2004-05 Ultra Basketball Forum

It looks like #199-219 of the 2004-05 Ultra Basketball set ("Draft Day Rookies" subset) was actually inserted 2 cards per box in Fleer Tradition instead and we'll need to update each set as needed, but here's the question:

Each of the cards has a gold foil-stamped "Draft Day Rookies" version SN375 and one with no stamping or SN at all. It doesn't appear that this was a bankruptcy/unmarked-getting-out-into-the-aftermarket type of deal, but I don't know for sure.

Beckett and COMC has the unmarked one as part of the base set with SN375 as a parallel. Does anyone with knowledge of this set know if the unmarked were included in Ultra packs at all (possibly Retail?) and Tradition had the SN375? Were the unmarked also in Tradition? Are the unmarked simply from liquidation? The boxes of Tradition only say "Ultra Update, 2 cards per hot pack", nothing about SN.

Hmm, thought I was going to be able to help here as I thought I had bought a few packs of these back in the day and definitely knew I had some of the RCs. However, seems like it was a later release.

I only have the Bernard Robinson and Donta Smith RC but don't know their provenance unfortunately.

I can confirm the Bernard Robinson (#200) I have is not serial numbered (neither is the Smith #210 FWIW) even though we appear to only have the /375 version listed here in the base set.

Here's what I found...this is the back of the 2004-05 fleer tradition packs.

Not sure how "hot packs" were distributed though... Do any of you know how that worked? Or was it random in with all the other packs?

... Okay apparently I can't figure out how to share the photos on here via cellphone so here's what the back of the packs says...

Rookie cards are 1:4

Rookie Draft Day Parallels numbered to 375 are 1:1 in "hot packs" 

The "hot packs" were one per box in Fleer Tradition. And the numbered "Draft Day" Yuta Tabuse card in my hot pack was the only Ultra card in the whole box I opened. It was just regular Fleer Tradition rookies in the other 35 packs.

Thank You! 

So it sounds like the SN375 ones were one per Tradition hot pack, which makes sense.

Now....where did all the unstamped ones come from?

Bumping this one so we can look into closing out a page 1 IR. Were the unstamped ones aftermarket or Retail?

As I am 99% sure I got my ones from a bargin bin in a (now long closed) card shop here in NZ I think it unlikely they were dabbling in aftermarket post-bankruptcy cards. From that I would lean they came from packs of some sort but obviously can not confirm that in any useful way.

I figured it out!

From the Hobby box description:

Rookie Hot Pack (1:36 hobby packs)
Hot Pack Inserts (Overall Memorabilia odds, 1:2 hot packs)
- 20 Ultra Update Rookie Cards, 2:1 hot pack
- 30 Tradition Rookie Cards, 4:1 hot pack
- 18 Tradition Trio Rookie Cards, 1:1 hot pack
- 68 Rookie Draft Day Parallel numbered to 375 (1:1 hot pack)
- Throwback Threads Single Event-Worn 1:2

Fleer Tradition's yellow Draft Day Parallel (#221-268) is only 48 cards, so the other 20 are the Ultra ones with SN375, and each Hot Pack has one card from this group of 68. The 20 "Ultra Update" are the ones without the stamping and are 2 per Hot Pack.

The checklists have been created under Tradition, and IRs are in to move everything from Ultra to there.

Thanks all!