Remember when Upper Deck's 1996 Game Jersey cards were the hottest inserts on the planet? That's not the case anymore. After seeing 100s of jersey cards of their favorite player per year, collectors have mostly fallen off the jersey card bandwagon. Sure, they are still popular pulls and essential parts of any product, but it continues to amaze me how low some of them go.

I recently priced Topps Luxury Box Basketball and there was a triple jersey card with Dwyane Wade, Tim Duncan and Chauncey Billups that was numbered to only 249 and it sold for $2.45. And that's, in no way, picking on Topps because the same thing happens with new jersey cards from Upper Deck, Donruss Playoff, Racing Champions, etc. Three good players on the card and it's a buck or two.

I'm not sure where they go from here. Autographs are still very popular, but they are suffering too from needing to be in every product that hits. Jersey cards were popular in the beginning because they brought us closer to the game that we collect, but after more than a decade of jersey cards every player you can think of has 100 or more and it's difficult for even single-player collectors to go after them.

To an extent, patch cards have also sliced into the popularity of jersey cards since the patches are so much more desired and scarce. Every great new idea, like jersey numbers, nameplates, etc. that arrives makes a regular jersey card that much less collectable.

I'm assuming they will continue to be a staple in every product, along with patches, autographs and rookie cards, but it's a little disturbing when you see the above example and thousands of others just like that.