Hoops Hobby

The 2001-02 Indiana Pacers were a team on the rise. An emerging Jermaine O’Neal gave them a foundational piece inside, with Reggie Miller and Jalen Rose providing scoring on the perimeter. Travis Best was a solid player but would not be the future at point guard for the team. Enter a rookie from Iowa State named Jamaal Tinsley.

2001 also coincided with a period where I was highly engaged in the hobby, making trades online, going to card shows with my dad. Tinsley wouldn’t be the last Pacers rookie I would collect, but he’s the first I really remember going out of my way to collect in his rookie season as it was happening.

Big Game indeed. 23 assists, which would remain his career high for his whole career. The play that really stands out to me all these years later though, is at the 7:55 mark of that video, where on a fast break he wraps the ball around his waist to fake a pass to Al Harrington and then finishes with a finger-roll.

I’m going to forget about the fact that the photo on the 2005-06 Topps Big Game card isn’t from the Wizards game and just enjoy the shine on this blue parallel.

Fortunately, I’ve shared a card that does feature that moment here on the blog before, so here it is again, his 2001-02 Upper Deck Series 2 card (not labeled an official RC).

Like I mentioned, I was on the lookout for any Tinsley rookie I could find that season, and while of course I didn’t get them all, I did pick up some fun cards to look back at now.

The first is an XRC, a redemption card from 2000-01 Upper Deck Legends. The light blue basketball as the background makes this card stand out for me when I see it in a binder page. These exchange cards were so exciting to see at the time, too, seeing the number and then wondering who that player was or could be.

I’ll try to share these in groups, now. These are three I want to highlight from the group of Fleer products. To this day, Fleer Authentix goes down as one of my top products, partly because I pulled some really fun cards out of the couple of hobby boxes I opened over those years, but also because no other products with ticket themed cards have come close since, especially on the rookie cards.

Fleer Platinum has rookie cards with a 1986-87 Fleer design, and Tinsley is dressed to match that red white and blue design in this photo. The rookies are short printed, 1:6 packs for hobby and 1:15 for retail.

And Fleer Premium is one of my favorite products from the early 2000s, with the shift from Skybox Premium to Fleer Premium starting with the 2000-01 season. The 2001-02 product brought the return of Star Rubies with a much different look and feel, with a red border. The veterans are /100 while the rookies are out of 50. The 2001-02 Rubies, for me anyway, have been much harder to track down at the right price than the 2002-03 cards. As far as the base cards, the design is sharp, with the nice black border and foil background.

I recently added an Authentix rookie parallel from COMC, the Front Row /100. The difference is the gray text at the top and bottom, along with the Pacers logo and border behind Tinsley and main rectangular portion of the card. Normally I’m not a fan of clashing colors and would much prefer a neutral color like a gray, but in this case, I think I prefer the red on the base card, aesthetically. I’m still missing the Second Row parallel out of 200, which has gold instead of the red/gray.

Topps really nailed its products during the 2001-02 season. The Topps Heritage design, modeling the 1974-75 Topps set, continues to be card I stop and look at whenever I flip through my rookie card binder. Just love the colors on this one.

Tinsley’s rookie year coincided with the debut of Topps Pristine, with three levels of rookie cards, along with refractors and gold refractors. Within the last year I added the last base rookie I needed (rare), to go along with the trio of refractors. All that’s left for me is the Gold refractors. The one pictured here is the common refractor.

The Topps Xpectations release lasted two seasons, and I mention it here purely for the nostalgia for me. The veterans in the set had action shots while the rookies looked like the Tinsley above. Just an affordable, lower-end product for collectors with a shot at nice autograph and memorabilia cards.

Upper Deck Series 1 is the classic ‘Star Rookie’ for Tinsley. For Upper Deck basketball, Star Rookies as a short-printed subset started in 2000-01. It’s one of the few cards from the big three manufacturers where Tinsley is in Iowa State gear.

Ovation had three variations of rookies- Profiles, Statistics, and Scouting Report. This is the Profiles variation. All three variations have the same card number and are all out of 625. No parallels for this set either. Imagine that!

Sweet Shot has the look and feel of a premium brand. I just love the design on this 2001-02 Tinsley rookie. Simple, classy looking design. These are out of 1200 while the top picks are out of 600. Rookies had memorabilia versions as well with the same card number and print run. I do not own the Tinsley.

Tinsley’s SP Authentic rookie autograph is in my Pacers autograph binder. It’s definitely the best design of my Tinsley autographs and of most any of his rookie cards, in my opinion. Speaking of autographs, his is one of the best looking in my collection.

Tinsley’s Basketball Diary insert from 2002-03 Upper Deck captures his second career triple double, later on in his rookie year.

Look at the checklist on this 14 card insert set: Jordan, Kobe, Garnett, Dirk, Shaq, Pau Gasol, Marbury, Stackhouse, Francis, Jason Richardson (was a hot pull at the time), Brand, Vince, Tim Duncan, and… Jamaal Tinsley. Tells you how highly thought of Tinsley was thought of at the time.

Only four players from the 2001-02 draft class are featured in the 2002-03 Hoops Hot Prospects Class Of memorabilia set. The first is Tinsley and Pau Gasol, the other is Jason Richdardson and Tony Parker. At this point, Tinsley was recognized as being one of the best players from the 2001 draft, and rightfully so.

Looking back at my Tinsley collection, and in particular, the rookie year cards, I enjoy flipping through the rookie year binder to see all the Tinsley rookie cards I mostly traded for back at that time. Still looking to fill in a lot of gaps, as well. The 2001-02 card year was full of fantastic products, and it’s a big reason why Tinsley is my 4th largest player collection, behind Reggie Miller, Tim Duncan, and Jermaine O’Neal.

What’s your favorite year of basketball card products and why? I’d love to hear about it.