Enjoy Set Building with 2003-04 Upper Deck MVP Basketball
by Bob Williams
May 2, 2004
The 2003-04 Upper Deck MVP Basketball set is made up of 230 base cards that include 30
rookie cards. Since a hobby box consists of 24 packs of 8 cards each with every
pack including one rookie card, set builders should find this to be a relatively easy
set to complete. Every box also includes one memorabilia card, so you'll have the added
enjoyment of finding items like a warm-ups or shooting-shirt card. Also watch
for ProSign cards that features autographs of some of the best athletes in the NBA®.
The base cards in this set (common players and rookies) feature a clean, standard front
design that integrates the player's name, position and team in the bottom center area along
with the Upper Deck MVP logo. The card backs also follow a standard design of player vitals,
career statistics and general notes. Keep in mind that both the card fronts and backs contain
a white border around the top, bottom, left and right edges, so centering will be a consideration
when grading these cards.
Common players make up card numbers 1-200 in the set and rookie cards are numbered from 201-230.
With rookies of LeBron James (RC card #201 shown below), Carmelo Anthony, Darko Milicic,
Dwayne Wade, T.J. Ford, Chris Bosh and Kirk Hinrich, this set provides a nice option
for getting rookie cards of the new 2003-04 players.
Subset and insert cards include:
- MVP Rookies (1:1)
- Sportsnut Fantasy Interactive cards (1:3)
- Rising to the Occasion (1:12)
- Basketball Diary (1:12)
- A Tribute to Greatness (1:24)
- Monumental Moments (1:24)
- MVP Silver regular parallel (1:2) - left and right edges on card front are silver
- MVP Rookies Silver parallel (1:24) - left and right edges on card front are silver
- MVP Materials - Warm-ups Memorabilia cards (1:48)
- MVP Materials - Shooting Shirts Memorabilia cards (1:72)
- Combo MVP Materials Memorabilia cards (1:144)
- Triple Dimension Memorabilia cards (each card sequentially numbered to 25)
- Rising to the Occasion Subset Parallel card (each card sequentially numbered
to 250)
- Basketball Diary Subset Parallel card (each card sequentially numbered
to 100)
- A Tribute to Greatness Subset Parallel card (each card sequentially numbered
to 50)
- Monumental Moments Subset Parallel card (each card sequentially numbered
to 5)
- MVP Gold - regular and rookie parallel (1:85, each card sequentially numbered
to 100)
- MVP Black - regular and rookie parallel (1:335, each card sequentially numbered
to 25)
- ProSign (1:288)
The memorabilia cards combine for an overall odds of 1:24 (1 card in every box) while
the subset parallels combine for an overall odds of 1:175.
Expect to pay about $2 per pack or about $40 for a hobby box. At this price,
2003-04 Upper Deck MVP Basketball provides one of the lowest-priced options for
collecting 2003-04 basketball cards, including the key new rookies.
All things considered, 2003-04 Upper Deck MVP basketball is a nice set to collect, especially
for those collectors looking for a traditional-looking product at a reasonable price. Set
builders should enjoy putting together a complete set of this product and will also receive
several of the nice subset and insert cards during the process.
About the author
Bob Williams is the owner of TradingCardCentral.com, the one stop site for
sports and non-sports trading card enthusiasts. He has been collecting
sports, non-sports and gaming cards for over 20 years and has a personal
collection of over 0.5 million items.
All hobby articles...
|