Contenders Basketball SP Tracker – 2/4/10 Update
There are roughly 20% more Contenders auctions in the basketball category than when I started this tracker yesterday.
I will continue to update the numbers as often as I get the chance. Again, its early to try and guess SPs but the one notable thing I saw since yesterday was a Tyreke Evans redemption selling for $200, simply incredible
| Player | Listed | Sold |
| Brandon Jennings |
5 | 2 |
| Tyreke Evans |
3 | 1 |
| James Harden |
0 | 3 |
| Blake Griffin |
4 | 2 |
| Jrue Holiday |
5 | 1 |
| Ty Lawson |
4 | 2 |
| Jonny Flynn |
2 | 4 |
| DeJuan Blair |
4 | 7 |
| Earl Clark |
2 | 1 |
| Stephen Curry |
5 | 3 |
If you are interested in checking my totals, or finding out what of each player is listed, you can simply click through on the player's name and see the total cards listed presently.
Although the results are very preliminary, it sure doesn't seem that DeJuan Blair is an SP. It also intrigues me that the 3rd pick, James Harden, doesn't have any autographs listed right now.
2009 Playoff Contenders Basketball on eBay – SP Tracker
2009 Playoff Contenders cards have hit eBay! On-card autos, NBA jerseys and possible SPs to be announced later all add to the excitement of this product. Contenders has been a huge hit in football since 1998, it remains to be seen how the basketball card collectors will react to it.
One of the most exciting parts of this release is trying to guess what players will be SP'd. Often, after SP information is released, huge price spikes happen. So lets try tracking 10 notable rookie autos. I will update this list as time goes on and educated guesses will be made on who, signed how much, of what. I will track the player and the amount of each autograph listed and sold:
| Player | Listed | Sold |
| Brandon Jennings |
4 | 0 |
| Tyreke Evans |
2 | 0 |
| James Harden |
2 | |
| Blake Griffin |
3 | |
| Jrue Holiday |
2 | |
| Ty Lawson |
2 | |
| Jonny Flynn |
4 | |
| DeJuan Blair |
5 | 1 |
| Earl Clark |
1 | |
| Stephen Curry |
3 | 1 |
If you are interested in checking my totals, or finding out what of each player is listed, you can simply click through on the player's name and see the total cards listed presently.
It is too early for prognostication upon what cards are short prints and which are not. The next few days should bring us a great deal more information as this product makes its way into the hands of more collectors.
A Pull for the Ages – Lebron/Kobe Exquisite Logoman
2008-09 Exquisite Lebron James - Kobe Bryant Dual Logoman 1/1 Auto
This card was pointed out to me this evening by a friend and its a beaut (more pictures in the link). Lets just say, if I ever pull a card like this, there will be a hole in my roof from where my head hit it when I jumped. Certainly a pull for the ages. With 3 days+ to go, the bidding has already reached $10,000. It likely won't stop there.
So lets speculate for a moment, lets say this card ends at $15K. What other basketball cards could you buy with $15k? Here are 6 possible alternatives for you, if you had the patience to wait as they showed up.
1. 2 1986-87 Fleer Michael Jordan PSA 10s or 3.5 1986-87 Fleer Michael Jordan BGS 9.5s
2. 6 1957-58 Topps Bill Russell BVG 7 RCs
3. 7.5 cases of 2009-10 UD Exquisite Basketball
4. 15 2008-09 Exquisite Derrick Rose Auto Patch /99 RCs
5. 43 1996-97 Topps Chrome Kobe Bryant BGS 9.5 RCs
6. 139 2003-04 Topps Chrome Lebron James BGS 9.5 RCs
To be honest, aside from the Exquisite cases I think I would take any of these over the Dual Logoman. The simple fact is there can be many more cards like that one produced.
What would you take? Something from the list above or something else?
Jason Heyward Sales – A Case Study
Decisions decisions. You want to "grab those prospects with both hands and make a stash," but that prospect has multiple 2009 releases, which should you buy? This is the situation for many 2009 Draft Picks - Mike Leake, Tyler Matzek
, Jiovanni Mier, Matt Hobgood, Tony Sanchez and the list goes on. What about a player like Robert Stock? Base Chrome, an Elite auto and a 2010 Chrome Auto to come?
Let history be your guide. Perhaps the hottest player in the MiLB right now is Jason Heyward. His cards have seen a nice spike this winter. Because I have a gmail account that houses every eBay email I've received since 2006, I have the luxury of looking back on what Heywards sold for upon their initial release. I busted 2007 Elite, BDP and Sterling. Here is a sampling of initial sales and sales dates:
2007 Bowman Chrome Draft 20 Ct Lot- $112.50 - 12/9/07
2007 Bowman Chrome Draft Xfractor /299 - $36 - 12/23/07
2007 Bowman Sterling Auto - $37.64 - 1/16/08
2007 Bowman Chrome Draft Refractor BGS 9.5 - $36 - 1/25/08
2007 Elite Extra TOTC Auto /169 - $56.55 - 2/21/08
2007 Bowman Sterling 9.5 Auto - $70 ea 6/8/08
2008 Bowman w/Chrome Auto 9.5- $60 - 8/8/08
..drumroll please, their sales prices today.
2007 Bowman Chrome Draft 20 Ct Lot- $155.86 - increase of 38.5%
2007 Bowman Chrome Draft Xfractor /299 - $38.89 - increase of 8.0%
2007 Bowman Sterling Auto - $62.51 - increase of 66.1%
2007 Bowman Chrome Draft Refractor BGS 9.5 - $48.63 - increase of 35.1%
2007 Elite Extra TOTC Auto /169 - $82.50 - increase of 45.9%
2007 Bowman Sterling 9.5 Auto- $98 - increase of 40.0%
2008 Bowman w/Chrome Auto 9.5- $109.99 - increase of 83.3%
3 Disclaimers:
1. My sales data is a small sample the prices are right when they came out and right now, as opposed to a more complete history. Heywards have dipped a little at times, so if you were opportunistic, your ROI might even be higher.
2. Items likely sell in a range of 10% above or 10% below any given price, this too will change ROIs.
3. When 2007 Elite, BDP and Sterling released it was not public knowledge that Heyward would have a 2008 Chrome Auto. This may have driven intial buy-in prices down.
3 Conclusions:
1. Any parallels higher than an Xfractor /299 in Chrome Draft have not performed well. They have Xfractors and Blues have increased somewhat but I believe Golds and Oranges may have not moved up at all. The combination of no ink and a Chrome Auto a year later killed them. Be very careful buying non-auto base cards from BDP.
2. Elite performed rather well in spite of other (read: Chrome) options. Base Elites /750 sell for over $60 currently. I believe knowing exactly how many autographs exist is something collectors like and something that differentiates Elite from Sterling and Chrome.
3. In spite of a 2008 Chrome Auto that wasn't known about at the time of release, 2007 Sterlings in both raw and gem form have performed well.
3 Things to think about for the Future:
1. Pay attention: don't overpay or undersell. As I mentioned, cards sell in ranges...you should pay attention and do your best to ensure you are buying at the bottom of the range and selling at the top of the range. For example: 2007 Bowman Sterlings sold for between $30-$40 at release and now sell for between $55-$62. If you bought at $30 and sold at $62, your return is 107%, if you bought at $40 and sold at $55 your return is 38%.
2. Anyone selling Heyward for 50%-100% profits ought to be pleased. He was super-hyped upon release and has lived up to expectations. He's not a guy to triple your money on, same thing goes if you are buying Dustin Ackley cards right now.
3. This is why grading makes sense. Lets say I bought a Hewyard Base Sterling Auto for $35, sent it through the FCB sub for $8 and received a BGS 9.5. I can now sell my 9.5 for $98 and I have $43 total into it, a return of 128%.
Obviously, anything with Jason's name on it is selling well right now, in the future I will try to run the same analysis on someone who has seen less of a price spike. Maybe this will help tease out which cards truly are the best investments. In Jason's case you could have made money on a litany of different cards and grading options.
Straight out of left field – Elite Series Insert Set
I've been posting a lot lately about opening 3 cases of 2009 Donruss Elite Extra Edition. Much of this posting is for entertainment value alone, however, the analysis is also fascinating.
When analyzing an Elite Case Break several things should come to mind: low #'d autos, names like Ackley, Tate and Chapman, Hot Boxes, a Pujols Auto #'d /20 and so forth. During my consideration of opening 3 cases, all of these things ran through my head. One thing that didn't was inserts, no, not the autographs, just the inserts.
On a whim, I decided to sort my Elite Series inserts into player lots and auction them off, I started them at $.99 and ran them for 7 days. My results were as follows:
Tony Sanchez7 Elite Series Inserts $7.39
Donavan Tate 4 Elite Series Inserts $0.99
Nolan Ryan 8 Elite Series Inserts $1.25
Dustin Ackley 4 Elite Series Inserts $3.25
A.J. Pollock6 Elite Series Inserts $0.99
Mike Minor 7 Elite Series Inserts $1.54
Al Kaline8 Elite Series Inserts $3.54
Albert Pujols8 Elite Series Inserts $10.49
Will Clark8 Elite Series Inserts $0.99
Total sales for my 60 Elite Series cards were $30.43. Now, you may say, that really isn't that much and right you are. However, when you consider that Donavan Tate /999 Autos were a "big hit," in the product and sell for less than that, $30.43 isn't all too bad. When you are trying to recoup case moneys, anything works.
School Colors and College Ties inserts are now for sale in my auctions, I wonder if I'll have the same kind of luck.
A wide range of emotions – Demetri McCamey
Illinois junior point guard Demetri McCamey is one of those athletes that brings out the widest range of emotions possible in me. Anger, hate, joy, love, sadness, happiness and virtually every other emotion that can be experienced by a human, have been experienced by me, due to Mr. McCamey.
Going into the reasons for all these emotions would fill the pages of even the largest journal. In the old days, a picture was worth a thousand words, so maybe a video is worth a million, or something like that.
Illinois is in a tight game, vs. Indiana, at home - ANGER - IU is under .500! Illinois' jerseys are undescribably ugly - DISGUT! McCamey disregards the designed player - RAGE - have you not learned yet! McCamey sinks an ugly floater for the game winner - EUPHORIA - all is forgiven!
The crowd perspective does it even more justice.
Tyreke Evans – Rookie Card Buffet
Tyreke Evans is the odds-on favorite to win NBA Rookie of the Year. 20.5 ppg, 4.6 rpg, 5.0 apg and 1.5 steals-per-game. The stats don't lie, that is a nice stat line for anyone, let alone and NBA Rookie.
With Panini acquiring the exclusive NBA license in 2010, the basketball card market has changed significantly. So have the rookie card options. Panini has already released seven basketball offerings, and we know about four more that are on the way.
As a result of this, the collector has a ton of options available to purchase that fall in the "Panini" category of rookie cards. From what I can see, it appears that collectors aren't differentiating much between products, for example:
This 2009 Panini Limited Auto Jersey /299 sells for about $50 right now.
This Threads Auto Jersey /50, also sells for about $50.
This manufactured patch, from Rookies & Stars is #'d /349 and sells for between $45-$50.
It seems that to some degree, collectors are thinking "its a Panini release" and lumping the cards together, thus the similarity in prices.
On the other hand, both Upper Deck and Topps had unconventional releases this year, 2009-10 UD Exquisite was multi-sport and also did not feature NBA logos for rookies. Many of the rookies, Evans included. did not have an autograph, only a base card #'d to 225. Topps Chrome
also didn't have players featured in their NBA jerseys and instead of having thousands of chrome and parallels had a very limited print run.
Both of these releases are selling stunningly well on the secondary market right now:
Tyreke Evans Exquisites /225 are selling for $150+, a Gold /12 sold for $900!
Tyreke Evans Base Chromes /999 are selling for $30-$35, Refractors are even higher
Although there are many conclusions to be drawn from these sales, the ones that comes through the clearest are differentiation, rarity and name-brand.
Collectors like the fact that Topps and UD won't be producing more cards like the Chromes and Exquisites this year. Because of that, the ones that exist now are fairly rare. There are only 225 Evans Exquisite cards, total, for the year. Lastly, Topps Chrome and UD Exquisite have been THE standards of basketball rookies since 1996-97 and 2003-04 respectively. Even with some modifications, it is clear, collectors still respect and collect that.
It also makes something very clear for Panini. Differentiation between brands will be the most effective way to make the most of the NBA license. Producing 20 brands that look and feel the same will not. I'm not saying they have done this but it is something they must be proactive about not doing.
As a for instance, if they can make a National Treasures basketball card that is similar to the patch autographs we are seeing from the 2009 football release, they will give collectors a totally different card to chase and that would be a very good thing.
As with most everything else, time will tell how this will play out and we shall see if the Rookie Card buffet gets stocked with a variety of items, or if we continue to see the same dishes.
2009 Elite Extra Edition – non-auto parallels
Non-auto Elite paralells are the pulls that you don't want to see. You see a little hint of gold...you start thinking, "this could be that Gold Status Autograph out of five I have been dreaming off, IT IS Aroldis Chapman
!!!!...but but but, it doesn't have an autograph, its /50, it's all over."
This sums up the range of emotions I went through when pulling the card above. An Aroldis Chapman Gold Status Auto would sell in the 100s, the card above sells in the 10s and by 10s I mean 10 
.
In my 3 cases of Elite, I pulled the following:
26 Gold Status Diecuts /50 - Chapman was the highlight
41 Red Status Diecuts /100 - Tate was the highlight
99 Blue Aspirations Diecuts /200 - Ackley was the highlight
The question is, how much value will these provide me in sales? I have ever non-auto parallel I haven't already sold up in my auctions. If you want to flip through the auctions to see who is being auctioned feel free.
Let me know what you think!
2009 Topps Tribute, Big Time Mistake
As announced here on FCB, Topps has come out and "clarified," that some recently released Topps Tribute cards actually included pieces of Stadium Seats, as opposed to GU Jersey or Bat. The cards are as follows:
1. Babe Ruth Dual Relic Bat / Old Yankee Stadium Seat
2. Babe Ruth
Triple Relic Old Yankee Stadium Seat / Uniform / Old Yankees Stadium Seat
3. Ty Cobb Dual">Ty Cobb Dual Relic Bat / Tiger Stadium Seat
4. Jackie Robinson Triple Relic Ebbets Field Seat / Bat / Ebbets Field Seat
5. Mickey Mantle Triple Relic Old Yankee Stadium Seat / Uniform / Old Yankees Stadium Seat"
In short, you thought you got a 3 piece Mickey Mantle bat/gu card. Not really, you got a one-piecer, with some Yankees Stadium seat from who knows when.
Topps deserves credit for the "mea culpa," they could have left us in the dark forever about what said "meoribilia" was but that is about where the credit they are due stops. Their apology gift? Return the card and you get a new fresh pack of 2009 Topps Tribute.
Topps had a chance to do something real good by bringing Topps Tribute back. People loved 2002, 2003 and 2004 Topps Tribute, heck, you could get GU Bat cards of guys like Nap Lajoie. But alas, they tried to the go cheap-o route on it, by using seat relics and inserting thousands of current player autos (Jay Bruce and David Wrights out the ying-ying), in a supposedly "HOF" product, that didn't work. To top it off, they were, at the very least unclear and at the worst deceitful about what some of the cards were.
But never fear, in spite of the fact that the card you pulled is worth a bit less than you thought it was ($100 or more in the case of Ruth), Topps will give you a $50 pack, if you return the card and another chance at a Melky Cabrera Auto! We know you pulled what you thought was the box hit....for that, you get another pack.
This bungle was brought to you by your exclusive MLB and MILB card producer. Sigh.
A mighty flood – 2009 Elite Extra
If you've got "a guy" from 2009 Elite, you should probably consider buying now. The market is flooded with singles. Let me give you some examples of eBay searches and the stunning results they yield. All are confined to the baseball category.
2009 Elite- 4,591 results
2009 Elite AU*- 2,406 results
Elite Aroldis Chapman-54 results
Elite Dustin Ackley- 83 results
Elite Tate - 57 results
Plus you've got 2009 Bowman Sterling and 2009 Bowman Draft
competing for buyer's attention. That's another 3600+ listings right there. So perhaps the time has come for those of you wanting to load up on a particular prospect or brand to enter the market? It certainly seems that way to me but I'm open to dissenting views.
