Posted 9:26 AM by Gene

Remember when people battered down convenience stores to buy BASEBALL CARDS hoping their two-cent pieces of posterboard would someday be worth 500 UMPTEEN MEGAZILLION KATRILLION DOLLARS? Well, not long after SELIGISM sputtered its way to GREATNESS. NOW:

Sports card company Upper Deck has won an auction to take over rival Fleer's name and its toy car business.

The Upper Deck Co., a privately-held company based in Carlsbad, Calif., bid $6.1 million for the intellectual property and die-cast toy business of debt-ridden Fleer, according to the Web site of Warren J. Martin Jr., a lawyer overseeing Thursday's auction.

Saddled with nearly $40 million in debt, Fleer went out of business in May. Lawyers for the Mount Laurel-based company said that the rising costs associated with putting sports memorabilia into packs of cards, coupled with dwindling interest in the hobby, led to the company's demise.

I guess greed isn't what it used to be. That or the collectors have graduated to HOUSES.

A NICE PUNCHLINE:

Fleer's remaining memorabilia — items ranging from a uniform from Japanese home run king Sadaharu Oh to a box of baseballs signed by retired pitcher Sparky Lyle to pingpong balls used in an NBA draft lottery — is to be auctioned later.

The proceeds from that auction and the one held Thursday will go to a list of creditors that includes dozens of professional athletes.

HARDY-HAR-HAR!