.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

Yeah. Can I take it out?

[Graham Stephan]

Oh, literally, it's never been taken out before, and I'm, like, so nervous. Well, I. I went straight from Logan's hand into the sleeve, and it's been in the sleeve ever since.

[Gary]

Right. Okay. Well, I'm not gonna. I'm not gonna take it out. It kind of takes one of the areas. The surface.

[Graham Stephan]

Yes.

[Gary]

Blemishes that you can't see. But I. I can see enough already to. To see it's not a 10. Why.

[Graham Stephan]

Why would you say that?

[Gary]

Okay. 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. 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 on these to see more than that wrong with it. Okay. Not because it's. You. You want honest opinion?

[Graham Stephan]

Honest opinion.

[Gary]

I think it is absolutely a very solid nine.

[Graham Stephan]

Okay. But you don't think.

[Gary]

This is my opinion.

[Graham Stephan]

You don't think there's any chance of it a 10, or you think like, hey, this is probably a nine. You could be honest with me. I'm not gonna be.

[Gary]

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

[Graham Stephan]

But it's probably a nine.

[Gary]

Yeah, it's probably a nine.

[Graham Stephan]

Okay.

[Gary]

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

[Graham Stephan]

Okay.

[Gary]

Now, tag uses. Uses a something where they tell you how strong of a 9 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 9. Does that take away any chance for a 10? Absolutely not. It could absolutely be graded at 10.

[Graham Stephan]

Would you send it to CGC Beckett or PSA?

[Gary]

I would not send anything to PSA these days. Nothing. CGC. I would send it to Tag because it's fun. You know, it kind of puts the fun back in grading because you're going to see your card, 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, you know? Plus, it's good to 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 Illustrator 10? This card is in better shape than his 10. So for what that tells you, anything's possible. Yeah.

[Graham Stephan]

Okay.

[Gary]

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

[Jack]

Okay.

[Graham Stephan]

For some of these Logan's. Yeah. Signature.

[Gary]

Is that on the.

[Graham Stephan]

It's on the plastic sleeve.

[Gary]

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

[Graham Stephan]

Oh, that's fun.

[Gary]

Yeah. Very nice.

[Graham 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 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?

[Gary]

Did I say anything earlier about. Are those reparations? Are those. Would you call them reparations? Would they come back?

[Graham Stephan]

Maybe.

[Gary]

Did I mention that?

[Graham Stephan]

Yeah, you did.

[Gary]

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. We'll go back.

[Graham Stephan]

Yeah.

[Gary]

And I would have to know that before I did that, I wouldn't. I wouldn't send it to have them repair anything.

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

Oh.

[Graham Stephan]

For you to review. So if you want to see that as a Big thank you to all the channel members. We'll have that up for you as well.

[Gary]

I want to see it. Yes.

[Jack]

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.

[Gary]

Okay.

[Jack]

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

[Gary]

200,000.

[Jack]

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

[Gary]

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

[Jack]

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

[Gary]

It's kind of like if you asked me some of these questions today where I could move the needle a bit and the whole reason you're asking me that, it's kind of like you're collaborating with me there where you and I are going to really pump up this card or something like Mars Attacks.

[Graham Stephan]

Yeah, buy the whole Mars Attacks collection.

[Gary]

Yeah. Leave out the Mars Attacks, otherwise they're going to be too expensive for you and I to fight over about it.

[Jack]

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.

[Graham Stephan]

About it?

[Gary]

Yeah, well, you know, I, I think the, the greatest story is from the past, you know, from how did that become a priority of mine and has been my entire life in that. And I'm going to tell you a story of how it started for me. My interest in the charity work back in the, in the late 60s when I was in my mid teens in that I was very involved in drugs, in psychedelics and you know, things that were around for. It was common, you know, back then. And I got very sick and I quit. 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 50 years, 55 years now, 57 years. 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 got involved in Narcotics Anonymous and you know, went through my treatment and did well. And I met a lady that maybe you would know of her. Maybe, but not. 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.

[Jack]

She

[Gary]

did a lot of work with Me with Senate subcommittees and things like that. Me as a teenager and her as an Academy Award winning actress. We did a lot of things together and she drove it 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 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 that in her opinion, the most important thing you can be is on time. Most important thing. Obviously there's 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 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 our 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. 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 Brain Health and Autism with Steve Aoki. And he said, gary, this box is for you, for your charity, anything you want to do with it. And walked away. A guy I never even saw, I'd never heard of him before, right? A first edition based Pokemon box. Even six years ago that was worth a ton of 100,000 or something, that was 250. Yeah, see that, See that? And I mean, even now I get misty thinking about it, right? I think it just makes me think, just makes me see the positive side of everything that we're doing and what this is all about. And that ended up growing into Pokemon Saves the World that we were all involved in together. And now to get to present day, my wife Tuan, honestly, she doesn't need to work, right? She's 50. Hope she doesn't mind me saying that, but 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 then 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 and that. So it's all the shows I go to, my interest in Collecticon, the dollars that came out of that and have come out of that steadily has all gone into our autism charity, Autism Instruct. And so 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 the future. As long as I can, I'm going to be there for that because it's good for me.

[Jack]

Well, that's a very noble cause. We appreciate that a lot. 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.

[Gary]

Great.

[Jack]

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

[Graham Stephan]

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

[Gary]

Yeah, well.

[Graham Stephan]

Portfolio, Pokemon,

[Jack]

Graham's Pokemon portfolio.

[Graham Stephan]

We'll see you tell me.

[Jack]

So you guys will see Graham $30 in his

[Graham Stephan]

Poikimon Poikiman portfolio.

[Jack]

Thank you guys so much for watching. Of course, we would not be here if not for you guys. Thank you. Thank you.

[Graham Stephan]

Thank you.

[Jack]

Thank you, Graham. Thank you, Gary.

[Graham Stephan]

Until next time.

[Jack]

Till next time.

[Gary]

Thank.

[Graham Stephan]

You.