Upper Deck Reveals 2010 Greats of the Game Basketball
Upper Deck has released the first of its first collegiate-focused sports trading card set: 2010 Greats of the Game Basketball. With its recently inked exclusive contract with The Collegiate Licensing Co. (CLC), Upper Deck features some of the greatest collegiate roundball stars in history.
“Our 2010 Greats of the Game Basketball release represents one of our most popular basketball brands from years past and now it’s making its return as a stand-alone product,” said Brandon Miller, Upper Deck’s CLC brand manager. “It is well positioned to thrill hoops fans with strong collegiate content featuring autographs from the likes of Michael Jordan, Bill Russell, Larry Bird and Magic Johnson.
The 200-card base set is chock full of the biggest names who have ever played collegiate basketball, as well as a few standouts who bypassed college all together before joining the ranks of professional basketball, and includes four 25-card subsets spotlighting the best of the best. The four subsets include “Big Man on Campus” featuring names such as Hakeem Olajuwon (Houston), Danny Manning (Kansas) and Bill Laimbeer (Notre Dame); “Banner Season,” which celebrates winning campaigns posted by the likes of UNLV, Duke and UCLA; “Old School,” which pays tribute to college stars like Larry Bird (Indiana State), John Stockton (Gonzaga) and Bill Walton (UCLA); and “Glory Days,” a compilation of stellar moments coming from Alonzo Mourning (Georgetown), Derrick Rose (Memphis) and Calbert Cheaney (Indiana). Some of the players featured who made the leap to pro ball without ever attending college include Moses Malone, Vlade Divac and LeBron James.
Beyond the aforementioned base-level cards, Upper Deck’s Greats of the Game Basketball brings collectors some of the most sought-after insert cards ever assembled. The memorabilia insert card lineup is entitled “Old School Swatches” (one per box, on average) and highlights players like George Gervin (Eastern Michigan) and David Robinson (Navy), while the autographed inserts boast varied numbering across an assortment of lineups including “Memorable Monikers,” “School Pride” and “Legends of the Hall.” Autographed parallels of the regular base cards are also sprinkled in with one version numbered to 199 and the other numbered to 50.
“Fans and collectors have been asking for comprehensive collegiate trading card sets for a long time,” said David Kirkpatrick, Vice President of Non-Apparel Marketing for The Collegiate Licensing Company. “The team at Upper Deck has assembled this tremendous collection of many of the best players in college basketball history. The 2010 Greats of the Game set is the first collective project in our new partnership. The collegiate institutions and CLC are looking forward to working closely with Upper Deck to maximize the tremendous opportunities that exist for licensed collegiate trading cards.”
The product, currently on store shelves, includes eight cards per pack, 16 packs per box.
