Below is just my opinion and analysis of this week’s IPO. They are offered only as opinion and to encourage discussion. Looking forward to your own opinions and comments.

Brett Favre (900 @ $5.00)

Brett Favre Jerseys Memorabilia Posters

With the 2004 football set winding down and 2004 basketball being sold as well, eTopps is only offering 3 football cards this week. The first thing you’re going to notice is that the maximum print runs have been slashed dramatically. While you might have thought that 1,250 was a pretty low maximum for players, eTopps has selected 900 as the new cap for this week. This was most likely caused by the soft sell of 688 Vanderjagt and 710 Spikes cards and perhaps the hope that a lower possible print run will mean more buyers. Regardless of what it means you should be excited. This will be Favre’s 4th eTopps card and while that would usually be a bad thing, in this case it is not. With a maximum of 900 cards this will become Favre’s short print. People usually look to the shortest print of a card when deciding which to buy, assuming a rookie version is unavailable. The market caps of Favre’s previous three cards are $22k, $12k, $8k. This leads pretty smoothly to the $4.5k of 2004 but the card should appreciate in value due to its SP status. Expect a hard sellout of this fan favorite with some getting shutout. I would rate this card a very good buy at IPO.

Lavar Arrington (900 @ $5.00)

Lavar Arrington ranks up there with Ray Lewis and Brian Urlacher as one of the best linebackers in the NFL. While you can easily recognize the other two mentioned you might have a tougher time identifying Lavar because until this year he had always refused to join the NFL Players Association. Because of this the NFL could not sell his jerseys, put his picture in video games and do most of the things that come along with being a sports star. A search for his cards on eBay will reveal some rookies from 2000 and then nothing until 2004. That makes this an intriguing card because the overall population of Lavar Arrington cards is so small. Because of that you would think eTopps would attempt to sell a ton of these but the 900 print run is definitely attractive. Luckily, Takeo Spikes debuted last week and we can easily compare this new offering to Takeo’s. I warned against purchasing Takeo and apparently many others felt the same way because his print run came in at 710. That should mean awesome card, higher price, right? Unfortunately no. His card immediately fell below IPO and has even dipped below the $4 mark, giving it about a $3k market cap. These results don’t make Lavar appear like a very good investment. I hate to recommend against a 900 PR cap because I think eTopps is heading in the right direction, but there simply isn’t going to be much demand for a veteran linebacker outside of his own team’s fans. Then again, with basketball debuting this could very well become the ‘player SP’ of the football set. I would consider this a risky buy at IPO.

San Francisco 49ers Team Card (750 @ $6.50)

Target: 1.5 wins after week 8, 4.5 wins after regular season

Wk 1:  L 21-19
Wk 2:  L 30-27
Wk 3:  L 34-0
Wk 4:  L 24-14
Wk 5:  W 31-28
Wk 6:  L 22-14
Wk 7:  bye
Wk 8:  @ CHI
Wk 9:  vs. SEA
Wk 10:  vs. CAR
Wk 11:  @ TB
Wk 12:  vs. MIA
Wk 13:  @ STL
Wk 14:  @ ARI
Wk 15:  vs. WAS
Wk 16:  vs. BUF
Wk 17:  @ NE

The 49ers are the only team card available this week and the maximum of 750 possible cards seems extremely low. Then again, 6 teams have sold under this amount so far this season. The 49ers schedule actually doesn’t look that bad for the rest of the year if you toss out the Seattle and New England games. Unfortunately the team has suffered tons of injuries and continues to lose heartbreaking games. It’s difficult to speculate on the week 8 performance bonus because the game against Chicago could go either way. Thus I would say that if you’re a set builder then you should go ahead and purchase this card at IPO. Other team SPs such as the Cardinals and Bucs are selling above IPO because there are so few of them so this one might be cheaper if it undersells. If you’re only into team cards for the bonus then I’d pass at IPO and possibly show more interest in the second half of the season. There are plenty of team cards available that already locked their performance bonus and only look to payout more into the future. Either way at a cap of 750 this card shouldn’t depreciate much, if any, at IPO. I would consider this card a safe buy at IPO.