As autographed sports cards continue to evolve, the hobby has seen autographed jersey cards give way to autographed patch cards, which in turn yielded to autographed letter cards featuring an entire jersey letter. These cards have proven so popular that Topps built an entire set with them in mind, Letterman Basketball.
Boxes of 2007-08 Topps Letterman Basketball hold three four-card mini-boxes, with an autograph numbered to 75 or less or a patch card numbered to 19 or less in each mini-box. Every box contains one Autographed Letterman Patches card on average.
Base Cards and Parallels
The Letterman base set is about as simple as it gets. There are 50 veterans and retired NBA stars followed by 25 2007-08 rookies, all numbered to 599. Expect to find a rookie and two veteran/retired cards in each mini-box.
Chromium card stock allows for a design that's bound to inspire a love it or hate it reaction from the collecting public, as it puts the player photos on a design so reflective it looks like they are printed on a mirror. They will need to be handled carefully to avoid smudges and fingerprints.
Topps uses Refractors as the base set parallels, but they're kept to tasteful amounts with only three levels: regular (#'d to 99), X-Fractors (#'d to 25) and SuperFractors (1-of-1).
I cracked open one mini-box of Letterman Basketball for this review and found the expected three base cards. Larry Bird and Chris Paul represented the established players, while Al Horford was my lone rookie.
Autographed Cards
There's little doubt that autographs are the big hook in this product, and they start with the Autographed Letterman Patches found one per box. Topps got 30 NBA players to sign no more than 35 copies of each letter in their last names. The letters aren't from game-worn jerseys - except for the Autographed Authentic Letterman Patches, which are all 1-of-1 - but they still provide something different from your average autographed card.
Topps took the idea to the next level with Autographed Letterman Booklets, which fall one per eight-box case or 1:24 mini-boxes. These are giant cards numbered to 25 that are hinged to fold up like an accordion, with one entire jersey letter from the player's name on each panel. The first letter is autographed, except for the 1-of-1 SuperFractor versions which sport signatures on each letter.
There are also autographed cards that have nothing to do with letters. Scenic Signatures cards put player autographs on small black-and-white inserts in the card itself. Singles are numbered to 25 or less, with dual signatures numbered to 10 or less.
The remaining signed cards are autographed memorabilia cards of one form or another, including Autographed Jersey Number Patches, Autographed Team Logo Patches, Authentic Autograph Quad Relics, and Autographed Authentic Jersey Tags. None of these cards have print runs of more than 75 copies, and all non-Letterman autographs combine to fall one per box.
There was no Letterman card in my review mini-box, but I did find an Antawn Jamison Scenic Signatures card numbered to just 19.
Relic Cards
Relic (memorabilia) cards help make up the remaining hit in the one mini-box per master box that doesn't have an autograph. As such, I didn't find any in my sample mini-box.
Actual game-worn relics are pretty rare. There are Authentic Quad Patches numbered to 10, plus Authentic Letterman Patches with an entire game-worn letter and Authentic Jersey Tags, all of which are 1-of-1's.
The rest of the patch cards are embroidered team logo cards or manufactured mini jersey numbers. While cool to look at, they've been tried in other products in the past and don't carry nearly the values of their game-worn brethren.
Finally, while they aren't relics in the traditional sense, Topps also created 1-of-1 14K Gold Letterman Cards for each letter in the names of 11 NBA players. And yes, that's exactly what it sounds like: actual jersey letters made out of gold. It would be hard to imagine these not fetching pretty nice prices on the secondary market.
The Last Word
Letterman Basketball is Topps' last effort for the 2007-08 season, though it wasn't always intended to be that way - the product was initially announced for a May release. The guess is that the intricate autographed cards took longer than expected to create, and Topps should be commended for its ambition and patience.
With a small base set and low rookie and game-used content, Letterman is essentially a one-trick pony. Even though it's a really good trick, some collectors may be put off by that fact or the price (over $175 a box). Still, autograph collectors should eat this up, and it's for them that a set like this is truly intended.