Every trading card collector’s dream comes true right here in Hamilton County
By STU CLAMPITT
news@readthereporter.com
On Thursday night, NBA hall of famer Tim Duncan made Nick Birk $110,000 richer.
Twenty-five years ago, at eight years old, Nick Birk opened a random pack of basketball trading cards and found a Tim Duncan card printed on foil. It was an odd-looking thing and was labeled as a limited run numbered one of one.
Nick’s father, Mike Birk, told The Reporter that Nick put it in a plastic case because it was so strange and looked like it might be too easy to damage.
The card stayed in that case for decades. It got moved from house to house a few times. There were a few moments in Duncan’s career when Nick and his dad thought maybe they should figure out how much it was worth.
No one could tell them if it was worth anything.
“We had tried to sell it,” Mike told The Reporter. “The Spurs won five NBA championships. Then Tim Duncan retired. Then Tim Duncan went into the Hall of Fame. At each one of those times, Nick and I are talking, I’m saying, ‘Nick, if we’re going to sell this thing, we need to find out what it’s worth.’ And we could never find the value.”
The Birks put the card on eBay on three separate occasions looking for a minimum bid of $600.
“We couldn’t get a nibble,” Mike said. “So, we’re thinking this thing is a gimmick.”
Nick’s older brother, Chris, took the card to a little shop called Indy Card Exchange, 7035 E. 96th St., Suite P, Indianapolis, and showed it to the owner, Andy Albert.
And this is where things got interesting.
“This shop owner knows what the heck it is, and he’s just excited to see it,” Mike said. “And he’s not excited for himself. He’s excited for this story of an eight-year-old kid owning a card for 25 years. He’s excited for us to know that, hey, we’re going to make this kid some money.”
And that kid did indeed just make some money. When the auction ended near midnight Thursday evening, the winning bid netted Nick $110,000.
Sometimes you just have to gather in the living room and watch your fortune unfold on an internet connected TV. (Photo provided)
Andy Albert has been buying, selling, and trading cards since he was 10 years old. He bought Indy Card Exchange from the previous owner 12 years ago, after being one of the original owner’s best customers for a long time.
Albert says he’s seen things like this happen on very rare occasions, but never with a story as good as this one.
“It’s such a unicorn!” Albert told The Reporter. “To find a card like this and to see what the return value is now – compared to what it would have been – has happened maybe three times in my lifetime. But this one – the backstory is even more special.”
The idea that an eight-year-old kid had the foresight to put the card in plastic and it then survived 25 years, finally to be graded at 7 out of 10 on the Professional Sports Authenticator (PSA) scale is what impresses Albert the most.
“It literally blows me away every time I think about it,” Albert said. “It’s one of the most iconic stories in the trading card industry. It’s similar to somebody who’s 85 years old who found their Mickey Mantle Tops rookie from 1952 and it’s in mint condition. For something from the 90s to be worth this much and be sitting in Nick’s box and sitting on a shelf and kicked around in a big screw-down case for the last 25 years to be discovered as Tim Duncan’s Holy Grail card just, it’s – I don’t know. I don’t even know how to describe it. Words don’t describe it. It’s unfounded, honestly.”
Mike Birk told The Reporter the story of the card is great, but the thing that he is most amazed by is how Albert handled the situation.
“Knowing that we had tried to sell it three different times for $600, this guy could have looked at us and said, ‘Hey, you know, you’ve got a great card here, it’s probably worth some money. I need to get it graded and authenticated and put it on an auction. I don’t know what I’m going to get out of it. But hey, kid, here’s five grand,’” Mike said. “And we’d have been happy. He didn’t do that.”
Albert told the Birks he needed to get the card authenticated and graded. Then it would need to be entered into an auction. He did all that at his own expense, telling Nick Birk that he could pay Albert back at the end of the process after the check came in from the auction.
“This guy got excited for us, and he was excited to be part of our story,” Mike said. “He took the right steps to get the card where it needed to be to get graded and put it in the right auction. He paid to put it in the auction. I just want him to get a few props. And to me, that’s the bigger story.”
Albert told The Reporter it’s about more than cards and money to him.
“I’ve got a strong faith and I’ve got a business that I’ve built on integrity,” Albert said. “It’s built on integrity and trust, which is tough in this industry because a lot of it is just straight about money. ‘How much more can I make?’ But God’s blessed us beyond what we could possibly imagine these last 12 years, and I would never want to do it any other way. And I was so, so happy to see them [the Birk family] be able to come out on top like that.”
The night of the auction was rife with excitement and doubts and hopes and more for the Birk family as they watched the clock tick down. The auction was set up with time extensions if bids came in during the last few minutes, and with bid increment changes as the price went up and the clock counted down.
This 1998 Tim Duncan card grew up to be a $110,000 windfall for Nick Birk earlier this week. (Photos provided)
“Again, this is a phenomenal once-in-a-lifetime experience that you just never think you’re going to be part of,” Mike said. “And it happened because my older son first took the card in for his younger brother and found the right guy to make it happen for us.”
If you have any collectible cards you like to sell, trade, or just find out if they might be worth somewhere between $1 and $100,000, stop by Indy Card Exchange, 7035 E. 96th St., Suite P, Indianapolis, and ask for Andy Albert. The shop is open 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesday through Friday and from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. on weekends.
You can also visit the shop online at IndyCardExchange.com.
Who knows? Maybe you have the next unicorn sitting in a box in your own closet.