I'll have to postpone writing about the McDonald's High School All-American Game for now because arguably the hottest topic in the industry is Beckett Exquisite Football box break video. If you haven't seen it yet, here's the link to the video.

The video has many collectors wondering if the box was purposely loaded with big cards so it would be promoted on Beckett. Sorry, I won't be commenting either way about that. Exquisite sells for $500 per box for a reason; there are a lot of cards like this in this product. While the odds of that happening are minute, it also wouldn't make sense for a company to advertise to the public that two or three of the best cards in the set are no longer available. The better publicity would be for collectors to see those same cards selling on eBay. Either way, this isn't the first time, or first card company, whose online box breaks have been called into question as far as their accuracy.

What I am writing about is what they pulled. First, what is the value of that Peterson Autographed Patch 1/1 card? The regular version is numbered to 99 and sells for anywhere from $1,525 to $2,352 on eBay. Where does that put this one? I'm guessing it's gotta be at least $5,000.

As for the Walter Payton/Brian Piccolo dual-cut signature card, I don't even have a ballpark figure for that one. I guess it might be in the $2,000-$4,000 neighborhood. To me, that was the strangest part of the video because one of the Beckett guys seemed like he'd never heard of Piccolo and the other one was explaining who he was. Piccolo is one of the most desired football autographs in the hobby. Neither seemed all that excited about a card that would probably be the best pull ever for about 99.9% of the collecting public.

Not to be outdone, I opened a box of Exquisite too. How did I do? I got a Jerricho Cotchery Signature Jersey Numbers numbered to 99, Kevin Kolb Rookie Signature Patch numbered to 225, Reggie Nelson Signature numbered to 150, Marion Barber Maximum Jersey numbered to 15, Trent Edwards Patch numbered to 50 and a Lee Evans base card numbered to 150.

It's one of the more volatile times right now in the basketball card market as teams make their playoff push. While a couple players on hot list are obvious, like Kobe, LeBron and Kevin Durant, others are a not quite as obvious. Two rookies from this season are really heating up near the end of the season. Al Thornton (Clippers) and Thaddeus Young (Sixers) have really shot up collector's wantlists and their prices are rising, in many cases, up to the level of Al Horford, Mike Conley, Jeff Green, etc.

Both are basically a result of playing time. Neither guy saw the court early in the year and is now regularly in the starting lineup. Both are also extremely athletic and highlight film worthy, which never hurts. Neither guy will be the Rookie of the Year, but both have really caught fire.

Two rookies from the 2006-07 class have also made significant gains this year. Rudy Gay has had a breakout year for Memphis, with most of his rookie singles increasing significantly throught the season. Rajon Rondo has held the starting point guard spot for the best team in the league all season and collectors were very high on him already going into the season. Even with the addition of Sam Cassell, Rondo will hold the bulk of the minutes through the playoffs.

On the flip side, Kirk Hinrich is one of several Bulls who has fallen significantly this season. Hinrich is still clinging to his starting job, but losing minutes to Larry Hughes and not very effective when he does play. In addition, teammates Luol Deng and Tyrus Thomas have also been huge disappointments this year. Deng was extremely hot in the playoffs a year ago, but has been ineffective and battled injuries this year. Thomas has been given many chances to start, but isn't anwhere close to consistent. He's currently buried on the bench.

Also, Andrea Bargnani was the runner-up to Rookie of the Year last season. This year he's been horrible. He's a 7-footer, who stands at the three-point line all the time and doesn't rebound. His sophomore season has been a bust and most of his cards are half the value they were when the season began.

If you haven't read it anywhere yet, Upper Deck is cutting production levels for its remaining 2007-08 offerings. This means hobby shops that purchase direct from Upper Deck will not be guaranteed allocations of the products with cards available on a first-come, first-serve basis.
 
“The cuts actually started with SP Authentic Basketball and have been pretty significant,” said Chris Kollmeyer, Upper Deck’s basketball brand manager. “The cuts are difficult to take from a financial standpoint, but allow us to make improvements to the brands.” Kollmeyer said the lower print runs for UD Black Basketball means a higher concentration of superstar autographs. There are two autograph cards per box. “This is the type of enhancement the production cuts allow us to make to improve the brand and ultimately the market.”

Production levels of two of Upper Deck’s higher-end products are being cut significantly. UD Premier Basketball, scheduled to be released April 2, will be limited to just 499 cases. SP Rookie Threads, scheduled to be released April 18, will be limited to just 599 cases. The cases will now be sequentially numbered.

Upper Deck reported that after its announcement, interest in its UD Premier product line has gone up dramatically.  They recently conducted a signing with Michael Jordan who was kept very busy with the sharpie as he added his signature directly to many of the cards in the set.  The photo above is a sneak peak of some of the cards Jordan will have in the 07-08 NBA Premier product.