Smart Man: The 11 Year Old Who Found The $1 Million Paul Skenes 1/1 Rookie Card Has Rejected The Pirates Offer Of 30 Years Of Season Tickets Behind Home Plate And Is Instead Taking It To Auction
Rob Tringali. Getty Images.Three days have gone by since a lucky 11 year old from Los Angeles stumbled upon the elusive and very valuable 1/1 Paul Skenes Rookie Debut Patch Autograph card. Card collectors all over the globe had been searching every pack they could get their hands on, only for this kid to find in something called a Hobby Box set which I imagine is a box with a bunch of card packs inside. It cost the family $320 for the set which they gave to the kid on Christmas. He journaled about the whole thing here.
The Pirates offer still stood, making this the longest they've pursued a free agent in decades. The deal was headlined by 30 years of season tickets behind home plate along with some other minor fun stuff like meeting Paul Skenes himself. Big problem with that? This kid lives in LA and has no ties to Pittsburgh in anyway. While the offer is definitely awesome, what good is it to him? Dodgers season tickets sure, but Pirates? How would that make sense?
Let's play this out real quick. The kid takes the deal and relocates his entire family to Pittsburgh as he dedicates his life to the Pirates. The team, having just given away hundreds of thousands of dollars in ticket money, absolutely never spends in free agency ever again and promptly trades Skenes in four years when it becomes a certainty he's not signing back with them. Three times in the thirty years they make the playoffs as a surprise wild card team, only to never advance to the NLDS. His life becomes miserable as he clings to these seats, wondering every day why he passed on the auction and life-changing money. Eventually Bob Nutting relocates the team and leaves this kid in the dust. He gets to meet Livvy Dunne, but all that comes of it is a signed picture (actually sick). In short, by taking the deal he ruins his life and immediately signs up for depression.
So after some similar thought, the kid and his parents officially passed on their deal.
Turns out after further examination of the card, it's been given a mint 10 grade, assuring it's of the highest condition and quality. Experts believe this could fetch $1 million at auction. Jack-fucking-pot.
The wheels to make a decision on where to turn with the card accelerated Thursday when PSA (Professional Sports Authenticator) announced via social media that the Skenes card received gem mint 10 grades on the quality of the card and the quality of the autograph. Even before grading, the value for the card could be estimated as a high six-figure item. With the gem mint grade, there’s an expectation the card could be sold for up to $1 million. The current record sale for a Skenes card is $123,220, which his 2023 Bowman Chrome Draft Prospects Autographs Superfractor (another 1/1 card) fetched in September. With a Debut Patch element, which Skenes wore on his jersey when he made his first start for the Pirates, it’s hard to compare the value of any other card to this one, though.
The card will be auctioned offer by Fanatics Collect and the proceeds from that will be donated to the LA fire relief funds. So the kid gets his fortune and potentially a couple hundred k will be going to a good cause for people in need. I know it was tough to turn down a game experience with Livvy Dunne, but sometimes God gives the toughest battles to his bravest soldiers. Well done kid.