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Last Updated On: November 8th, 2024
With the arrival of each new season, much of the hobby turns its attention to speculation of rookie cards. In recent memory, the NBA has produced a slew of absolutely electric young stars, including Luka Doncic, Anthony Edwards, and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander.
While the NBA’s future hasn’t looked this bright since the ‘90s, there’s a generation of what The Athletic’s Marcus Thompson II termed the “Uncle Brigade” – fading superstars worth enjoying simply because their greatness suddenly has an expiration date – that deserves some attention.
In this post, we’ll highlight three future Hall of Fame players — Kevin Durant, Giannis Antetokounmpo, and Russell Westbrook — whose card values have dipped roughly to pre-2020 levels. Further, we’ll offer some guidance on which of those players’ cards we’d focus our energy and money on as the season gets underway.
Let’s dive in!
Table of Contents
Overview: Buying The Dip
While many in the hobby chase high-flying rookies or hunt for in-prime superstars, there’s significant value to be found on the margins. Case in point: we try to highlight that year’s Hall of Fame class ahead of each new season and identify players worth targeting.
That’s because prospective Hall of Famers have two things going for them: First, they’re no longer playing, meaning they tend to be out of the spotlight; second, their legacies are cemented, hence their inclusion in the Hall of Fame, which means their cards will likely appreciate in value over time.
This sweet spot is what we like to call “The Dip.” The Dip is when a player’s card value is in a price correction and could be undervalued. And as any econ major will tell you, it’s always best to buy low and sell high.
We see three players whose cards are currently in The Dip: Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook, and Giannis Antetokounmpo. How did we arrive at this trio? The first thing we did was research the worst performing Card Ladder player indexes over the last five years to single out the most notable names on the list.
Then, we considered each player’s legacy: all are former MVPs with storied careers, while Giannis and KD are also champions (we’ll discuss each player’s unique story later).
As a result, we’re presented with some excellent opportunities to purchase their cards at potentially undervalued prices. There’s no secret here; all three will end up in the Hall of Fame one day. If you buy into The Dip, you might find yourself with a nice return on investment down the line given everyone has forgotten about these superstars’ cards.
Keep in mind that the card market moves quickly. As flippers look to chase high octane youngsters like Victor Wembanyama or exciting rookies like football’s Caleb Williams for a quick buck, The Dip offers something a bit different. The idea here is to make an investment in a player for the long haul.
3 Future HOF Hoopers Worth a Look
Let’s talk about the individual players themselves in more detail. We’ll start with the lowest-priced player first: Russell Westbrook.
Russell Westbrook
Over the course of his 17-year career, few players have been as beloved, reviled, and polarizing as Russell Westbrook.
It’s best to think of Westbrook’s career as three distinct phases. First, as the high-flying youngster from UCLA who joined forces with Kevin Durant and James Harden to form an extremely gifted corps in Oklahoma City. After Durant left OKC for the Warriors, Westbrook moved into Phase 2 of his career by taking over the Thunder’s mantle en route to six All-Star nods, and an MVP award in 2016.
Finally, the twilight of Westbrook’s career has seen him turn into a woefully inefficient sixth man, with stops in Washington, Houston, Los Angeles (twice), and now Denver over the last six seasons.
At his peak, however, Westbrook was a triple-double machine (albeit a turnover-prone one) who electrified crowds with his swashbuckling style and gritty attitude. He’s a surefire Hall of Famer who was included among the league’s 75 best players ever in 2022.
His lack of championship rings makes prognosticating about Westbrook’s legacy difficult. His lone Finals appearance came in 2013 when the LeBron James-led Miami Heat nearly swept the Thunder. The glaring omission of a championship trophy will inevitably put a ceiling on Westbrook’s legacy, where he’ll join the likes of Charles Barkley and Steve Nash as all-timer players who never reached the mountaintop.
The concern here is that Westbrook will be remembered as the ultimate “Good Stats, Bad Team” player who stuffed the box score with eye-popping figures but never had the juice to truly uplift his teams’ performances.
Westbrook’s Card Index via Card Ladder
Let’s turn to Westbrook’s Card Ladder Index to see The Dip in action. Remember, the Card Ladder Index takes the aggregate performance of all of Westbrook’s cards in the database for a given time period.
So we see Westbrook’s chart, a dictionary definition of The Dip. That Westbrook’s index spiked in 2021 isn’t surprising, considering everyone’s value spiked in 2021, but stands out from a player performance standpoint in how far it has fallen since.
Something interesting happens when we take a closer look at Westbrook’s recent index history. From 5,000 feet, it appears relatively stagnant, clinging to the 8,000-9,000 mark. But upon closer inspection, we see Westbrook’s recent index values trending up.
It’s impossible to point to any singular reason for this bump. On the one hand, Westbrook joined the Denver Nuggets this summer, and so long as Nikola Jokic suits up in the Mile High City, Denver is a contender. Or perhaps the bump is due to generalized fan excitement for a new season. Still, another reason could be something as intangible as fan appreciation of Westbrook’s game, which bodes well for collectors in the long term.
Giannis Antetokounmpo
For the past six seasons, Giannis Antetokounmpo has been among the three or four best players in professional basketball. Consider this: since 2018, The Greek Freak hasn’t finished worse than fourth in MVP voting, including when he took the prize in 2019 and 2020.
He’s a perennial All-Star whose double-doubles have propelled his teams to deep playoff runs, including a championship in 2021. There’s absolutely no doubt in my mind that Giannis will be remembered as not just one of the best players of this generation but among the best of all time.
Here’s where things get a bit tricky: Unlike Westbrook, who’s clearly at the end of his professional basketball career, Giannis is only 29. I’m pretty bearish on this iteration of the Milwaukee Bucks (teammates Damian Lillard and Khris Middleton aren’t the players they once were, and the Eastern Conference is as stacked as ever). So, if you’re asking whether Giannis can further burnish his reputation with another ring in the next year, I’d say probably not.
However, if we’re talking holistically, I believe there’s an excellent chance that Giannis will add another Finals championship to his resume before his career ends. Moreover, if he is traded, NBA insider Marc Stein has pegged the Miami Heat, Golden State Warriors, and New York Knicks among the “credible” suitors for Giannis’ services. Moving from a relatively small media market like Milwaukee to the likes of San Francisco, New York, or Miami could bring more attention to Giannis’ career (if possible) and boost his card values simultaneously.
Antetokounmpo’s Card Index via Card Ladder
If we examine Giannis’ index, we see a player whose cards once doubled, tripled, and quadrupled in value between 2020 and 2023. But a quieter-than-expected series of playoff appearances combined with the likes of Luka Doncic and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander rising to stardom has seen Giannis’ values take a hit.
That said, I’m extremely bullish on Giannis’ values in the short and longer term. Long term, he’s a Hall of Famer whose cards are on track to match someone like Julius Erving – a one time Finals winner who is beloved to basketball fans. Speaking of Erving, here’s the Sixers legend’s index:
While Erving’s figures are certainly lower than Giannis’, they follow a trend line we’d hope for Hall of Fame legacy players. See how his cards have survived the post-2020s Dip? Today, the cards are three times as valuable as in 2020, which is an excellent return on investment. We’re attempting to forecast this sort of track with Durant, Westbrook, and Antetokounmpo.
In the short term, there’s still lots of fun to be had with Giannis’ cards. Should Giannis find himself traded to a legitimate contender, his stock should catapult. There’s plenty of legacy left for Giannis to attain, and considering he’s already a champion, anything additional he achieves is mere gravy.
Kevin Durant
If Westbrook and Giannis’ legacies are a bit up in the air (for vastly different reasons), Kevin Durant’s is decidedly not. You name it, Durant’s probably done it:
- Rookie of the Year? ✅
- MVP? ✅
- Finals winner? ✅
- Finals MVP? ✅
Through 17 seasons, Durant has cemented himself as probably the best-scoring wing of all time, having averaged 27.3 points per game over the course of his entire career. With the end in sight, Durant has a slim shot of adding a few more accolades to his resume, but another championship is unlikely.
This brings us to the Durant legacy discussion. While his on-court resume is enviable, Durant’s been at the center of multiple tumultuous situations. First, he left the Oklahoma City Thunder for the Golden State Warriors at the height of the latter’s 2010s dominance (and immediately after the Warriors eliminated the Thunder from the playoffs). Then, he put together a supposed super team in Brooklyn with James Harden and Kyrie Irving, only to see it implode during the pandemic.
After taking virtually no accountability for the Nets fiasco, Durant forced his way to Phoenix, where he’ll likely spend the remainder of his career toiling in the desert, hunting for an oasis that probably doesn’t exist.
Such will be the great debate about Durant’s career. Yes, he’ll be a legend, but we may also wonder what might have been if we could replay the Slim Reaper’s career.
Durant’s Card Index via Card Ladder
No surprises here: Durant’s Card Ladder Index shows a very clear case of The Dip back to 2020 prices. 2021 and ‘22 represent his high water mark, and for good reason: it was the heyday of Durant’s Nets experiment. Had things panned out, there’s a chance his index doesn’t have such a pronounced decline over the last two years.
The pronounced decline with Durant’s cards makes for an excellent entry point to invest in his rookies given their relatively low pop counts across the board.
Types of Cards to Target
There are a few ways to target Giannis, KD, and Westbrook cards. One method is basing your decision purely on pop count and growth, a topic we dove into recently. If pop count is your jam, you’ll want to target cards with relatively low pop counts and reasonable growth over time. This ensures that your card’s scarcity remains constant.
Pop count is a fun exercise for these cards as each player’s rookie season commenced before the 2020s surge, meaning we can actually see some enticing pop counts for rookie cards. Take, for instance, the 2013 Prizm Giannis Antetokounmpo #290 Base BGS 10 RC, which carries a pop count of 254 and sold last for $635, the same area it went for in March 2019. While we are dubious of BGS generally, the BGS 10 still goes for a small premium to a PSA 10.
Other low pop cards we like are the 2007 Topps Kevin Durant #2 Orange Border PSA 10 RC (34 cards, and one of KD’s more popular rookies) and the 2008 Bowman Chrome Russell Westbrook #114 Xfractor /299 in BGS 9.5 (37 cards).
If your pockets are a bit deeper, you may wish to use The Dip to target higher-end cards whose prices are presently undervalued. To this end, RPA (rookie patch autograph) cards could be your answer. RPA cards tend to hold their value extremely well over time, as many are serial-numbered to ensure scarcity and as an affinity for the player grows over time.
Westbrook’s 2008 Exquisite Collection #93 RPA /225 in BGS 9.5/Auto 10 recently went for $3,000, which is just a shade higher than it sold for in 2017. The Giannis 2013 Immaculate Collection #131 RPA /99 in BGS 9.5/Auto 10 sold recently for $9,600, which is less than it sold for in March 2019.
Ultimately, the decision is in your hands to pick the cards you believe will stand the test of time. As always, we recommend doing your research on Card Ladder to verify pop count and growth, sales history, and demand.
Trending Westbrook, Giannis & KD Cards on eBay
The following eBay auction results are curated to display Westbrook, Giannis, and KD cards getting the most bids on eBay. The results order and price ranges can be adjusted with the form filters below.
Summary
To sum up, fading superstars make for excellent investment opportunities, especially when you can buy The Dip on a cemented legacy. In this case, I would rank the players by investment: Giannis Antetokounmpo, Kevin Durant, and Russell Westbrook.
This likely tracks based on the case for each, but as a reminder, I like the chances Giannis adds another trophy or two to his mantle before retiring. If this is the case, Giannis’ cards’ current values represent a tremendous buy-now option for both the intermediate and long term. In Durant’s case, I’m convinced we’ll remember him fondly, if quizzically, which should make for an excellent longer-term investment. As for Westbrook, his lack of a championship somewhat hardcaps his cards’ future value.
One of the best aspects of this exercise is that anyone can do it. Be sure to take some time and research the Card Ladder to find players whose Dip might be worth buying. Over the next few seasons, we’ll see a definite change of guards in the league, which could open up others (Stephen Curry, LeBron James, Chris Paul) to the same sort of analysis.
Let us know if you think of any in the comments below! Or, if you’d put the players listed here in a different order, be sure to drop us a comment and explain why.