Wow. You don't have to collect Beanie Babies to know how horrible that was. It's a collectible, and Marlon totally messed it up by yanking the tag off that Beanie Baby. I was never that big into Beanie Babies myself, but I did follow them in their heyday, and a big part of the dolls' value comes from the tag still being attached, and to that extent they even make special tag protectors that collectors can buy in order to prevent the tags from getting creased.
The show better make that collector whole again, but Game Girl makes a very valid point that collectors of other items may be reluctant to appear on future shows if their items are going to be treated so cavalierly. Even if the Beanie Baby collector is compensated with fair replacement value for it, what if this should happen to another collectible that's very rare, so rare that those who have them don't want to get rid of them? Or, not to mention, a one-of-a-kind collectible that, in addition to book value, has great sentimental value to the collector? Yeah, the simple answer would be "don't bring it on the show," but I'm sure the producers made all sorts of promises about how they'd take care of them, handle them carefully, keep them secure, etc., and since this was ABC, there'd be a trust factor as well. I'm sure the collector cringed when the host tossed the Beanie Baby to Marlon, even without the tag being removed.
I hope this story gets out among the collecting communities - not just Beanie Babies, but everything. Even if this was just a one time, isolated incident, that's still once too many.
