Pop Report: MJ Cards Soar While Overall Grading Numbers Fall

PSA graded 196,762 cards last week, a 19% decrease compared to the prior seven-day stretch. If you’re looking for reasons for the slight drop, you won’t find them in Michael Jordan’s or Joe Burrow’s directions. Both guys paced the grading markets in their respected sports.

Read this week’s Pop Report from GemRate for more news on PSA’s latest grading trends.

From a category perspective:

• Hockey was the only major sport to see an increase compared to last week.

The mix of the top 50 players (and characters) graded during the period were as follows

18 – basketball

15 – baseball

7 – football

6 – tcg

2 – soccer

1 – golf

1 – misc

Below you’ll find a list of the top players graded for each category. 

An important consideration is what to make of this list. In the current situation where fears of junk slabs dominate the hobby, ranking high on this list likely is negatively correlated with price as that signals a meaningful number of slabs could move into the market in the near future. However, under normal circumstances, it could potentially be a leading indicator of positive price correlation as the list more accurately represents forward looking activity (i.e. bets being placed on players) and price potential.

BASKETBALL

Top 10 Most Graded Players & Top Graded Card (during the 1-week period)

Noteworthy moves

• UP: Michael Jordan, LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, Lamelo Ball, RJ Barrett, Shaquille O’Neal, Anthony Edwards
• DOWN: Ja Morant, Zion Williamson, Luka Doncic
• OUT: Coby White, Tyler Herro

BASEBALL

Top 10 Most Graded Players & Top Graded Card (during the 1 week period)

Noteworthy moves

• UP: Bo Bichette, Shohei Ohtani, Ken Griffey Jr, Yordan Alvarez, Jasson Dominguez
• DOWN: Fernando Tatis Jr, Mike Trout, Juan Soto, Kyle Lewis 
• OUT: Randy Arozarena, Ronald Acuna Jr

FOOTBALL

Top 10 Most Graded Players & Top Graded Card (during the 1 week period)

Noteworthy moves

• UP: Tom Brady, Jalen Hurts
• DOWN: Justin Herbert, Tua Tagovailoa

SOCCER

Top 10 Most Graded Players & Top Graded Card (during the 1 week period)

Noteworthy moves

• UP: Jude Bellingham, Jadon Sancho
• DOWN: Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo, Christian Pulisic, Giovanni Reyna, Pedri  
• OUT: Phil Foden

Note: Hockey and soccer lists are more volatile because grading activity is lower. Much smaller moves in grading activity can have a big impact on these lists.

HOCKEY

Top 10 Most Graded Players & Top Graded Card (during the 1 week period)

Noteworthy moves

• UP: Sidney Crosby, Jaromir Jagr, Eric Lindros, Kirill Kaprizov, Evgeni Malkin, Dominik Hasek
• DOWN: Connor McDavid, Alexander Ovechkin, Mario Lemieux
• OUT: Adam Fox, Cale Makar, Auston Matthews

Note: Hockey and soccer lists are more volatile because grading activity is lower. Much smaller moves in grading activity can have a big impact on these lists.

Data in the Sports Card Investor Pop Report series is provided by GemRate. Follow GemRate on Instagram and Twitter for more on the latest cards graded by PSA.

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