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PNP 629- What Honus Wangers T206 Tells Us About Potters AI Derpy Dragon

Poor Man's Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·45m 39s·analyzed·Jul 10, 2025
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.028

TL;DR

Orby argues rare AI Harry Potter playfields will become pinball's most valuable collectibles, using sports card economics as analogy.

Summary

Orbital Albert (Orby) hosts a lengthy episode comparing sports card collectibility—particularly the Honus Wagner T206 card—to pinball machine rarity, specifically arguing that the 100 accidentally produced Harry Potter machines with AI-generated 'Derpy Dragon' artwork will become the most expensive playfields in pinball history. He disputes Zach Menny and Dennis's contrary opinion and builds an argument around how rarity combined with product quality determines long-term value in collectibles.

Key Claims

  • 100 Harry Potter playfields were accidentally produced with AI-generated artwork (the 'Derpy Dragon')

    medium confidence · Orby states this as rumor/alleged fact but notes uncertainty about exact distribution across Pro/Premium/CE/Arcade editions

  • The rare Derpy Dragon playfields will eventually become the most expensive playfields ever in pinball

    medium confidence · Orby's core thesis, disagreeing with Zach Menny and Dennis from Pinball Show who disputed this prediction

  • Rarity + product quality = collectible value; demonstrated through sports cards like Honus Wagner T206

    high confidence · Orby uses extensive sports card analysis (top 10 most expensive cards) to support this economic principle

  • Harry Potter is widely considered Eric Meyeroff's masterpiece shooter design with David Thiel doing sound

    high confidence · Orby states this as community consensus

  • Retro Ralph has a CE version of Harry Potter with the Derpy Dragon artwork

    medium confidence · Orby questions whether Retro Ralph received one of the rare variants

Notable Quotes

  • “I don't want to disagree just to disagree and be divisive and be argumentative and be rude. I want to disagree and make a valid point about it.”

    Orbital Albert @ early — Sets tone for respectful disagreement with Zach Menny and Dennis

  • “what makes something collectible is partially the rarity and how great it is”

    Orbital Albert @ late — Core thesis statement explaining why Derpy Dragon playfields will increase in value

  • “The reason why this Honus Wagner card is so expensive is because he immediately contacted them and told them immediately he does not want any more printed.”

    Orbital Albert @ mid — Key analogy: unintended scarcity creates value (parallels to accidental AI playfields)

  • “So you think pinball people are rich? No. Collectibles people are. Like that's a different level.”

    Orbital Albert @ mid — Contextualizes how serious collectibles markets operate at scales beyond typical pinball budgets

  • “when you have two pinball podcasters both agreeing and using such a rare term like jarring, I think we'd all have to agree, it's stunning and yet jarring at the same time.”

    Orbital Albert @ late — References community consensus on Harry Potter CE artwork aesthetics (jarring design elements)

Entities

Orbital AlbertpersonJersey Jack PinballcompanyHarry PottergameZach MennypersonDennispersonRetro RalphpersonEric MeyeroffpersonDavid ThielpersonChristopher Franchi

Signals

  • ?

    community_signal: Pinball media conducting investigative journalism on Jersey Jack AI artwork issue; Colin (TWIP) praised for reaching out directly

    medium · Orby commends Colin's investigative work as award-worthy for 'Nerdies' but expresses own nervousness about contacting Jersey Jack directly

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Disagreement within pinball media (Orby vs. Zach/Dennis) about whether rare Derpy Dragon playfields will appreciate to become most expensive in pinball history

    high · Orby explicitly states he disagrees with Zach Menny and Dennis from Pinball Show regarding Derpy Dragon resale value trajectory

  • ?

    manufacturing_signal: Approximately 100 Harry Potter playfields accidentally produced with AI-generated artwork; exact distribution across Pro/Premium/CE/Arcade editions unclear

    medium · Orby states 'the 100 accidentally playfields that were put out' and questions whether distribution split between CE/Arcade/Premium; notes uncertainty about whether Jersey Jack has officially confirmed

  • $

    market_signal: Rare variant playfields expected to appreciate significantly in secondary market, paralleling sports card collectibility economics

    medium · Orby builds 40+ minute analogy between sports cards and pinball, concluding rarity + quality = long-term value regardless of initial aesthetic criticism

  • ?

    community_signal: Christopher Franchi's transition from Stern to Spooky Pinball as artist/designer referenced through Orby naming his dog after him

    low · Orby mentions his dog 'Draco Franchi' is named after 'favorite pinball personality' who used to be on a show (likely Stern-adjacent); context suggests Franchi's career move is common knowledge

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.137

0:00
All get around, he's on the rebound, hear the sound of our buddy, oh lordy, it's Orby, pinball now to rejoice, he's tugging pinball, craft beer and coffee, mixed with syrup and honey, he hopes to laugh with his family in a random tangent, stories of his boys, he's on the poor man's pod network, we're gonna get more listeners, for the Pinball Nerds Podcast.
0:32
Coming to you from beautiful River Hibbert, Nova Scotia. Welcome back, Pinball Nerds, to episode 629 of your fifth favorite pinball podcast. My name's Orbital Albert, and on today's show, we're going to be talking all about how Honus Wagner's T206 collectible card, the second or third most expensive, depending on who you ask and which sales are private or not, most expensive sports card to have ever sold. Also today, I will be doing a video as well. So for everybody watching, hopefully on YouTube land there, if this goes well, I do apologize. I wasn't 100% sure how to make my new Shure MV6 microphone work while recording through the app on my laptop. And if it seems like the video is a little wobbly, it's because it is. You know why? Because it's up on a table. So I apologize. Here, I'll turn. I mean, I don't want you to see my. Oh, no, you saw my SpongeBob shorts. I have Luna, Tuna, Elo and Agar down here. and Draco Franchi over here. Where's this guy? Hi, bud. See, there you go. There you got to see him. Anyways, this is not a dog podcast. Would that be cool? I would do a dog podcast. But this is not a dog podcast. Here, let's get rid of these extra pillows I had here. Here, one pillow for Draco Franchi, one for Luna Tuna, Elowen Agar, and one for Orby's back. There we go. All right. So Today, we are here talking all about how rarity in pinball could be what causes the Harry Potter accidental or mistakenly printed derpy dragon, as it might be. We're going to be talking all about how derpy dragon and the mistakenly so-called rumored... I don't know, again, if Jersey Jack has 100% said this is true or if it's just a maybe or not. But it sounds like, bye Draco, bye Mr. Franchi, it sounds like there's a very, very, very good chance that the 100 accidentally playfields that were put out are going to make that particular Harry Potter playfield the most expensive playfield that we actually have in all of pinball ever. and I believe the machines, especially any CEs. And again, I don't know how many of the arcade editions had it. I don't know how many of the CEs got it, but it does appear. Let me try turning off this light. I wonder if turning off this light could help my camera. I can see my camera switching all the time. I don't know, but then I look like I'm in the dark here, right? I don't know. Is that better? See, I'm in the shade, but it's not switching all the time. I don't know. I will work on the lighting, guys. I need to work on getting a new camera. I'm only going to be using this particular camera a grand total of one time.
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Zombie Yetiperson
Poor Man's Pinball Networkorganization
JBS Showorganization
Cale Hernandezperson
Colinperson
Honus Wagnerperson
  • ?

    product_concern: Harry Potter CE features 'Derpy Dragon' artwork criticized as poorly executed/aesthetically awkward, yet paradoxically will become valuable due to rarity

    high · Orby repeatedly references 'Derpy Dragon' as a flawed design element; references Dennis using term 'jarring' to describe artwork; suggests aesthetic quality is secondary to rarity in value determination

    • 3:36
    Yeah. So I did hear Zach many and Dennis talking about on the pinball show, talking all about how they don't think ever that the Derpy Dragon version will be the most expensive.
    3:49
    I totally 100% disagree, but I don't want to disagree just to disagree and be divisive and be argumentative and be rude. I want to disagree and make a valid point about it. So, believe it or not, I did use a little bit of AI. I constructed the idea of this episode long before I looked at chat AI at all. Sorry, before I looked at chat GPT because I always get it wrong, but there you go. So I don't want this to be a full chat episode, of course, because I did come up with this idea myself. But I asked chat what was the 10 most expensive cards of all time and what makes them rare. and the answer to that is pretty straightforward so let's just go through these quickly okay as I'm going here I should have a little desk I need to get a desk instead of me just like crouching over here but I'm trying to make sure you can see me on the camera I'm trying to make sure that I'm recording into the mic and being close enough to the mic I know it's not a directional mic so I have to make sure I'm not turning my head too much or anything so to all of you pinball podcasters and content creators on YouTube who have to worry about lighting who have to worry about your uh what camera speed you're recording at i'm at 720p but i think my shutter speed is really bad so i do want to get a new camera this is just a test it will get better don't worry please subscribe and like i am getting a better camera i just got to make sure the camera is working with the sure and it sounds nice and crisp because thank you so much to the person i haven't figured out how i'm going to thank them and until i do that i don't know if i'm quite ready to announce and if they happen to mention I may have told a couple really close pinball nerds how much I appreciated it, and I'm sure a couple close people to them may know. But this beautiful microphone, let's take a little look here.
    5:32
    Wow. Ooh. I need those firework sounds, right? I need those. But let's just look at the top most because I understand Pokemon very well. I understand comics very well. but probably the thing that I've researched the most and the thing that actually is the most collectible for how much it costs to how much it's worth now. OK, yes, there are some sports cards that originally cost like four hundred thousand and they're now worth four million. OK, so they've 10x. But these cards came for free in cigarette packages, a lot of them. And if we take a look here, what makes them so rare is just not what makes them so valuable is not just that they're rare. so if you had something in pinball that was just super rare like a one-off plastic that had just like some ai on it but it was just a one one-off plastic it would be cool but it would never have high value we're talking about eric menyer's masterpiece harry potter everybody agrees it's his best shooter they're working on the code if they've got david thiel on sound one of the top if not the top dude in sound so we know the sound's going to get better and better and better The music in it was already rad AF. The artwork is incredible. The CE artwork is just chef's kiss. For the first time ever, I made that sound. After making that sound like a hundred times on the show, for the first time ever, you all got to see me kiss the chef. And listen, if you love listening to me in your car and you don't want to use extra bandwidth, believe me, I can guarantee you the sound quality is always going to be, I believe for now, will be better right here on the Poor Men's Pinball Network. listen to me on any of your podcatchers or over there on Apple. I think Apple is my second most listened to. So I'm going to make sure that I always try to keep the sound quality good for all the people just driving around their cars listening. But I also want to start working on the Pimlner's podcast channel, or I believe I will start by having this just on my own channel, which I forget what it is. But you're watching me on it right now, so you know more than I do. Let's get back into what we're talking about, though. So my point is I didn't know if it would be two years. I didn't know if it would be 10 years. I didn't know if it would be 20 years. But I knew at a certain point from what I know in collectibles, especially with sports cards, that the rarest ones always end up being worth more if the product itself is valuable. Bye, Elowen. We lost both dogs. We started with both. I may have given them treats to come sit by me just so you all could say hello to them and see what I go through while trying to record a show like this. If someone pulls in the driveway, the kids come home, that sort of thing. I was recently just watching, and thanks for the shout-out, dudes. That was so funny. JBS, of course, Jamie Birchall, friend of the show. I got to be back on his old channel, Wormhole, which, sorry, Jamie, sore spot.
    8:14
    Don't want to get you upset, but the artist formerly known as the Wormhole. So I was on Wormhole back in the day, and I had a great time. I absolutely loved it. But, of course, it's now just called the JBS Show. And my favorite part of JBS, he still interviews like arcade owners and stuff like that, and I enjoy those. But what I really love to dig into is when Cale Hernandez, okay, one half of the Electric Bat Pinball podcast, and Retro Ralph, of course, from – well, everybody knows Retro Ralph. He even got to do the video for Harry Potter, right? So they go together and they do, I believe, the Roundhouse. Now, I've been calling them the new Pinball Brat Pack. I think you add in Ian from Nudge, Colin from the Kineticists, those five dudes. I'm an orbiter. You know me, Orbiter Albert. I just like to orbit around, okay? But I think those dudes are kind of like the new pinball brat pack. I would say you go back five years ago, you would have had Marty Robbins, Ryan C., Jeff Teolis, Zach Menny.
    9:19
    Even Greg Bone was more so in that when he was much more often. Now he's back with Ken Cromwell on the new Flippin' Out podcast. So that's, it is kind of nice. It's really nice to hear Ken back. It's nice to hear Greg back. I know Greg used to be, one of my favorite times was when Zach and Greg used to be on the This Week in Pinball run by Twip back in the day. And they would, they did this whole thing where they had to sing a song that was related to a pinball machine. And as much as Dennis hates singing from Zach, I love all singing pinball podcasts. because something I love almost as much as pinball is like singing and music and all that kind of stuff. So anyways, let's just get into this. I've gone off topic enough here, okay? I got to get a cool desk to put here. That's what I'm missing. I got the microphone now. I got the camera even though I don't know what's going on with the lighting. I apologize for that. Y'all are going to have strokes out there if you're watching this. I remember I was watching Walt Wood. Shout out to Walt Wood. Don't agree with everything he says. I don't agree with everything any pinball podcaster says, but I respect him as a content creator. And I appreciate that he's doing his best to like just make cool content because he's been in the game for a long time. He's a hell of a better pinball player than I am. He's way better at analyzing code and rules and even shot layout than I am. And he definitely has something to say. The sound quality isn't necessarily incredible. The lighting isn't necessarily great. I mean, in comparison to mine, probably way better than this. But anyways, if you haven't checked out Walwood, make sure you go check him out. But let's talk about for a second here. Let's talk about for a second why I do actually this one time disagree with Zach and Dennis when they said Zach had gotten numerous phone calls to switch out. People who had the AI art wanted to just get in line and get the regular art. And then I even saw another gentleman on Facebook who was his lifelong dream to get a Harry Potter. And of course, what happens to the poor dude? it comes there and it's smashed and the glass is like coming out the bottom and you can see the thing that says do not accept this game honestly me personally after what I about to tell you I might have just kept it anyways and got new glass maybe there was more wreck than the glass we don know so maybe that was smart and maybe the one he gets replaced with will be one of the 100 with the better play fields it something i still haven't heard anyone talk about are like 50 of the ai play fields are they actually inside the ces and like 50s in the arcade or or the middle version did it even get any you know what i mean so we don't know we are 90 of them in the ces are 10 of them i don't know if there's only 100 AI play fields and they end up making, I'll say of the lower, let's say all 100 were in the arcade version, the lower version. If any are in the CE version, that's going to be very expensive. But wait, didn't Retro Ralph get the CE version and he has the Derpy Dragon? This is okay. For all you YouTube watchers, this is what Derpy Dragon looks like. He's just on the side there just chilling like that. Anyways, oh boy, open your eyes. Open your eyes. There we go. Okay. I've had no gummies today I actually I actually haven't but I I may have I may have had a little creatine or a little bit of the old caffeine from angry alpaca that's right uh but number 10 on my list is this is the 10th most expensive uh sports card to ever sell okay number 10 is 1952's Mickey Mantle number 311 so this is a specific card okay uh why is it valuable sold for 5.2 million It is the most iconic post-war card ever. Mickey Mantle is obviously a top five, maybe even a top three for many people. Top two. Him, Babe Ruth, it's hard to say, right? Some would say Shohei Ohtani, others Mike Trout. There's arguments to be made for all of them. Shohei certainly might be the best since Babe Ruth at, wait, was it Babe Ruth or Mickey Mantle? I think it was Babe Ruth, who was also a really good pitcher and also a very, very good, very talented hitter at the same time. Could get the knock it out of the park. Sorry, Franchi. I know you. Wait, that wasn't even a pinball reference. I'm allowed those. Yes. I did one show without Christopher Franchi getting mad at me. This is incredible. In 629 shows, I never thought that would happen. But he just did. All right. I'm getting a little too thunder, thunder thunder by the beach um here we go okay so why is it so valuable this 1952 mickey mantle card is so valuable not only because it's mantle's first tops card so not technically his rookie card but let's be honest kind of as thought of by most people your first like non-little league card is kind of considered your first true rookie card so it's kind of his first true rookie card but also this specific one is a PSA 9 from 1952. Do you know what the chances are of even getting an out-of-package PSA 9? Would have been back then and nowadays even less so. Honey, Luna Tuna, Elo and Agar wants to come visit you. Can you move the child gate? My wife was kind enough to put up the child gate for Draco Franchi so he didn't jump up and down and knock over my leaning tower of pinball here instead of leaning tower of pizza. That's another pinball reference. Oh, and the other pinball reference. Man, look at these shorties.
    14:40
    Okay. Whoa, whoa, whoa. Too short. Dude, I got on the Rick and Morty shorts to match with my pinball shirt.
    14:50
    Sorry, listeners. Hold on. I got to spin around. Oh, I hit my head on the light, guys. Okay, can you see back here? You probably can't hear me.
    15:03
    This, that was, I just showed everybody an OG. That's right. It used to say ACE, A-C-E. Now it says half an A and an E. On the back is this an OG London, Ontario Pinball League shirt. That's right. So shout out to all my London pinball nerds. All right, let's get back into it. So what makes this so rare? The fact that it's a high grade, it's a PSA 9. And also on top of that, that Mickey Mantle is an incredible player. and it's his rookie card. So that's the most sought-after card. Okay, let's move on to number nine. This is the exquisite LeBron James RPA. So RPA, for those of you who don't know much about sports cards, is just a rookie patch auto. That means it's his rookie card, but also there is a patch on there, usually a game-worn patch. And if that said game-worn patch is from his rookie year or, God forbid, his rookie game, then it's worth even more. And then if he actually held said card and he wrote his autograph on it, there you go you get an rpa so rookie patch auto r is for rookie patches for like i just explained part of his jersey being on there the most expensive part of his jersey by far is the logo man so the little the little mba uh logo patch is by far the most expensive if you want to get a jersey so there we go there we go done and done so why is this rpa so expensive it sold for 5.2 million dollars tying the 10th most expensive lebron james obviously is the goat and then over and above that. Okay, Jordan, yes, but LeBron, Jordan, arguable. Also, Exquisite is the most premium brand. So that card brand is the most rare and it is the most expensive and therefore making it super duper rare because there's only one of these on planet Earth. There's only one that is a specialty patch like that. That's his rookie card. That's been signed and I'm assuming this is probably a 10 uh wow okay lebron james rpa number eight national treasures luca donchik same thing logoman one of one auto sold for 4.5 million in 2021 next number seven is a 1951 bowman mickey mannell rpa psa 10 so this is even arguably more rare because it's a psa 10 from 1951 as opposed to the last one we spoke about which was a psa9 from 1952 um it is the considered the true rookie card of mickey mantel like we said the other one is the first tops rookie but not the true one also in a gem mint there's only a few of these in existence that we know of so it's ultra vintage mickey mantel obviously top five baseball players of all time and then on top of that it's a psa10 which there would be very very very few of those like it said on planet earth probably four five in existence all right next number six a much more modern card this is the 2020 flawless lebron triple logo man so this has not one not two but three logo mans on it um this card is the only ever card with three different lebron james logo man patches it has one patch from each of the following teams which makes it more unique it's not just three patches from when he was on the calves or the lakers right it's one patch from when he was on the calves one patch from when he with Miami Heat and one patch from being on the Lakers. So this makes it a very true, extremely rare one of one, like true, legit one of one. So massive media hype also led up to this. It sold for $5.52 million. Little piece of paper sold for $5.52 million. So you think pinball people are rich? No. Collectibles people are. Like that's a different level. When you can spend $5 million and any of those dudes buying $5 million, that's not their first piece of paper. They obviously own lots of other collectibles and probably mostly sports collectibles. And therefore, that was, yes, probably their most expensive. But like that's just when we complain about $2,000 for like a working topper that has stuff that moves on and gives you an extra game mode. And, you know, I get it's a little unreasonable, especially when we came from. I remember being in pinball when I believe even 10 years ago, weren't stern toppers like $3.99 to $4.99 typically? Maybe I'm wrong. Let me know in the comments below, guys. I've never been able to say that before, but I love saying that now. I want to interact with you guys on YouTube. Eventually, once I get enough people on my Living With Albert YouTube channel, I think that's what it is. Make sure you subscribe. I will be talking about more than just pinball. I'll be talking about craft beer. I'll be talking about collectibles. A show that I'm working on right now is I suspect I know the man who owns the most, the single largest collection of new in box, like brand spanking new. Okay. Okay, brand spanking new, new in box pinball machines. And this gentleman, well, I'm not going to, I'm working on it. I haven't got a response from yet. I'm trying to be, I'm not quite going to be calling to be that much level of investigative journalist. By the way, if I still did the nerdies and when, okay, I will still do the nerdies, the sixth annual nerdies. when I do the nerdies our own pinball nerds podcast award show I will be specifically considering very strongly because I'll still look at Jason Knapp stuff over at Knapp Arcade he does great work and there's lots of other people doing investigative journalism but I would say primarily Colin you're gonna be most likely the front runner to win that best investigative journalism piece of the year looking into that AI art, reaching out, you got to have some cojones, huh? You got to have a little bit of the, you got to, like for me, I would be so afraid to reach out to Jersey Jack. If I thought he even heard, listen to one second of, you know, of my show, I would be nervous as hell. Nevermind reaching out and contacting him. Like, I mean, I guess I haven't met him in person. I haven't been invited to the factory before, you know, don't worry. I'm not going to be a nut bar and lose my mind today. I've crashed out once this year. Guys, do I not get one crash out per year. I don't know. Anyways, it was a baby crash out. It wasn't like last year's. Jeez, my stern rant, that was a way bigger crash out. This year's crash out was like, yeah, I crashed out a little, but yeah, it was a mini crash out. I mean, I was kind of hit by some meteorites and I had some other pinball podcasters hurtling missiles at me and I should have deflected better and just not brought it up. I should have just let it roll off the duck's back.
    21:11
    But I didn't, but I'm trying to get better at that. So let's go. Let's not be divisive. Let's move on we did number five here the mike trout superfractor auto one of one again are you getting it it's the rarity one of one means rarity there's only one on planet earth right so again rarity number four the gaudy bath rube bath rube bath rube rube bath no babe ruth there you go third tries a charm so the psa9 babe ruth gaudy this came up from gaudy i don't think they're they do throwbacks to gaudy still but i don't think they're actually around as a card company anymore uh like tops is kind of still around right sort of they got bought out but okay 1993 babe ruth gaudy uh only one exists in a psa9 this is the only one okay so 7.2 million dollars 1933 Babe Ruth. Number three on the list, 1914 Babe Ruth PSA 1. So this is pre-rookie card. It says it's his rookie card from his minor days with Baltimore. Only 10 copies are known to exist. And believe it or not, the PSA 1 looks to be the highest graded ever. A PSA 1. I mean, a PSA 1 means the cart is basically falling apart. It's in tatters. Okay. It looks worse than my underwear on December 24th when my wife hasn't got me any new underwear for a whole year and they're falling apart by the little snow Underwear and socks are the two things I actually spend a decent amount of money on because that important You don want your dogs to be barking and you don want your boys to be crowded You don want them to be crowded right You want to have space You want to be able to move around. All right, we've gone off topic. I'm trying to keep it PG. I've sworn zero times today, so I'm pretty happy with that. All right, let's keep her moving. Number two is the T206 is arguably the most famous sports car of all time, the Honus Wagner. I know you're thinking, Albert, you've been talking about Babe Ruth. Where are you going here? You're talking about all these great baseball players. You're talking about Babe Ruth. You're talking about Mike Trout. You're talking about LeBron James. You're talking about Mickey Mantle. You're talking about Luka Doncic. LeBron James. You're talking about the GOAT. But you're not talking about – I'm not going to say he's mediocre because he was a very, very good baseball player. But he didn't even play long enough to really be full legendary status. so why on earth is number two of the top 10 most expensive sports cards of all time why on earth would it be honus honus honus wagner so to those of you who don't know sports cards let me just go on can i go on a tiny orby rant just franchi fast forward like two minutes i'm sorry i'm gonna go off topic for a second so there's all sorts of stories of how this went but back then honus wagner was very very very anti-tobacco i don't know if he had friends or family members that died of cancer. I don't even know if they knew the two were related. Maybe just didn't like the yucky smell. And for any of you who have smelled like a – I was in Holland once, and I couldn't find any Siggy's. I was partying like a rock star there. So I bought a pack of freaking – what's that most American – Marlboro. I got the Marlboro Reds. Oh, my God. I end up looking at it. There's equivalent to like nine of my Du Maurier or like whatever cigarettes I smoked here, the Canadian Ultralights that I smoked. there's the equivalent of like nine ciggies in one of these Marlboro I was like I just be like filling your whole mouth up like oh like you'd have to have nine Canadian cigarettes equal one Marlboro red so that was disgusting I was smoking like a puff and putting it out and then it just tastes gross by the end but anyways don't smoke ciggies where we're going with this but the reason why a guy like Honus Wagner his card got so famous and so popular wasn't because he was better than Babe Ruth. It's not because he's better than Mickey Mantle. It's not even because he's arguably better than Shohei Otani or Mike Trout or even LeBron. He's definitely not the LeBron James or Michael Jordan of basketball. The reason why this Honus Wagner card is so expensive is because he immediately contacted them and told them immediately he does not want any more printed. So they only printed a couple dozen or they don't really know how many exactly, but not many got out of the factory and even less of them are in people's hands here now still today being graded or anything like that right so if we take a look at this why is it so expensive well the honus wagner t206 is known as the mona lisa of cards only 50 to 60 have known exists i was pretty close there uh wagner allegedly refused inclusion in tobacco cards making them extra ultra rare As well, it's been reverbed, sorry, reverbed, not reverbed. It's been reverbed over generations and generations. Come on up here, buddy. You can come up here.
    26:06
    Oh, Draco just came in from a nice walk. Come here, bud. Oh, look. Drop target Danielle brought me a treat. There you go. Tuna, come over here at this one.
    26:16
    Oh, there he is. Look at this guy. You never see him with short hair, but we had so many ticks this year, we actually got him cut short. And also for the summer, just for the heat. So he is a English Sheepadoodle. Pretty cool, huh? Anyways, there's my boy Franchi, named after my favorite pinball personality. He used to be on a show called Saps. I don't want to say my favorite pinball artist because I don't want to upset Zombie Yeti or Kevin O'Connor or all those awesome artwork. Like the Dune artwork, the Dune artwork is growing on me. I used to use this term in pinball as a joke. Oh, it's growing on me. It's growing on me. Like it was like a freaking, you know, like it was like, I don't know, mold growing on cheese or something like that. Or if we had to be kinder, if it was like lactobacillus or some type of pediococcus or some type of like souring agent other than a yeast on a beer. Like, wow, sometimes things grow on you and they get better. and sometimes they get old and moldy is the cheese old and moldy or am i old and moldy a little bit of both a little bit of both uh it's so weird seeing myself while i talk because normally i never do that but i did notice during covid oh sorry i said the c word guys over here the gray in my beard like started coming in right here and then finally just this year it's like mitigating across the bottom so because i don't mind having gray in my beard i don't even mind that i have a decent amount of gray hair what i don't like is when it's uneven and you just got a blotch here i'm like yo can we just we just fill the whole bottom with gray if we're gonna go gray just give me the gray trough you know men past like 45 have at least the gray trough just hook me up with the gray trough i don't like it to be uneven i don't like artwork to be uneven like that jarring artwork with and the funny thing is after i use the term jarring dennis on the eclectic gamers pinball podcast use the exact same term i think he was more so referring to the white space between the red, but when you have two pinball podcasters both agreeing and using such a rare term like jarring, I think we'd all have to agree, it's stunning and yet jarring at the same time. Can it be both? I think so. Look at me. Oh, I went the wrong way because of the camera. Okay. Wow. Probably should have combed my hair before we started, but that's okay. I got a little Conan hair going on where it jiggles up there. All right. Number one on the list. That's right. here we go the top card is the 1952 mickey manil sgc 9.5 and sgc grades a lot harder than psa so arguably an sgc 9.5 is better although maybe not worth more than a psa 10 but sometimes some would say harder to get so it's not quite a 10 but wow i'd love to see that card crossed over because if that card went over to psa and it got a 10 i don't think it would but it could if it somehow did it would go up to uh it would go up from the 12.6 million dollars it sold at kind of at the height of covid so that's probably partially the reason why i don't think if it's sold right now i'd get 12.6 million this 1952 tops mickey mantel card 311 we talked about this card before but we talked about it in a much lower grade to get it in a 9.5 is just incredible and I think we can all agree what makes it incredible is just how rare it is and how rad it is. So computer closed, laptop closed.
    29:39
    The thing that we can all learn as pinball nerds is that what makes something collectible is partially the rarity and how great it is. Will Galactic Tank Force ever be worth more than the Harry Potter CE? Probably not. even though Galactic Tank Force, again, Franchi, awesome artwork. And, you know, because of many other factors, it's not thought of as an awesome machine. Harry Potter's already got a much better status, and Harry Potter's only going to go up from here as the artwork gets better. So my suggestion is, and I did ask Chat, Chat disagrees with me, I think it will be around the year 2029. I think it will take three to four years. Chat said by the year 2027, just two years from now, arguably a year and a half from now, Now we're almost at, well, yeah, we're in the seventh month of the year, July, right? My birthday month is a couple of weeks away. So if I would say right now, all the people that are trying to switch out their machines, I would say if it's going to bug you and you have a personal vendetta against AI, do it. But just know you could be turning. And if you're only going to keep it for a year or two, for the next year or two, I could see the non-AI art reselling for more money. But I think come the year 2027, or maybe chat's more correct, the year 2029, the more rare something is if it's also great. So just like when we were looking there at Honus Wagner, he wasn't the best. All of those other players are arguably higher up in their ratings or the rankings of how good they are in their sport. But he was good enough, and it's super-duper-duper rare, and it has a cool story beside it. The Jersey Jack thing with all the AI and being the first pinball machine with proven AI in it and so on and such forth, just with all the coverage it's got it's going to be a neat interesting story you and i listening to this or watching this and talking about this will know about this new people are going to come into pinball next year and the year after and the year after and just like how new people came into pinball two or three years ago and they were shocked by how you know they lost money for the first time on say a new pinball and box price or something like that and and many of us who had been in the game for a while weren't we could kind of see this coming the forest through the trees if you will the same way it's a little bit shorthanded or short-sighted to assume that if you just because you have derpy dragon okay it's so fun doing that that face but just because you have derpy dragon does it mean that it's less valuable and i would say yes right now it's less valuable but if you can just hold on get some diamond hands and hold on to that sucker for a couple years it's going to skyrocket i truly believe at the very least again chat and i disagreed i think it will be worth more than a supreme pinball machine which arguably sell for between 20 to 40 depending on where they got it how they got it that sort of thing if someone right now had a new inbox supreme it would be worth more than any other pinball machine on planet earth if 15 to 20 years from now someone has a new inbox documented derpy dragon it's got to be guaranteed to have the ai inside it and it's never been opened and it can be proven it's never been opened that will be the most expensive pinball machine of all time unless someone comes out with like who knows maybe tilt amusements i've seen you know the roof of the uh you know i've seen the roof of the barn they're out at tilt amusements and they've trent's taken us for the walk around and i've seen this like the number one this the number one that's like he's got so many different sterns new in box still from back in the day which i assume they still exist so someone probably does have a new in box supreme i don't know who that is or where it is, that might always be worth more. But right now, if I had to use my crystal ball, I would guess that even just five to 10 years from now, the most expensive pinball machine, and I don't have to make money off pinball. I absolutely love just talking about pinball. Mostly I love playing pinball.
    33:30
    I like doing these shows for you guys. I like the interactions. And when I took a couple weeks off, one of the things I missed the most was, usually within 72 hours of doing a pinball show, I get messages from three to five people just saying what they liked, sometimes what they didn't like. Sorry if you can hear my dryer finishing there and that sound going off. But you know what? With my non-directional mic, you might not hear it as much. It's just distracting me and my ADHD. It's not distracting you. But I truly believe that if you're someone who really wants to make money, if you want, I don't think you should use pinball as an investment. It makes the water murky when you try to make money from your side huss. It really does as soon as you become like a mod maker or as soon as you become like you know where you like working with the company it kind of starts to feel more like a job And this show from time to time will start to feel like a job and I take a couple of weeks off And I make so little money from it. It's not really like a I don't I don't have a Patreon. I don't sell any T-shirts. I probably should. They look nicer than this one. Come on. I do want to do a Patreon possibly perhaps in the future, but I'm just I'm just kind of figuring out the whole process again and getting back into it. What I want to tell you is that if you're someone who really wants to make money or at least save money, I would highly recommend if you have the space, if you have to rent, like if you live in downtown New York City or L.A. or something and you have to rent a storage unit to do this, you will absolutely probably lose money on this and I wouldn't recommend it. but if you have the space if you live out in the country or even live in the burbs and you have space for just one pinball machine as an experiment to see if you can make money i would honestly reach out and try to get the best priced new in box derpy dragon and let it sit there in the corner and let it cook because i truly believe at the year again chat disagreed with me more of a professional than me arguably but you want to choose ai you want to choose albert ai albert ai You choose.
    35:22
    I think it will be worth easily 75K. 75K by 2040. I think it will be easily worth 30K by 2035. I think by 2030, you're looking at easily a 20-ish. I think it's gone up 25%. So you're talking 5% to 7% minimum per year that it's going to get, that it just sits there new in box. Used prices might actually be closer to what I'm saying, to be honest. 2040 if you had it new in box I wouldn't be shocked if it'd be 150k that's on the high end it depends how many people listen to me if only one person listens to me and holds it till 2040 like if you're listening to this right now and you're anywhere within your you don't have to be a male it doesn't have to be a male in your 40s but male female anyone you actually don't use a credit card to do this don't use your home equity line of credit or a second mortgage because even that four to six percent you'd be paying it'd be very hard to break even on it but if you have money just sitting in the bank that you're not going to put into stocks especially i think this would be more fun i personally if my wife and i sold our farm or sold the house i would go out and honestly consider purchasing three to five of these because i think you could sell one in 2035 you just have diamond hands and hold on probably get five times your money what other project what other product like you would have to buy a house or you'd have to take a lot of risk with a car you'd have to take a lot of risk with putting in like to get that type of return you have to put almost 100k into stocks to get that type of return in that type of year is almost guaranteed and i really think and again i am not a financial investor so please asterisk hashtag not not a financial investor uh or sorry not a financial services advisor anymore i used to work for one of the top three banks in canada but i don't do that anymore what i'm just saying is that if i had like 250k saved up for retirement and like 200k that's in in in like fairly like medium risk stocks to low risk stocks so I could edge out three to five percent per year I would take a small clump of that talk to your partner talk to or if you live on your own cool do your own thing but I would buy two or three new in box derpies before the 100 are gone if you could afford five of those if you're a distro I would buy five of the derpy dragons and I wouldn't let anyone buy them I would say I'm sorry unless you need money for your family like for food tomorrow like you know what I mean like the the mortgages bill is coming up and you know you're going to get the property taxes are due or something and you're going to lose your house, I would honestly like, I would just sit on them because they are going to go through the roof. Now, maybe, maybe, maybe, hashtag don't want to be divisive, when it's possible when Zach Menny was saying, oh no, they won't go up in value. Oh no, they won't be worth more. If I were him, I would be saying the exact same thing because I would want the maximum number of people to contact me and be like, oh can i please trade in my ai1 for a non-ai1 sure yeah no problem and i would just hoard them i really really really would and i know a lot of distros won't want to do that they'd rather move product when they can but for me personally the gentleman that i'm going to talk about on an upcoming show who i have very very very um there's a very good chance he owns the most even more than Trent Augustine, Zach Menny, and Mad Pinball combined, okay? More than Nitro had in the 90s, all right? This is more than like Palladium.
    38:40
    This is more than – what's that family-run entertainment center in the States with the two names? Not Bob and Doug. That would be a Canadian one. But more than any large family-run entertainment center could even dream of doing – Oh, my God, guys, I have to end it because my battery is getting low. So here's what I will say.
    39:03
    This is the first time in 629 shows I've ever said, if you can afford it, I think you would make money on this. This is a unicorn event. This is a once in a lifetime. I honestly, honestly, I'm not, I don't own one. If I owned one, I was saying this to try to make money. I could understand you guys saying, okay, maybe I'm not telling the truth. Hold on. I've got to plug this in. Oh, boy. I forgot about keeping it charged. Charles in charge wait this is that's not how that song goes this is supposed to be the one show I don't sing guys and then of course now that I have a chord string across here Draco Franchi is going to want to run here and knock down my everything I have set up on my tower here but let's just end the show by saying this if and only if you can you have extra moolah sitting around this would be the one time I would take the chance could I be completely wrong and could Derpy Dragon go to zero dollars and zero cents and no one wants it sure but i'm probably not i think arguably everybody would agree that the x and y axis of which one is worth more money non-derpy or derpy will change as we get more of them out there once we get to a thousand arcade editions that are non-derpy and then we have a hundred that are derpy it's a ten to one probably people still yeah they'll sell for around the same once you get to ten thousand made or god forbid they get to fifteen or even 20,000 made, that means that these play fields are a 1 in 100 to a 1 in 150 to a 1 in 200. That means 0.5% of them are this uniqueness that is a big pinball conversation about AI. And I think without a doubt, it will by the year 2030 be much, much, much more expensive than the other version. So again, if you're only going to keep it for a year or two, yeah, I would probably strongly consider just grabbing the other AI one because the Derpy dragon, although I think will be worth more eventually, might be harder to sell for now. And when I was thinking about that, I was trying to think of like a good comparison to explain that. Well, the solar, right above me, the solar power that we have on our house. Houses with solar power take longer to sell, but houses with solar power sell for more money, especially if those, you know, especially if they're still relevant. If your solar panels are like 30 years old and they're only producing at like 20%, they're almost more maintenance than they are, you know, giving back power no but like for the first 15 to 20 years that you own a house like our solar power system is worth around 40k we had a good chunk of that subsidized thank you nova scotia government we didn't do it because we're tree loving hippies we did it and we didn't do it just because i'm half dutch and i want to save money we did it all of the above we want to have uh we want to provide back into the grid yes it gives us that warm feeling of oh yeah you're helping out sure cool nice but we did it i'll say primarily because in the winter being here in Canada. Our costs are being so far north. I mean, David Dennis is probably the only pinball content greater further north than me, at least in Canada. And shout out to David Dennis, by the way. Go listen to the most recent Silver Ball Chronicles with him and Ron. It was incredible.
    42:04
    I've gone to 42 minutes. I've gone too long. This is all to say, if ever one time once you were going to purchase a new in-box pinball machine and expect to make money, because you usually shouldn't no other there's very very very very few other toys or collectibles on planet earth that aren't limited edition that aren't limited to 50 or limited to 100 or limited to like you saw with the sports cards one of one there's very very very few collectibles on planet earth that are guaranteed almost to go up in value once you buy them and pinball machines were that for two years, just for two years, as were cars, as were houses, as were almost anything you could put money into went through the roof. Hell, toilet paper went through the roof. But it doesn't mean toilet paper is a collectible and it doesn't mean you're always going to make money on toilet paper. In fact, you probably lose money on it as it gets brown. You know what I mean? All right. Here's the thing. If you want to make money from time to time or prevent losing the most amount of money, simply play a pin before you pay. Play before you pay. I'm going to get a play before you pay sign and put it up there on my derpy alligator. But no, play before you pay. This is the way. This isn't just a Mandalorian saying. Obviously, this is a pinball saying. And if you play it before you pay, a few things will happen. You have the opportunity to make sure you want it before you buy it. But most importantly, arguably, you'll see if the prices are going up or down or stabilizing and you'll choose if you'd prefer to buy it. I mean, if the prices are fairly stable between new and used, you might just buy new. If it's only 500 to a thousand bucks, it's losing. But if it's losing thousands of dollars six months later, seven months later, by the time you've got to get in quite a few games, I don't mean go and play one or two games. I mean, I would play at least 10 to 15. Some games I've played 20 times and I was like, I don't know. And right around the 25th or 30th game, you're like, okay, you're figuring out the shots. Okay, you're understanding the rules. Okay, you know how to start a multi-ball. And for a guy like me with a really bad memory, it does take those extra few games. There might be some people who play five to ten games and they know for sure, like, wow, I love this, or wow, this isn't for me. But I would encourage all of you to play before you pay.
    44:14
    And over and above that, really make sure you can afford it in your budget, understanding the fact that there's a good chance when you go to sell it, especially if it's new in box, it might lose a little bit of money. we no one wants to buy and sell a pinball machine that's going to lose like three four or five grand but if we buy a ce and we lose a thousand that's fine especially if you own it for a whole year and got five six seven hundred games on it hell i know my guardians of the galaxy we got 600 games in the first summer we owned it like the first two months we owned it we got like 600 games so like you know that's that's a lot that's a lot that's with me restarting if i didn't get to 100 million on ball one i restarted on galaxy that's just what i like to do but anyways this has been a blast this has been fun uh it's a lot of work having to set up this and having to worry about this and so i apologize to anyone listening if it was slightly annoying i'm going to try to make sure i always keep the listeners who are listening directly through the poor men's pinball podcast uh remembering uh you know thinking about you guys making sure it sounds good and the quality is great thank you again to the awesome person who got me this sure mv6 and until next time pimple nerds remember to eat sleep and breathe jersey jacks uh derpy dragon playfield i think but wait now i have to stop here and then i have to get over to the other one guys this is so much harder