The 1993 Leaf Baseball card set marked the return of one of the iconic card brands of the 1980s and early 1990s. While the set itself was fairly standard for the era featuring current players and limited retro cards, a small number of cards from the base set have gone on to become extremely valuable modern chase cards coveted by collectors. Let’s take a deeper look at some of the most expensive and desirable 1993 Leaf Baseball cards.
Perhaps the most legendary chase card from the 1993 Leaf Baseball set is the Alex Rodriguez rookie card. In 1993, A-Rod was still in the minors playing for the Mariners’s Single-A affiliate but was considered one of the top prospects in baseball. His rookie card appearance in the Leaf set was one of the first widely available versions of his rookie. While Rodriguez would go on to have a Hall of Fame career and cement himself as one of the greatest players of all time, in 1993 he was still an unknown prospect.
Due to the limited print run of the 1993 Leaf Baseball set and the relatively low initial hype around A-Rod, many of his rookie cards ended up in penny sleeves and long boxes instead of toploaders and magnetic holders. As Rodriguez’s stardom grew throughout the 1990s and 2000s, collectors started scrambling to obtain his rookie. Today, a PSA 10 graded Alex Rodriguez 1993 Leaf rookie card regularly sells for $100,000-$150,000 at major card shows and auctions. Even well-centered PSA 9 examples command $30,000-$50,000 due to the rarity of high-grade A-Rod’s on the market.
While the A-Rod rookie gets most of the headlines, another 1993 Leaf card that has exploded in value is the Ken Griffey Jr. Most of Griffey’s early rookie cards from 1989 Fleer and Upper Deck are considered the true rookie cards. However, 1993 was one of Griffey’s early superstar seasons where he won the first of his consecutive AL MVP awards and Baseball released some of his best and most iconic cards in sets such as Finest and Topps.
Griffey’s 1993 Leaf card featured him smiling in a Mariners uniform and became a highly sought after chase card very early on due to Griffey Mania of the 1990s. Even back in the 1990s, pristine PSA 10 copies would sell for $500-1000. Today, that same PSA 10 Griffey ’93 Leaf is worth a staggering $50,000-$80,000 to prestigious collectors. PSA 9s in great condition still fetch $20,000-$30,000. While not technically a rookie card, Griffey’s ’93 Leaf has stood the test of time as one of his most popular and valuable vintage issue cards.
In addition to A-Rod and Griffey, the 1993 Donruss Elite Series parallel insert set found within 1993 Leaf factory sets and cases also contain some extremely high-priced short prints. The most well-known is the Kirby Puckett parallel insert short print numbered to only 125 copies. Puckett was already a six-time All-Star and four-time Gold Glove winner by 1993 but remained a hugely popular collector favorite throughout the late 80s and 90s.
Mint raw examples of the ultra-rare Puckett ’93 Donruss Elite parallel have sold for over $15,000 in recent years. A true PSA 10 gem mint could potentially sell for $30,000-$50,000 if one ever surfaces, underlining how incredibly scarce high-grade versions are. The other major short prints from the Donruss Elite parallel insert set like the Cal Ripken Jr. (237 copies) and Nolan Ryan (150 copies) numbered parallels also commonly sell for $3,000-$6,000 each in top-graded PSA/BGS slabs due to their extreme rarity within the 1993 Leaf set.
A couple other 1993 Leaf cards that have achieved significant value due to player achievement as well as print run scarcity are the Derek Jeter rookie and the Frank Thomas rookie. Jeter’s legend and career 5 World Series rings with the Yankees have made any of his early 1990s Upper Deck, Stadium Club, and Score rookie issues highly sought after trophies today worth $10,000-$30,000 in PSA 10.
His 1993 Leaf rookie falls into a similar category of non-traditional yet highly valuable Jeter rookies due to the player and the set’s scarcity. In gem condition, PSA 10 Jeter ’93 Leaf rookies could bring $15,000-$25,000 today and even strong PSA 9s sell for $7,500-$12,000 showing the rising demand from Jeter collectors. Meanwhile, Frank Thomas was well on his way to becoming one of the game’s most feared hitters by 1993 after winning the 1990 AL ROY award. PSA 10 examples of his 1993 Leaf RC have sold for $5,000-$8,000 price tags.
While not one of the flashiest or most print run scarce sets of the early 1990s, the 1993 Leaf Baseball release contains some true blue chip treasures for wealthy vintage collectors today. Cards like the Alex Rodriguez, Ken Griffey Jr, rare Donruss Elite parallels, and star rookies of Jeter and Thomas have all achieved astronomical values worthy of anchor status in the strongest collections. For patient collectors who can stomach the high prices, hunting a pristine graded gem of one of these 1993 Leaf big boys remains a worthy modern collecting quest and potential investment.
