1992 Donruss Diamond King
Retail Super (Test Issue)
Like many cards on my 'Ten Toughest List' - you won't find too many dealers who know much about these oversized cards. The few that do will tell you that this is a very difficult issue to get ahold of.
In my experience I've only seen two auctions in the past 10 years for this supersized card. [Originally written in 2003] One on eBay and the other sold through an independent auction house (Ron Oser Auctions).
How difficult (rare) is it? Well, that's a tricky question. On one hand I can look to my own experiences and tell you that it's near impossible to get one. On the other hand Beckett, via their Almanac No. 6 (2001 issue), has suggested that there have been several auctions for these cards. But I can't verify those sales and I track of a good many auctions. Among them: eBay, Yahoo!, Sotheby's, Lelands, Rothman, Al Rosen's Mr. Mint Monthly SCD Auction, Sportscards Plus, Butterfield & Butterfield, MastroNet, Christie's and several others. But I don't keep track of every single auction 24hrs a day, 7 days a week - so it's possible that they were sold via that route. It's also possible that Beckett is following private sales between well-established collectors/dealers. I can only say that I can't verify those sales noted by Beckett.
Strangely, the following year, Beckett's Almanac No. 7 (2002 issue), changed the listing so that the prices for the Supers are no longer even shown. I wonder why? And just as bizarre, the Beckett Almanac, No. 8 (2003) and No. 9 (2004) continued to bury this ultra rare issue inside a brief blurb about the regular 1992 Diamond Kings, not even offering a multiplier. Just what's going on here? Beckett Conspiracy Theory? Update: Almanac No. 10 (2006) finally brought back the listing multiplier. Apparently this ultra-rare issue took a three-year journey into Beckett's Land Of Limbo and only recently returned to reality. I guess this is Beckett's version of Tom Hanks' "Cast Away".
As a counterpoint - The Krause Standard Catalog Of Baseball Cards values the Thomas at $350. With the most expensive of the series being the Ripken at $650.
Not sure what to make of the discrepancy. But regardless, these oversized cards are very tough to get.
A bit about the history of this unusual issue...
Back in '92 Donruss had hoped to package their card overruns into retail sales products. You have to remember that one of the most troublesome obstacles in printing cards is overproduction. Not in regards to their collectibility, but in the costs associated with storage. If you print x-amount of product and only a percentage of that sells - you're stuck with storing the rest. Trust me, companies do not want to deal with storage fees, handling, and maintenance. That's why card companies work hard to produce only enough product to fill their orders. But back in the heyday of card production the big five companies often ran the presses based solely on speculated sales - often leaving them with a lot of product just sitting around.
Donruss wasn't about to spend more money to store their excess overruns. So, like other manufacturers, they did their best to move their products thru other venues. In this case Donruss wanted to re-package their extra 1992 cards into blister and rack packs for retail sales.
Now as I understand it, Donruss was asked by several large supermarket lines - Target, Wal-Mart, etc (this was prior to them being called big box retailers) - that in order for their chain of stores to carry Donruss products they (the retailers) would have to be offered something unique. It's now a common practice, but at the time this was a fairly new demand. The retailers knew that card collectors would not go into their stores just to purchase trading cards, not unless there was something that could only be found via retail packs and boxes. To this very day you'll notice that card manufacturers produce two kinds of inserts: Hobby-Only and Retail-Only. That's due to that particular demand by retailers. And in order to satisfy that demand - Donruss printed up these super-sized versions of their 1992 Diamond King line.
They're pretty
much no different from the pack inserted versions (the artwork and foiling are
the same). Except for two notable differences:
• It's a very large 4-7/8"W x 6-3/4"H.
• The back border of the Super is light blue (see above), the back borders
of the regular cards are dark blue. However, I would think the size alone would
tell you which version you have. <g>
My understanding is that as few as 10 complete sets were printed and handed out to their sales staff for presentation to prospective clients (the retailers). But, for reasons I still haven't uncovered, the deal fell through. Leaving only the sample product for collectors to collect.
†You'll notice that my copy is heavily pot-marked. It was stored in a salesman's binder for several years, and when removed, specific points of ink were stuck on the plastic sheet. Sad huh? <sigh> I'm constantly on the lookout for a nicer replacement.