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.

Antonio Gates (1,000 @ $5.00)

Gates is the #1 tight end in the NFL right now. His rise to fame is compelling because he never played any football in college. He played basketball instead and was a free agent pickup for the Chargers practice squad last year. He has quickly become one of Drew Brees' favorite targets and put up 3 touchdowns a couple weeks ago against the Saints. While it would have been nice to have a rookie of this rising star, a 2nd year card limited to 1,000 isn't bad either. The only card that we can really compare this to would be Boo Williams' issue this year. However, Boo is not having anywhere near as good a year as Gates. Also, Boo only sold 703 cards, something we probably can't expect from Gates. To decide whether Gates is a good buy at IPO is difficult. Only one non-rookie player in the 2004 set is currently valued at $5 with a print run of 1,000 or greater and he has two Super Bowl rings. I would expect a sell out and a target price of around $4 after IPO. I would consider this card a risky buy at IPO.

Craig Krenzel (1,000 @ $5.00)

About the only good thing you can say about Craig Krenzel is that he is undefeated as a starter in the NFL. Last week he was even able to beat the Titans without throwing a single touchdown pass. Unfortunately his stats aren't that good. He's only thrown above a 50% completion rating once and has 4 interceptions to go along with his 2 touchdowns. The fact of the matter is that he's a 3rd string quarterback, who because of injuries, has been forced into the game. He is not the future of the Bears so I wouldn't kid myself about this card. If you still think a rookie card of a 3rd string player is worth a shot here are some other 3rd string QBs with rookie eTopps cards: Kliff Kingsbury currently worth $1.50, Brian St. Pierre currently worth $1.00. I would consider this card a bad buy at IPO.

Reuben Droughns (2,000 @ $4.50)

For some reason I thought that perhaps eTopps had turned over a new leaf with its limited print run of 900 for stars like Favre and Hasselbeck. I had also hoped that they had learned their lesson from fill in players like Quentin Griffin and Mewelde Moore. I'm not sure if they decided to make a Droughns card because he is doing well or from the message board requests, but from the posts I saw they all seemed to be sarcastic. Quentin is currently trading under $2 at a shorter PR of 1,750. Mewelde is currently trading under $4 at a much shorter PR of 1,250 and it is a true rookie card. Even if this card sells 1,000 it still won't hold its IPO price. I would consider this card a really bad buy at IPO.