Keep in mind, the idea of collecting is not only about having the biggest, baddest cards you can get!!
For me, it is about putting sets together, to be proud of them.
Yes, I am a player collector - Blair - but I will (and have on many occasions) turned away from buying a Blair so I can buy a card for one of my sets instead.
If you collect a player, you will probably never own every card of that person. Look at Jared, probably THE BEST single player PC I have ever seen, but even with him, he has to say "collecting everything except 1/1". Obviously that is justified because of the rarity, but at the end of the day, you probably won't ever feel like you have completed anything.
I have recently purchased the last 3D star insert from 09/10 Upper Deck, which is the first full set I started chasing. The card is incoming and once it is here, I will be ecstatic because I have waited over 2.5 years to finish that set and have now completed it!!!
I don't think I have ever been that excited about a Blair I have pick up!
Long ramble, I know... but my point is that there are other ways to have fun in this hobby. Ways in which it doesn't matter to you when people want to over price or try to rip people off.