Should you buy Reid Detmers rookie cards following no-hitter?

Los Angeles Angels rookie starter Reid Detmers become entrenched in baseball lore on Tuesday night by throwing a no-hitter in a 12-0 win over the Tampa Bay Rays. Detmers did it in 108 pitches and only struck out two batters, most of the outs coming on balls in play. He finished with just one walk in the complete game. Now that Detmers is on the radar for AL Rookie of the Year at 20/1, does that mean we should be investing in his cards? Let’s take a look at some recent sales and what you should do with his cards.

Reid Detmers rookie cards: Buy or Sell?

Detmers was a first-round prospect from back in 2020, so he’s got a high pedigree coming out of Louisville. Detmers struggled in a small sample size in 2021 and isn’t an overpowering pitcher. He isn’t going to be flashy and rack up the strikeout numbers. That’s a bit unorthodox of pitchers nowadays, most having overpowering stuff rather than being crafty. Detmers has your usual four-pitch stable, mostly using a 4-seam fastball. If he isn’t missing bats, should that be a concern? Sort of. You’d like to see him getting more strikeouts. It’s hard to envision Detmers becoming an ace or winning awards in the future without that type of stuff.

Just looking at some recent sales on Donruss/Panini Detmers autograph cards, this feels like a sell-high scenario. Some of Detmers unlicensed autographs are going for around $40, which is a solid deal considering those cards probably were worth a quarter of that last year. Some more rare, certified stuff from Topps 2022 — the /199 refractor from Series 1 — was recently sold for $115, which is a great sale. The 2022 Topps Inception on-card auto /99 went for $130. This feels like the time to offload some Detmers rookie cards, maybe hold onto some stuff just in case he does end up being the Halos ace of the future.