First Buzz: 2025-26 Topps Chrome NBA cards

[imbluestreak23]

Originally Posted by yoyosh

I love any opportunity to discuss how terrible Fanatics is, but this is a PSA issue.

2024 Caitlin Clark base RC Prizm #22 is at 19%
Jayden Silver Prizm RC 12%
Drake Maye Silver Prizm RC 23%

This is a "people submitting cards are stupid in 2026" issue.

Every single one of those cards comes from sets with noticable flaws affecting every card in the set.

Bu't again, people are indeed not smart when submitting.

Why not hate on 2024 Panini Prizm Black NBA gem rates? You can't becaue the quality is great, gem rates are great, and it's easy to ignore becasue there is no Drake Maye or Clark RC in that product demanding 5,000 copies be submitted to PSA, so it hides under the radar. But people will complain oblivious to their own stupidity and ignorance (not directed at you, in general)

[weatherwarrior]

Originally Posted by imbluestreak23

This is a "people submitting cards are stupid in 2026" issue.

Every single one of those cards comes from sets with noticable flaws affecting every card in the set.

Bu't again, people are indeed not smart when submitting.

Why not hate on 2024 Panini Prizm Black NBA gem rates? You can't becaue the quality is great, gem rates are great, and it's easy to ignore becasue there is no Drake Maye or Clark RC in that product demanding 5,000 copies be submitted to PSA, so it hides under the radar. But people will complain oblivious to their own stupidity and ignorance (not directed at you, in general)

Only took 15 years for them to get it right lol.

In all seriousness though prizm black was the best release they have done in ages. I hope we get a prizm black football before they lose that license.

Im an old collector so topps chrome has a soft spot for me but hopefully the QC issues get better. I think in the rush to get these sets out they were very sloppy.

I did love prizm black. I just wish panini had put that effort in all the time.

Sent from my SM-S928U using Tapatalk

[auburn35]

Originally Posted by BayAreaChris

From Topps Twitter

We would like to provide clarity regarding the 2025–26 Topps Chrome Basketball Mega Boxes and recent questions about the packaging language.

The Mega Box packaging says “Chase Exclusive Blue X-Fractors,” but it should have said “Chase Exclusive Silver X-Fractors.” This copy on the box was the result of an unintentional error.

For 2025–26 Topps Chrome Basketball, the product includes exclusive Silver X-Fractors rather than Blue X-Fractors. Silver X-Fractors were inserted correctly at a rate of 10 per box, which is the same insertion rate used for the blue basketball parallel in the prior year.

We understand that the typographical error on the packaging led to some confusion; we believe that the product delivers a comparable value and the configuration described in the official odds and checklist.

We apologize for this error and appreciate your continued passion for the hobby.

There are now at least two different (very similar) lawsuits against Topps, related to this "packaging" issue.

https://www.classaction.org/news/top...rom-mega-boxes

A proposed class action lawsuit accuses Topps of misleading consumers after the trading card company revealed in an email that its 2025-26 NBA Chrome Basketball Trading Card Mega Box sets were missing the ultra-rare Blue X-Fractor cards, which were central to the company’s marketing of the product.

[90skid]

It's incredible to me just how bad you have to be to screw up the Mega box design like that. I mean literally the text for CHASE EXCLUSIVE BLUE X-FRACTORS is center stage right in the middle of the box.

Each department at topps must live in their own bubbles. I'm sure the QA folks had no idea the Blue X-Fractors didn't exist, they just simply approved it and moved on.


You'd think someone along the way would put the red flag up and be like uhhh guys... that's wrong, there's no such thing in these boxes - aren't we going to fix it? Sorry, we already printed 3 billion boxes, we can't take that hit in cost reprinting it to say Silver X-Fractors!!! Just funny.

[hermanotarjeta]

Originally Posted by 90skid

It's incredible to me just how bad you have to be to screw up the Mega box design like that. I mean literally the text for CHASE EXCLUSIVE BLUE X-FRACTORS is center stage right in the middle of the box.

Each department at topps must live in their own bubbles. I'm sure the QA folks had no idea the Blue X-Fractors didn't exist, they just simply approved it and moved on.


You'd think someone along the way would put the red flag up and be like uhhh guys... that's wrong, there's no such thing in these boxes - aren't we going to fix it? Sorry, we already printed 3 billion boxes, we can't take that hit in cost reprinting it to say Silver X-Fractors!!! Just funny.

Fanatics management is like “it doesn’t matter if we screwed up, they will buy it anyways.”

If topps offered a full refund for sealed boxes, would anyone really return them???

[phil]

Blowout down to MSRP $49.99 on blasters, must really be a backlog on those

[crownand]

Any hanger restocks anywhere??

[Bob Ross]

Originally Posted by 90skid

It's incredible to me just how bad you have to be to screw up the Mega box design like that. I mean literally the text for CHASE EXCLUSIVE BLUE X-FRACTORS is center stage right in the middle of the box.

Each department at topps must live in their own bubbles. I'm sure the QA folks had no idea the Blue X-Fractors didn't exist, they just simply approved it and moved on.


You'd think someone along the way would put the red flag up and be like uhhh guys... that's wrong, there's no such thing in these boxes - aren't we going to fix it? Sorry, we already printed 3 billion boxes, we can't take that hit in cost reprinting it to say Silver X-Fractors!!! Just funny.

IMO, they didn't screw up the packaging. One moron forgot to load the blue parallels into one of these card sorters. I mean, here is the packing floor:

[Slvnumber2]

Someone needs to Photoshop backyard breaks on to one of the sorting machines along with filthbomb sorting machine🤣

[hermanotarjeta]

Originally Posted by Bob Ross

IMO, they didn't screw up the packaging. One moron forgot to load the blue parallels into one of these card sorters. I mean, here is the packing floor:

How easy would it be to walk out with a card or a hundred there?

[Bob Ross]

Originally Posted by hermanotarjeta

How easy would it be to walk out with a card or a hundred there?

No kidding. This floor looks ripe for stealing.

[Bob Ross]

If anyone wants to take a gander, this is https://resource-commercial.com/proj...-headquarters/

200 planters rd sunnyvale tx 75182

[CTSportsboy57]

Backyard touting their 10 case Sapphire Basketball break last night yet regular collectors can't get one box via EQL. Pretty much the current hobby in a nutshell.

[hermanotarjeta]

Originally Posted by CTSportsboy57

Backyard touting their 10 case Sapphire Basketball break last night yet regular collectors can't get one box via EQL. Pretty much the current hobby in a nutshell.

That’s a half a million dollar break!??!!?!?!?!

[crdbored]

Originally Posted by hermanotarjeta

That’s a half a million dollar break!??!!?!?!?!

Best part is, they probably bought these at $999 a box from their friends at fanatics before release.
Then made half a million lol

10x!!

[mossoholic]

Originally Posted by CTSportsboy57

Backyard touting their 10 case Sapphire Basketball break last night yet regular collectors can't get one box via EQL. Pretty much the current hobby in a nutshell.

Lol 10 cases? Are you aware of the story on Flawless Basketball a few years back? I can't remember 100% the specifics or the exact dollar amounts.

There was a breaker that bought a bunch of product over time from I think Buffalo. He bought a Flawless Basketball case and it was shown that a bunch of the cards that were pulled were already cards that sold on ebay before he bought the case. He showed texts and or emails of what Buffalo said to him basically showing preorder sales purchases of cases directly from Panini for this. They had an order form shown for 200 cases. Yes 200 cases of the most limited product. Obviously, they had it listed above market but immediate resale profit if they just wanted to take what they could get and sell presale or around release would have been something like at least $15k per case. That's $3 million profit on one product. For one sport. That's if they wanted to take the bare minimum. Obviously, they sold breaks at higher prices and tried to sell boxes and cases for higher prices. There were probably multiple years where the combined profit from Prizm and NT basketball and football combined was easily $100 million+ profit. There were countless products they made more than Panini and Topps did if Topps and Panini's total cost to make the products were $0.

Point being, if these big companies are getting that much of the most limited product what do you think they are or were getting over the last 6 years for products with a 50k+ box count? 10 cases/100 boxes is nothing.

To be fair, I doubt in all of 2026 everyone on this entire forum combined, non bots, will be able to purchase 10 total cases of an in demand Topps hobby product through EQL, Fanatics lottery, and Topps website releases combined. I'd love to know what the last in demand product was a manual user was able to purchase a single case from Topps.

[hermanotarjeta]

Originally Posted by mossoholic

Lol 10 cases? Are you aware of the story on Flawless Basketball a few years back? I can't remember 100% the specifics or the exact dollar amounts.

There was a breaker that bought a bunch of product over time from I think Buffalo. He bought a Flawless Basketball case and it was shown that a bunch of the cards that were pulled were already cards that sold on ebay before he bought the case. He showed texts and or emails of what Buffalo said to him basically showing preorder sales purchases of cases directly from Panini for this. They had an order form shown for 200 cases. Yes 200 cases of the most limited product. Obviously, they had it listed above market but immediate resale profit if they just wanted to take what they could get and sell presale or around release would have been something like at least $15k per case. That's $3 million profit on one product. For one sport. That's if they wanted to take the bare minimum. Obviously, they sold breaks at higher prices and tried to sell boxes and cases for higher prices. There were probably multiple years where the combined profit from Prizm and NT basketball and football combined was easily $100 million+ profit. There were countless products they made more than Panini and Topps did if Topps and Panini's total cost to make the products were $0.

Point being, if these big companies are getting that much of the most limited product what do you think they are or were getting over the last 6 years for products with a 50k+ box count? 10 cases/100 boxes is nothing.

To be fair, I doubt in all of 2026 everyone on this entire forum combined, non bots, will be able to purchase 10 total cases of an in demand Topps hobby product through EQL, Fanatics lottery, and Topps website releases combined. I'd love to know what the last in demand product was a manual user was able to purchase a single case from Topps.

We all need to accept this and move on with life.

[Asian62150]

Originally Posted by mossoholic

Lol 10 cases? Are you aware of the story on Flawless Basketball a few years back? I can't remember 100% the specifics or the exact dollar amounts.

There was a breaker that bought a bunch of product over time from I think Buffalo. He bought a Flawless Basketball case and it was shown that a bunch of the cards that were pulled were already cards that sold on ebay before he bought the case. He showed texts and or emails of what Buffalo said to him basically showing preorder sales purchases of cases directly from Panini for this. They had an order form shown for 200 cases. Yes 200 cases of the most limited product. Obviously, they had it listed above market but immediate resale profit if they just wanted to take what they could get and sell presale or around release would have been something like at least $15k per case. That's $3 million profit on one product. For one sport. That's if they wanted to take the bare minimum. Obviously, they sold breaks at higher prices and tried to sell boxes and cases for higher prices. There were probably multiple years where the combined profit from Prizm and NT basketball and football combined was easily $100 million+ profit. There were countless products they made more than Panini and Topps did if Topps and Panini's total cost to make the products were $0.

Point being, if these big companies are getting that much of the most limited product what do you think they are or were getting over the last 6 years for products with a 50k+ box count? 10 cases/100 boxes is nothing.

To be fair, I doubt in all of 2026 everyone on this entire forum combined, non bots, will be able to purchase 10 total cases of an in demand Topps hobby product through EQL, Fanatics lottery, and Topps website releases combined. I'd love to know what the last in demand product was a manual user was able to purchase a single case from Topps.

I don't doubt this happens. So why does Fanatics sell to the breakers or distributors for so cheap when those guys are just flipping product for such incredible profits? What does Fanatics gain from doing business this way?

[mossoholic]

Originally Posted by Asian62150

I don't doubt this happens. So why does Fanatics sell to the breakers or distributors for so cheap when those guys are just flipping product for such incredible profits? What does Fanatics gain from doing business this way?

Ask anyone that is in this every day as a business off the record and they will all tell you what's really going on with Fanatics/Topps.

Fanatics has to sell to someone to create a market. They are selling most initial stock to these groups because they know via sales or breaking these guys will set a high price on the in demand products and there will be artificial scarcity. Fanatics holds back product to then sell in future waves, at higher prices, at a later date. The in demand products they sell under the table to these guys to still give the illusion of scarcity as only a small amount of people have it. They aren't even forcing all of them to take the bad hobby products in future waves now. Those get dumped on Fanatics website and/or Fanatics reps try to sell it. You can see some of these still on Fanatics site right now.

I don't know the exact rules for each person because I don't and have never received 1 box of allocation from anywhere. I don't know if they all or certain people only have to follow certain rules in terms of selling versus breaking. I know on 2024 Dynasty Baseball a guy had several cases on ebay for under market value. I tried to buy them from him. It was set up weird that if you just bought you had to buy as a personal break. He said the price was only so low because he was required by Topps to sell breaks on the boxes. He couldn't sell the boxes or cases outright. For some reason he would only break a case for 1 buyer instead of taking the time and effort to sell regular breaks for higher prices.

If Fanatics operated like any other card company in history they would run auctions to realize more of the profits. But they won't because of this holding back product to create artificial scarcity method. Short term it may be better for them but long term it is not. Instead of taking most of the pie they want them and their buddies to have 100% of it. How much business long term will they drive away? I guess we will find out in 18-24 months. First year of basketball with an amazing class and first year with football won't really be an indicator. They should care about the long term licenses since they own them but they do not.

[Asian62150]

Originally Posted by mossoholic

Ask anyone that is in this every day as a business off the record and they will all tell you what's really going on with Fanatics/Topps.

Fanatics has to sell to someone to create a market. They are selling most initial stock to these groups because they know via sales or breaking these guys will set a high price on the in demand products and there will be artificial scarcity. Fanatics holds back product to then sell in future waves, at higher prices, at a later date. The in demand products they sell under the table to these guys to still give the illusion of scarcity as only a small amount of people have it. They aren't even forcing all of them to take the bad hobby products in future waves now. Those get dumped on Fanatics website and/or Fanatics reps try to sell it. You can see some of these still on Fanatics site right now.

I don't know the exact rules for each person because I don't and have never received 1 box of allocation from anywhere. I don't know if they all or certain people only have to follow certain rules in terms of selling versus breaking. I know on 2024 Dynasty Baseball a guy had several cases on ebay for under market value. I tried to buy them from him. It was set up weird that if you just bought you had to buy as a personal break. He said the price was only so low because he was required by Topps to sell breaks on the boxes. He couldn't sell the boxes or cases outright. For some reason he would only break a case for 1 buyer instead of taking the time and effort to sell regular breaks for higher prices.

If Fanatics operated like any other card company in history they would run auctions to realize more of the profits. But they won't because of this holding back product to create artificial scarcity method. Short term it may be better for them but long term it is not. Instead of taking most of the pie they want them and their buddies to have 100% of it. How much business long term will they drive away? I guess we will find out in 18-24 months. First year of basketball with an amazing class and first year with football won't really be an indicator. They should care about the long term licenses since they own them but they do not.

But haven't they already created that "artificial scarcity?" Why keep selling products so cheap to breakers when they've already achieved the demand? Take NBA Sapphire...why sell it so cheap? They could have put it up for $3-3.5K on their website and it would have been gone within a day.

[hermanotarjeta]

Originally Posted by mossoholic

Ask anyone that is in this every day as a business off the record and they will all tell you what's really going on with Fanatics/Topps.

Fanatics has to sell to someone to create a market. They are selling most initial stock to these groups because they know via sales or breaking these guys will set a high price on the in demand products and there will be artificial scarcity. Fanatics holds back product to then sell in future waves, at higher prices, at a later date. The in demand products they sell under the table to these guys to still give the illusion of scarcity as only a small amount of people have it. They aren't even forcing all of them to take the bad hobby products in future waves now. Those get dumped on Fanatics website and/or Fanatics reps try to sell it. You can see some of these still on Fanatics site right now.

I don't know the exact rules for each person because I don't and have never received 1 box of allocation from anywhere. I don't know if they all or certain people only have to follow certain rules in terms of selling versus breaking. I know on 2024 Dynasty Baseball a guy had several cases on ebay for under market value. I tried to buy them from him. It was set up weird that if you just bought you had to buy as a personal break. He said the price was only so low because he was required by Topps to sell breaks on the boxes. He couldn't sell the boxes or cases outright. For some reason he would only break a case for 1 buyer instead of taking the time and effort to sell regular breaks for higher prices.

If Fanatics operated like any other card company in history they would run auctions to realize more of the profits. But they won't because of this holding back product to create artificial scarcity method. Short term it may be better for them but long term it is not. Instead of taking most of the pie they want them and their buddies to have 100% of it. How much business long term will they drive away? I guess we will find out in 18-24 months. First year of basketball with an amazing class and first year with football won't really be an indicator. They should care about the long term licenses since they own them but they do not.

Do you believe you can conquer the singles market instead of the sealed product market?

[mossoholic]

Originally Posted by Asian62150

But haven't they already created that "artificial scarcity?" Why keep selling products so cheap to breakers when they've already achieved the demand? Take NBA Sapphire...why sell it so cheap? They could have put it up for $3-3.5K on their website and it would have been gone within a day.

Huh? They need to sell some to have artificial scarcity. Can't be created before any boxes are sold and opened. They are helping these guys create the market. Then fanatics takes advantage later. Fanatics also gets a cut of the breaks on Fanatics Live.

I would guess prices are out well in advance of what we see. The $1000 per box was the price before they knew the market. What happened when they knew it on release day? What 1% of inventory sold to the general public and vast majority held back to sell at a later date? All later on for more than that $3-3.5k per box you mentioned. They could have auctioned it and sold for high prices. Got in the hands of the people that wanted it and all at high prices. But they think they are better off screwing 99.9% of their customers and going the backdoor route. Again short term maybe they are better off, maybe not. Long term I don't think it's in their best interest, but time will tell.

Why do you think they do presales? It helps them gauge the interest and prospective market. Better chance to decide how much to hold back and or when to dump.

If they put it all on the website then they can't have artificial scarcity. They can't take cuts of the breaks of the product sold on the website. If they list it all for sale on the site there are more individual buyers. More likely prices go down. They then can't charge as much on future releases.

[mossoholic]

Originally Posted by hermanotarjeta

Do you believe you can conquer the singles market instead of the sealed product market?

I'd love to meet the person conquering the singles market right now. If you get lucky on a few cards or it's higher end a few sales sure. Even if you find the needle in a haystack now what are the odds you don't buy enough losers to offset it? Grading was always the way to get ahead but it's not now for the vast majority. I went from 80%+ PSA 10 rate for years to 35%. Last time I sent in a handful of the same card and if I showed you the 10 next to the 9s you wouldn't even be able to differentiate them without looking at the grade. Did my eyes all of a sudden get that much worse?

In the past you could usually find people that didn't know what they had if you really put in the effort. Not so much now.

There were different things like Instant cards, Topps Now when they sold the actual good cards, Rewards cards. All that is gone or close to done.

To do it on a daily basis year to year and make at least a few hundred grand a year is close to impossible now. You have to be running some type of scam or getting preferential treatment. Soon after Fanatics has everything the least amount of people in many years will be making a living in the hobby.

[hermanotarjeta]

Originally Posted by mossoholic

I'd love to meet the person conquering the singles market right now. If you get lucky on a few cards or it's higher end a few sales sure. Even if you find the needle in a haystack now what are the odds you don't buy enough losers to offset it? Grading was always the way to get ahead but it's not now for the vast majority. I went from 80%+ PSA 10 rate for years to 35%. Last time I sent in a handful of the same card and if I showed you the 10 next to the 9s you wouldn't even be able to differentiate them without looking at the grade. Did my eyes all of a sudden get that much worse?

In the past you could usually find people that didn't know what they had if you really put in the effort. Not so much now.

There were different things like Instant cards, Topps Now when they sold the actual good cards, Rewards cards. All that is gone or close to done.

To do it on a daily basis year to year and make at least a few hundred grand a year is close to impossible now. You have to be running some type of scam or getting preferential treatment. Soon after Fanatics has everything the least amount of people in many years will be making a living in the hobby.

If we all accept the fact that there will no longer be a money tree from sealed wax going forward, perhaps the challenge of making money in the singles market could be the next frontier for you to conquer. There are certain cards every year that perform better than most other investments. In the singles market, you have a fair opportunity - your insight and perhaps some luck can help you win.

The easy money in wax is gone, we all need to accept that. Beat the game on a fairer playing field - the singles market.

[fabiani12333]

Originally Posted by mossoholic

Ask anyone that is in this every day as a business off the record and they will all tell you what's really going on with Fanatics/Topps.

Fanatics has to sell to someone to create a market. They are selling most initial stock to these groups because they know via sales or breaking these guys will set a high price on the in demand products and there will be artificial scarcity. Fanatics holds back product to then sell in future waves, at higher prices, at a later date. The in demand products they sell under the table to these guys to still give the illusion of scarcity as only a small amount of people have it. They aren't even forcing all of them to take the bad hobby products in future waves now. Those get dumped on Fanatics website and/or Fanatics reps try to sell it. You can see some of these still on Fanatics site right now.

I don't know the exact rules for each person because I don't and have never received 1 box of allocation from anywhere. I don't know if they all or certain people only have to follow certain rules in terms of selling versus breaking. I know on 2024 Dynasty Baseball a guy had several cases on ebay for under market value. I tried to buy them from him. It was set up weird that if you just bought you had to buy as a personal break. He said the price was only so low because he was required by Topps to sell breaks on the boxes. He couldn't sell the boxes or cases outright. For some reason he would only break a case for 1 buyer instead of taking the time and effort to sell regular breaks for higher prices.

If Fanatics operated like any other card company in history they would run auctions to realize more of the profits. But they won't because of this holding back product to create artificial scarcity method. Short term it may be better for them but long term it is not. Instead of taking most of the pie they want them and their buddies to have 100% of it. How much business long term will they drive away? I guess we will find out in 18-24 months. First year of basketball with an amazing class and first year with football won't really be an indicator. They should care about the long term licenses since they own them but they do not.

I highly doubt Topps isn't making the distributors take a certain amount of lower-demand product as well. Just because Topps sells a certain amount of product on their website doesn't mean a good chunk of it isn't also going to distributors as part of regular allocation. Topps doesn't need distributors to sell in-demand product. They don't need them to set initial prices either, as they have their own network of direct accounts. The distributors are valued for how much volume they purchase. And yeah, also because they advertise very high initial prices.