Vick's Cards Yanked From Donruss, UD, Topps Products

Jul 27 2007 4:37PM

Michael Vick spent the first six years of his captivating NFL career performing feats of extraordinary athleticism that made him one of the most collectible and collected players in all of sports.

His cards have been among the most desirable on the football market seemingly from the beginning. Certainly no other player in the history of football cards has had a more profound impact on the Beckett Football Hot List than Vick.

In the 12-year history of Beckett Football's 20-card Hot List, Vick cards have been responsible for 15 appearances at No. 1 (including 10 alone by his 2001 SP Authentic JSY AU RC), by far the most of any other player. In addition, 34 unique Vick cards have appeared on the Hot List; David Carr is second with 21.

The value of Vick's once-enormous appeal certainly wasn't lost on the folks at Donruss, who as recently as 2006 had a deal with the now-embroiled Falcons quarterback to appear on the company's packaging and advertising.

That, of course, was long before Vick landed in the center of a dog-fighting controversy that threatens to dramatically impact the rest of his career, to say nothing of his collectibility.

Friday afternoon, Donruss officials confirmed that they have removed Vick from all future 2007 products, beginning with the October release of 2007 Donruss Gridiron Gear. A few hours later, Upper Deck removed Vick from its 2007 card releases and pulled all Vick items from its UD Authenticated memorabilia product line.

The hits kept rolling on Monday when Topps announced that it, too, has pulled all Vick cards from remaining 2007 products, effective with Topps Chrome Football shipping August 13.

"If anybody who knows about the current Vick situation knows Donruss, they know that this is a decision we had to make because of Ann [Powell] and her love of dogs," says Scott Prusha, Donruss' communications manager. "This decision came straight from Ann."

Powell, who owns Donruss, is an avid dog lover whose Labrador Retrievers – Bailey, Diesel, Koda Bear, Lhotse and Snoozer – accompany her to work every day and enjoy virtually free reign inside Donruss headquarters.

Donruss has an existing autograph agreement with Vick, and much of the company's plans for the remainder of 2007 included inserting both autograph and memorabilia cards of Vick into every remaining product.

"[Value] wasn't even a consideration," Prusha says. "We met as a company and the idea was brought up to pull him. There was no opposition from anybody in the room. It was unanimous that we were behind the decision."

Kerri Stockholm, Upper Deck's Director of Marketing, said, "Of course we appreciate the fact that Mr. Vick is innocent until proven guilty, but the allegations alone have resulted in an outpouring of very strong emotion within our organization and among the collecting community. We believe collectors will agree and support this decision as being the best course of action for our football business."

Dan Hitt, Beckett Media's Sports Data Manager, says that while he applauds the companies' decision to pull Vick from future products, he's doubtful that it will have a huge impact either way on the value of Vick's trading cards.

"Vick seems to be doing all he can to crush the value of his cards," Hitt says. "Even the most recent basic Vick autographed card values have dropped more than 50 percent in value in the past year.

"Cutting off the quantity of new card releases for Vick won't endear collectors to the Falcons' quarterback. Not too many collectors would be excited about pulling any sort of Vick card out of a pack right now anyway, so nearly any replacement player would be welcomed."

Hitt notes that copies of Vick's 2001 SP Authentic RC, which once held a Beckett Value of $1,600 and currently books between $500 and $1,000, have recently traded in the $480 to $590 range.

For what it's worth, trading cards aren't the only sector of the memorabilia business reacting to the Vick situation. Earlier this week, the NFL's online store removed all Vick items from NFL.com, and Reebok recently announced that they have temporarily ceased distribution of Vick jerseys.

– Tracy Hackler

Officials from Topps and Players Inc were contacted for this story but were unavailable for comment Friday afternoon. Stay tuned to Beckett.com for updates to this story.