NBA at 50 Signature Basketball Collection

The NBA at 50 Signature Basketball Collection is a set of basketballs autographed by 49 of the 50 basketball players the National Basketball Association (NBA) named to its "50 Greatest Players in NBA History," to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Association in 1997. The NBA at 50 Signature Collection was created by Oklahoma City, Oklahoma-based sports memorabilia company Hardwood Authentics. Hardwood Authentics produced 50 sets, with 4 autographed and signature-certified basketballs in each set. The collection has been hailed by Hardwood Authentics as the "Holy Grail of sports memorabilia" because some sports memorabilia company executives and enthusiasts believe duplicating the collection would be an impossible feat. Between them, this distinguished group had accumulated over One hundred NBA championship rings, more than 400 hundred NBA All-Star Game selections and nearly one million points scored. The signed players are the following: Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Nate Archibald, Paul Arizin, Charles Barkley, Rick Barry, Elgin Baylor, Dave Bing, Larry Bird, Wilt Chamberlain, Bob Cousy, Dave Cowens, Karl Malone, Moses Malone, Kevin McHale, George Mikan, Earl Monroe, Hakeem Olajuwon, Shaquille O'Neal, Robert Parish, Bob Pettit, Scottie Pippen, Billy Cunningham, Dave DeBusschere, Clyde Drexler, Julius Erving, Patrick Ewing, Walt Frazier, George Gervin, Hal Greer, John Havlicek, Elvin Hayes, Magic Johnson, Sam Jones, Michael Jordan, Jerry Lucas, Willis Reed, Oscar Robertson, David Robinson, Bill Russell, Dolph Schayes, Bill Sharman, John Stockton, Isiah Thomas, Nate Thurmond, Wes Unseld, Bill Walton, Jerry West, Lenny Wilkens and James Worthy. The only player whose signature was not obtained by Hardwood Authentics was Pete Marivich, who was deceased before the selection of the "50 Greatest Players in NBA History." Since the time Hardwood Authentics President and Owner Tim Flatt began building the NBA at 50 Signature Basketball Collection in 1997, four signing players have died. They were Wilt Chamberlain, Dave DeBusschere, George Mikan and Paul Arizin. This fact, beyond the sheer financial and logistical difficulties of the project, is one reason Hardwood Authentics and other observers of the sports memorabilia scene believe that an equivalent collection could never be created.
Building the Collection
According to Flatt, he formed the idea for this collection after seeing an add in USA TODAY in which lithographs signed by 49 of the 50 Greatest Players in NBA History were being sold by Field of Dreams, Inc for as much as $25,000 per lithograph. Although he was originally skeptical that the lithographs could sell at such a price, Flatt began considering an even more ambitious enterprise after learning that the lithograph set had sold out. According to Flatt, "I decided at that point that we would do these basketballs, make them more limited and keep them to 50, and in the end we would have something that was definitely more valuable than the lithograph because it was more limited and more collectable." According to sports memorabilia magazine, Beckett Elite, Hardwood Authentics encountered significant and un-anticipated difficulty in completing this ambitious project. Some members of the 50 Greatest list, such as Dave Bing and Billy Cunningham, did not look fondly upon the sports memorabilia industry. However, the principal difficulty encountered by Hardwood Authentics was the pricing of signing sessions with the NBA greats. In the early years of the project, beginning with the signing of George "The Iceman" Gervin at the 1997 NBA All-Star game, Hardwood Authentics typically paid the signing stars around $20,000 for the signings. However, in the latter stages of the project, signings by recently retired stars such as John Stockton, Scottie Pippen and Karl Malone cost Hardwood between $30,000-$50,000 each. The last player to sign was one of the toughest autographs in sports, former New York Knicks Center, Patrick Ewing, for a reported $250,000. In spite of such obstacles, Hardwood Authentics completed what some industry experts had once considered an impossible accomplishment.
Significance
The NBA at 50 Signature Basketball Collection has been deemed one of the most, if not the single most, valuable autographed sports collections in history. The lithograph collection by Field of Dreams, Inc which triggered the NBA at 50 Signature Basketball Collection project was, in its time, considered to be the most significant autographed sports collection in existence. However, several factors indicate that Hardwood Authentics' signed basketball set will far surpass the lithograph set in value. First, the smaller quantity of the basketball set, (50 basketballs to around 250 signed lithographs), would typically generate a greater demand than that produced by the lithograph set. Another factor is that signed sports memorabilia tends to hold much greater value than do signed lithographs or photos. Hardwood Authentics maintains that signed memorabilia like the basketballs may be expected to earn premiums 500%-800% greater than those earned by signed lithographs. Perhaps the most significant factor in the value of the NBA at 50 Signature Basketball Set is timing. Before the project was ever launched, one of the NBA's 50 Greatest Players, Pete Maravich, had already died. Since that time, an additional 4 of Maravich's fellow greats have also died. Thus, the time window to complete a comparable project has passed. Moreover, Hardwood Authentics and other industry experts have noted that the relative youth of the NBA made this project possible. For example, a similar project featuring the greats of Major League Baseball could not possibly be completed due to the absence of such luminaries as the deceased Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb, Cy Young, Honus Wagner, Lou Gehrig, Ted Williams or Mickey Mantle. Neither could a collector hope to duplicate the NBA at 50 Signature Basketball Collection with the autographs of NFL greats. Any such project would surely include players such as Johnny Unitas, Walter Payton, Sammy Baugh or Reggie White. Thus, it appears that with the NFL at 50 Signature Basketball Set Hardwood Authentics has achieved a sports memorabilia collection that will remain unparalleled for the conceivable future.

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