Blog Bat-A-Round: Favorite Set of the Decade?

This decade is rapidly approaching the end. It will be the 2020s by this time next week...so I thought it would make a nice Blog Bat-A-Round to see what everyone considers their favorite set from the decade.

For me there were a couple of sets that I considered, but I kept coming back to one: 2012-13 Hoops. Besides the fact that it's Panini's best NBA effort, it's also the set that brought me back to the NBA after walking away in 2006. The pure enjoyment the set brought me as I was chasing it when new, and in the years that have followed, is unmatched by any other set issued in the Teens.

As I wrote when I did my Top 20 Favorite NBA sets countdown, "Why I like it: There are many reasons. The biggest, of course, is that it's the one that got me back in. The fact that it includes coaches. The fact that it's (mostly) sorted by team. The fact that it was the first card for so many of the players who now make up the NBA in my collection. The color coding to each team."

All that still holds true. Nothing else from this decade has had as much of an impact on my hobby than this set. Not even the hockey cards, although the companion set- 2012-13 Score- is my 2nd favorite hockey set of all time and did play a role in my beginning to collect that sport...it didn't have as much of an impact as the Hoops set did. 

     
     
Although this scan is not up to my current standards, it's the one I used in my Top 20 sets countdown, so I thought it would be fitting to use it again....for some reason I can't get it centered, though. I'm one card away from completing the set, and I'm working on a trade to bring that card to me.

So, what's your favorite set of the decade?

NBA 20th Anniversary Countdown #13: 2012-13 Hoops

In a way, this set is directly responsible for Cardboard History's creation. It's the set that got me back into the NBA!

#13: 2012-13 Hoops

Why I like it: There are many reasons. The biggest, of course, is that it's the one that got me back in. The fact that it includes coaches. The fact that it's (mostly) sorted by team. The fact that it was the first card for so many of the players who now make up the NBA in my collection. The color coding to each team.

Set size/completion: 301 cards, I have 281 of them, 93.4% completion according to the Trading Card Database.

There is so much about this set, that makes it stand out among the other Panini era cards. It is, in fact, the only Panini produced set to make the Top 20...although if we can get a series 2 of Complete that actually completes the NBA, that will move into the top 15 as well.

This one requires a bit of a backstory...find a comfortable place to sit because this one has a lot of text.

In late 2006, sometime between September, when I got my last box, and Christmas, I was not enjoying collecting NBA cards anymore, or watching the games for that matter. I was unhappy with the cards being produced, and how the game was being played- to me at the time, it seemed like it was less about basketball and more about getting on the SportsCenter highlight reels. I told my family not to buy me any more cards, (then and now, the majority of my new additions come from my mom and brother buying me cards). I hadn't sorted my cards in years, my digital records were gone, (as I detailed a few posts ago) and to make matters worse, I could no longer afford to get a box of every set produced, or more than one, which is what I did pretty much from 1999-00 through 2005-06, although I did miss a few sets in that time frame.

I put my cards away and I at the time thought it was done and over with. I still watched some games but that trailed off too, I think during 2008-09 I watched only two games all season long, including the playoffs. My involvement with basketball was at an all time low. For instance, I knew that a team had moved to Oklahoma and became the Thunder, but I didn't know which team. I would not find that out until I started getting this very set and realized the SuperSonics were missing, actually.

But my love of basketball was too ingrained in me to stay away forever. I say that I was away from the game from 2006-12 but that's not entirely accurate...I was away from NBA cards from 2006-12 but I began watching the games again in 2009-10...but at that point I was only watching the Finals. In 2010-11 I watched most of the playoffs and I enjoyed it immensely. The Dallas Mavericks ran to the Championship and Jason Kidd, the best player on my all-time favorite team (2001-02 Nets) finally got his Championship ring. I still wasn't touching the cards, though.

Then came Lockout #2. The first lockout in the 1998-99 season hurt the world of cards immensely. I don't want to give away too much of the remaining dozen sets, but I will say this is the highest ranked set that was issued after Lockout #1. This time, the lockout helped the game. Even though it was shorter, when it came back for 66 games in the 2011-12 season, the games were fun to watch again. I enjoyed every game I watched, and I began watching the regular season again. (unlike most people I generally prefer the regular season). But I was still not collecting the cards.

Then we went to Lake George, NY, my favorite place in the world, for our formerly annual yearly vacation. (Since I got sick in 2013 we have not returned, but I am hopeful I will be able to make that trip again soon). While there we discovered a new card shop. He had some good rare cards at prices I simply could not pass up...I'm talking an X-fractor for a dime. I still mostly got NASCAR from him, which I never stopped collecting during this time period. Then we visited the local Target there, and in Wilton. They had a couple of older packs marked down to 99 cents. I don't remember how many I got but I remember getting a pack of 2008-09 Upper Deck, and then opening it in the car while my mom did the grocery shopping for our stay, and reading the backs of every one of the cards. It was only my second NBA pack since 2006. This was September 2011. (My mom had gotten me a pack of 2009-10 Panini in 2010) I decided then that I would get the packs discounted at Target but I wouldn't pay full retail price for any.

That lasted for about a month.

2012-13 Hoops was issued earlier than normal- most of the time the sets for the new season start showing up in October, but this one, according to the Database, was issued in August 2012. I know it was on the shelves in Lake George area Targets for our September trip. And not only that, they were 44 card rack packs for, I believe, $2. I couldn't resist that...I got some. Then I got some more.

Then, about 3 weeks after we came home from what would turn out to be our most recent trip to Lake George, I really discover the Trading Card Database. I had found the site in August 2011 and joined then but I only used it for reference until October 2012. It was then that I discovered all the other incredible features, and I set out listing my entire collection on there. I started with the NBA. This was the first time I had really looked through my paper listing in more than 5 years. It brought back so many memories, good memories, in some cases the only good memories I have of certain time periods was my cards.

That was it...I was back full time, and I have been back in the NBA ever since. I may not be able to afford to collect like I once did- having to spend $500 or more a month on medicine cuts way down on any hobby, and in fact caused me to essentially give up one of them- but I get what I can. And I find that I appreciate what I get now more than I did the first time around. Before, I would rush through each new pack as soon as I got it to see what I got, most of the time not even taking the time to read the cards. For instance I did an entire box of 2002-03 Topps Chrome while my mom was getting us fast food. Now, I've got packs I purchased in 2013 that I have not even opened yet. I've got an entire sealed box of Olympic cards that arrived in the mail in February 2014 that I have not opened. I appreciate the cards more now.

I realize now that the unhappiness I was having with the cards, and with the game...it was ME, not the cards or game. I've gotten some of the cards I missed and there is nothing inherently wrong with them. I've seen some of the games from that time repeated as "Hardwood Classics" on NBA TV and again, there is nothing wrong with them at all. It was me. If only I knew then what I knew now. A classic line, I fully understand it's meaning now.

All of the cards I've gotten from this set came from retail. I got a retail box for Christmas 2013 but you don't get many cards in a retail box.

Each team is mostly together. That helped me learn where the players I remembered from my first go-around, and where the players who came into the League in the 2007-12 drafts played for. I had not heard of most of the players until I saw them in this set. Two of my top 5 favorite active players, including Kevin Durant above, as well as Klay Thompson made their first appearance in my collection in this set. The first time I ever even heard Klay Thompson's name was when I got the card of him. (That's pretty rare- now that I'm fully into the game again, only two times has the first time I heard of a player been when I got a card of them, and both were in 2013-14. I'm not trying to brag, but I spend most of every day watching basketball or reading about basketball or doing both at the same time)

The set also includes coaches, which I've always been a big fan of coach cards. Unfortunately, this is the only set in the Panini era to include them. That really frustrates me, but it's not as frustrating as Panini constantly ignoring 150 or more players every single year. This year's Complete- a set that would have been on this list had it not ignored 120 players- almost seems like a victory because it "only" ignores 120 players instead of 150.

This is also the only year that Panini color coded each card to each team. Every year since then the backs of the cards have been black and white. While it makes them easy to scan, I like colorful sets that are matched to team colors.

Here's a card back. Another thing I like about the set is that they included some stats. Most Panini sets include one year, if any at all. Even the flagship Hoops set no longer includes full stats. If they had included actual stats instead of averages would have been better, because averages mean nothing, but it's more than we usually get from Panini so I guess I shouldn't complain. 

There were a lot of inserts for the set, and I like them as a general rule. There are also 4 parallels, of which I have 2 of them in my collection.

 Action Photos

 Autograph parallel

 Board Members- this scan is crappy, but this is the first insert I got from the set.

 Courtside

 Draft Night, a set that features 2012-13 rookies

 Franchise Greats

 Glossy parallel- looks just like the base cards, but shiny. Panini moved to glossy cards as a standard after this set.

 Rookie Impact, which shows 2011-12 rookies. Panini chose not to make actual rookie cards for the 2011-12 rookies.

Spark Plugs.

There are also rare Kobe's All-Rookie Team that is not in my collection, and there were also hobby-only 1989-90 buyback autographs which do not appear in my collection.

At some point I do want to purchase a hobby box and see if I can complete the set.

How did it lead to the birth of Cardboard History? Well, it led to me collecting full time again, and it led me to the Database, which has a blogroll on the main page. I started reading them regularly in mid 2014 and I enjoyed what I read, after reading for several months I decided to make my own and here we are!

• #20: 2002-03 Topps 10
• #19: 2004-05 Topps Total
• #18: 2002-03 Topps Pristene
• #17: 1992-93 Ultra
• #16: 1975-76 Topps
• #15 1996-97 SP
• #14 1992-93 Upper Deck
• #13 2012-13 Hoops

Birthday Cards (Of course I got cards for my birthday!)

Today is my birthday. My family makes a bigger deal out of it than I do to be honest, especially after I almost didn't have anymore back in 2013. (I turned 31 today, in case you are wondering). I always ask for cards, and usually nothing but cards. (This year I asked for some specific comics but didn't get any- I'll be getting them myself next month). My brother didn't get me cards, but he gave me something I have needed for a long time. A 2TB external hard drive. As I've already filled up 16 or so flash drives with my photography I REALLY needed one, and will begin exploring that after I hit publish on this post. I have been talking about getting one of these for over a year but I could never bring myself to spend the money on it when there were cards staring at me on the shelf.

And the cards, I got cards. Mom gave me nothing but cards, and I'm going to show some highlights now..

I'm just going to jump to the major milestone I mentioned in the last post- I knew I would hit 80,000 different NBA cards today. I sure did- I now stand at 80,025. It took me 19 years and 9 months to reach this milestone.
Here it is...from 2012-13 Hoops, Spark Plugs #6, Anderson Varejao

For some reason my scanner doesn't like 2012-13 Hoops so it puts lines on it. Close enough!  I actually got two new Varejaos today, I also got the Above and Beyond parallel from 2012-13 Panini Brilliance, but those mirror foil cards are not a whole lot of fun to scan so I am putting it off (LOL)

My birthday was not solely NBA...I know lately my posts have been more NBA-centric than anything else, but the NBA takes up literally 85% of my collection, so I have the most to post about. With no new NASCAR cards since last December also not helping. But there are lots of older NASCAR cards I don't have yet, and Mom got me an autograph, a relic, and an autographed relic, which scanned MUCH better than I expected it to!

Normally my scanner cannot handle any sort of depth, and Press Pass put the relics deep down into very thick cards. This time, my scanner picked it up perfectly. I don't get it, but I'm thrilled I don't have to use my other scanner than can do depth, but is badly damaged and means I have to practically recreate the scan. Off the top of my head this is only my 5th autographed relic for NASCAR. It's on-card, as well.

I got a blaster box of 2014-15 Threads. Each blaster box has two wood Rookie cards, and they are cool...

They are almost as thick as a relic, and the front of the card is truly a piece of wood. I only had two before today, from my single blaster I got when the set first came out.

Another cool card from Threads is the Team Threads cards. These are a hallmark of the Panini Threads brand, and they are pretty much the same from year to year- why mess with success? This year, the Rookie cards in this style are part of the base set, which is a first. I got Aaron Gordon from this blaster. It's only my second from the subset.

 

I really hope Panini does the Threads set again in 2015-16. They took 2013-14 off from the set, and I hope they don't again.

The relic from my blaster was Russ Smith. Russ was traded to the Memphis Grizzlies after the card was issued, but the jersey piece is from the New Orleans Pelicans- my very first jersey piece from the Pelicans! I now have a relic from every team in the league under their current name except the Charlotte Hornets, which used to be the Bobcats. (I have relics from the first Hornets, which are now...the Pelicans!) Every year there is always one rookie I get more cards of than any other- and even though I can't get as many cards as I once did, Russ Smith is still that one from 2014-15.

I also got a blaster of 2014-15 Excalibur. I really didn't like this set when I first saw it, but it's really grown on me. It's so easy to scan, it includes action shots from the season it was issued in, and it included a bunch of players who I didn't have in my collection- and I got two of them today!

 Bogdanovic is from my favorite team. Papanikolaou was not anywhere near as hard to write in my listing than I expected it to be :)

I also got my first Michael Carter-Williams on the Bucks card. Excalibur is the only set that includes images post-trade deadline. I am a fan of MCW.

My relic from the box...happened to be Chris Andersen. One of my least favorite players in the league. Still, I want to collect as many cards as possible, and that includes people I'm not huge fans of. I'm still happy to have it, as it's not a duplicate.
But the scan, though...I don't get it. There is not a lot of depth to this card, yet my scanner blurred the relic. I don't know how to explain that.

 I finally got a good scan of the Crusade insert! I have 7 of them now, three each from two blasters and one from a single pack, but the first 4 didn't scan well at all. Today, they did. I've always loved the refractor Prizm technology, and am glad every time I pull one, or three. Nash is my least favorite of the three players I got today, but scanned the best. (The others are Tim Duncan and Taj Gibson).

I can't let it go without saying how it irked me that Panini included Nash- who had retired by time the set was issued, the only retired player in the base set- yet refused to include Elton Brand in the last two YEARS worth of sets.

Overall, I got 56 new NBA cards, and 3 new NASCAR- although to be honest Mom couldn't wait and gave me the Nemechek auto on Friday :) I also opened a couple of packs of my stash of Journey to the Force Awakens but I have not scanned any of them yet. I have had an excellent birthday so far, and it's not over yet.

I also got a record number of birthday wishes on Facebook- last I checked, before I started typing this post, I was at 237...and this post took a very long time because my internet connection keeps going out every two to four minutes or so, causing me to fight with it and try to get it back again- which has taken a lot of fun out of posting.

We also had some snow, which is the second earliest I can recall!

NBA Draft 2015 / History of the NBA Draft on Cardboard

Later today is the NBA Draft...always an exciting time in the NBA, and truly the kickoff of the new season. (Hard to believe we are coming up on 2015-16...I began collecting the NBA during 1995-96 and I will be doing some celebratory stuff, but I digress). Not only will this be the 20th Draft I've watched, it's selections will also put my NBA collection at 2500 different people, most likely. It is possible that I will hit that mark before the first 2015-16 cards arrive somewhere in the September-November area. I currently stand, with the addition of the Matthew Dellavedova card my mom gave me two days ago, at 2497 different people. So, it is possible that by time the new season's cards get here, the important 2500 marker will be in the rear view mirror already.

Everyone suspects Karl-Anthony Towns will go 1st to the T-Wolves, and I am thinking that as well. After that, though...it's wide open. The Lakers, 76ers, Knicks and Magic make the rest of the top 5 picks, and all of them have many needs to fill...you don't get to the top of the draft by being a good team. Jahlil Okafor, D'Angelo Russell, Kristaps Porzingus are likely to all go in the top 5, but the order is still anyone's guess. Except maybe the Lakers, but I'm not privy to that info!

I actually have one card of one of the 2015-16 rookies already, but it doesn't count to my NBA collection, for two reasons, either of which would discount it by themselves and both appear on the same card. Those reasons being, 1. it's a college card, which I count as a separate collection, and 2, it's a multi-sport card, which I also count as a separate collection.

It's this one, from Sports Illustrated for Kids.

Honestly I had no idea SI for Kids was still being published. I got my last copy in 1999, basing it off the cards I can find. (I saw some of the cards on the Database over the years, but no actual issues) I saw an issue at my local Barnes & Noble, and saw that one of the cards was Steph Curry, fast becoming my #2 player in the league, to move to #1 when Elton Brand retires, which may come as soon as this off season. (I hope not!) So I had to get it. This card was included along with 7 others. I enjoyed reading the magazine, and I've also recently started reading regular Sports Illustrated as well. I suspect I will subscribe to both by the end of 2015. From what I've gathered Tyus Jones is expected to go in the second half of the first round, although to be honest I don't really follow players until they go pro, so basically all I know about him is what is printed on the back of the card.

One other weird thing about this NBA Draft...it is the one where the players were born after I began watching the game, and collecting the cards, both of which date to February 1996. Tyus Jones, up above, was born in May 1996. As far as I know none of the players in the League in 2014-15 were born after February 14th, 1996. It's a weird feeling for sure, but I have no intention of ever leaving the game and the hobby (again- I was away from the hobby from late 2006 through September 2011, and only watched sporadically during that time. I did always watch the draft though, or at least the first few picks. I now consider that one of the bigger mistakes of my life)
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The Draft on Cardboard

For the first 45 or so years of the NBA (and BAA, which everyone counts as part of the NBA, myself included) rookies were no big deal. In fact, until 1990-91, the number of players who got cards during their actual rookie season was fairly slim, Topps, sole producer of NBA cards from 1957-81, rarely included players during their first year. Although I'm sure there are more, I can only think of TWO cards issued by Topps during an actual first season- Pete Maravich's card in 1970-71 Topps, which I don't have, and Bill Walton's in 1974-75 Topps, which I got earlier this year via the blog.

Things changed in 1990-91. The hobby was beginning it's Golden Age, which truly began in 1989-90, and would last through the 1997-98 season, ended by the first lockout.

1990-91 Hoops was the first set to include images from the NBA Draft. While I have all the cards in the subset, I have only scanned the card of Lionel Simmons to date.

1990-91 Hoops is one of my all time favorite sets, and I hope to someday finish it.

It was also the second set to issue the traditional series 2, after the 1989-90 Hoops release. That would be the norm for the flagship sets, and even some of the secondary sets, until the lockout. The Draft cards were in series 2.

1990-91 also saw the debut of Skybox, which also included a small subset of Draft day photos. Again, Lionel Simmons is the only one I've gotten scanned to date.

 I'm not a huge fan of 1990-91 Skybox to be honest.

1991-92 saw Fleer, Hoops and Skybox joined by Upper Deck. Of the 4 sets that year, only Skybox had a Draft Day subset...they could afford to, at 659 cards, the largest set in NBA history.

Another year where Skybox's cards were not really interesting. Just a photo with a fake background. Meh.

1992-93 saw the return of Topps, the birth of Ultra and Stadium Club, and series 2s for all the sets produced except Archives. No main sets featured draft day images, but Hoops included some in their Draft Picks insert.

Topps Archives was a single issue release of 150 cards which highlighted the main players to come into the NBA in the interval between 1981 and 1991 when Topps did not have the NBA license. While the set had so much potential, it was also kind of a let down as well, I always held out hope that Topps would issue an Archives set for each of the years it wasn't covering the sport; the 80s were a great time in the NBA, and the players who came into the league during that time deserve to have their career properly covered...granted, Star did a very good job of that, during it's three years of operation, but Star cards have always been too expensive and too hard to find, so they are essentially out of my reach. But again, I digress.
The Archives set included the first card to ever show the draft board. It had a subset at the start of the set showing the top pick of each draft, the back of the card listing the first round picks.

This is actually the gold parallel, which was sold as a factory set only.

1993-94 saw much of the same, with the addition of Finest and the oversize Jam Session. There was no set that featured draft day photos although several appeared in the Skybox Draft Picks insert and several into regular base cards, like this one in Ultra.

1994-95 kicked off the four best years for the hobby, which again, would last until the lockout. None of the sets included any number of draft day photos, although some were included in random sets, like the Jason Kidd card from the Topps flagship shown. All the main sets returned, and they were joined by Collector's Choice, Flair, SP and the E-series (Emotion, E-XL, EX, etc), which would all become mainstays in the hobby. There were also several standalone issues. By this time Rookies were the key aspect of Series 2s, or in the standalone issues, they were issued late enough in the year to include in action photos.

1995-96 was the year I discovered the sport, and it was a spectacular year for cards. All the flagship sets returned, and Metal and SPx joined the field. But draft day photos were at all all-time low. By now the Rookie Photo Shoot had supplanted the draft day photos in the sets that did not have action photos (some had both). In fact, of the more than 3100 different cards I have scanned for 1995-96, only one shows a photo taken on draft day, an insert from Fleer of Jerry Stackhouse. Stackhouse had signed on to be Fleer's spokesman and they issued a multi-set, mutli-year insert documenting his early career. This is card #1 in that set. I have put more effort into scanning 1995-96 than any other year, because it was my first. The only cards not scanned yet by me are the ones that somebody else posted to the Database before I got the chance to. They are held off to the end of the scanning project so I can work on stuff I can post.

1996-97 was, in my mind, the absolute best year for the NBA on cardboard. It was the NBA's 50th Anniversary, and the celebrations lasted all year...and the cards were worth celebrating as well. In fact, when I make my list of Top 20 sets of all time to celebrate my 20th anniversary of collecting this coming February...at least 5 of 1996-97's sets are likely to make the top 10, let alone 20! It was, in short, nearly a perfect year for cards. Draft day issues were scant. The only ones I can locate are from a five card subset in Metal (one of the sets that will make the top half of my Top 20 list)

1997-98 was the last great year of the NBA's golden age of cardboard. The designs were mostly good, but not as good as 1996-97. Of the nearly 900 cards I've scanned on the year, this is the only one to show what may be a draft day image...or it may come from the Rookie photo shoot. It's Tim Thomas's base card from Upper Deck. I seem to recall there being others in the set, at least for Tim Duncan, as well.

1998-99 saw the lockout. The Golden Age came crashing down...and the hobby has never truly recovered since. After the lockout, it was less about documenting the game, and more about gimmicks- not to say there weren't gimmicks beforehand but now they became the focus. It is also during this year that the focus became more on chasing the so-called hits then actual normal cards.
It was also the end of the Series 2, for the most part. (Upper Deck would continue to produce a Series 2 until 2002-03, the last to be produced. Topps' last Series 2 was 2000-01. Fleer, Hoops, and Collector's Choice saw their last Series 2 issued in 1997-98, while Stadium Club and Skybox saw their last Series 2 during 1998-99. Finest would hold out a series 2 until 1999-00.)
There were no cards clearly from draft day issued in 1998-99. In fact, several major flagship sets, including Fleer and Hoops, saw no rookie cards included at all.
1998-99 also saw the introduction of a fad that still holds true to this day- short printing rookies, many times serially numbering them. SP Authentic started this trend during 1998-99, and it changed the landscape of rookie cards to this day.

1999-00 saw the new normal- predominantly single issue series, with photographs from the last season (or, in some rare cases, several seasons ago). While I am not overly happy with the way the hobby has gone since then, the majority of my collecting was done during 1999-00 through 2004-05, so I have a high percentage of cards from this era. 1999-00 was also when my favorite player, Elton Brand entered the NBA- as the #1 draft pick, no less! With the new format of card production, Draft Day photos were now at an all-time high. Fleer, Topps, Skybox Dominion, MVP (the former Collector's Choice), Victory and Upper Deck all used draft day photos. Topps and Upper Deck included draft day photos in series 1, and gave most of the players action photos in series 2.

 2000-01 was a low point in card design. I don't know why, but most of the sets that year were sub-par at best, in my opinion.  Most of the sets that used draft day photos in 1999-00 instead used Rookie Photo Shoot photos, in the case of MVP and Victory, they used college photos instead.

Topps, and the standalone but parallel Tipoff, was the only set to use Draft Day photos. Unlike in previous years, Topps Chrome did not use the same photos, but used action photos. That would be the way Topps did it until at least 2004-05. (I only have one pack of 2005-06 Chrome, 4 cards, so I don't know how they did it that year)

2001-02 was a better year than 2000-01, design wise, and more sets used Draft day photography, including Fleer Genuine, Topps and this set, a debut in 2001-02, Topps Pristene. This is a refractor parallel. Most sets by now were using Rookie photo shoot images, if they came out before action photos were available, although some UD sets still used college photos.

2002-03 was my peak year collecting. I added more cards to my collection in that year than I did in all of 2007-12 combined, for example. Many sets used a combination of draft day and rookie photo shoot images, some by Topps mixed in digitally altered images (which I loathe) and some by UD mixed in college uniforms. Most sets by now were serially numbering rookie cards, including this one, which was numbered to 2002 on the back.

2003-04 is the largest year in my collection, but draft day images are few and far between. There's a couple mixed in, in various sets. but Rookie Photo Shoot images are much more common. This card is an insert from Fleer Tradition (the flagship Fleer set) and includes a piece of the hat worn on draft day. This is the only one of the 10 card set in my collection.

2004-05 was the last year I really enjoyed the hobby as much as I once did, at least until I came back full time in 2012-13. It was the last year I had at least one card from each set, something I always considered one of my proudest achievements in the hobby, and something I'm working very hard on getting back to.
The only set to include draft day photos was the Topps flagship set.

I was still collecting fully in 2005-06, but I was starting to lose my patience with the  gimmick-of-the-month concept, and with the gameplay itself. (It was getting more trying to be a SportsCenter highlight than actually playing)
I started to trail off in collecting, and I even missed several sets (although I've since gone back and gotten at least one card from each major set). To this day I still consider the 2005-06 draft class to be "new" players as they were the last ones to join the league when I was still fully immersed in it; the fact that some of them have already retired is a cold reminder that the game moves on even if I don't.
Topps included these images for many of the rookies, and I don't know (remember) if they were taken on draft day or some other photo shoot.

In 2006-07, I really wasn't enjoying it anymore. In fact, near the end of 2006, I decided I was done. I don't know now if it was me, or the cards not being as good as they once were, or what, but now I regret it immensely. I didn't look at or touch my cards for many years. I would not touch the majority of them until December 2013. From this point on, I am missing more cards than I have. I truly believed that I would never get any new basketball cards. (I was still collecting NASCAR, provisionally, and I got back into non-sports for the first time since 1996 in 2009). The last box I opened, what I once thought as the true last box, was 2006-07 Rookie Debut, and it included some Draft Day photography.

Totally out of it in 2007-08, I have none that show Draft Day photography but that doesn't mean they don't exist.

2008-09 I have even less cards of. 2008 was my worst year since I began collecting cards in 1988. I only got ONE documented card (a NASCAR card). None of the less than 200 cards from the 2008-09 season depict draft day photography, the few rookie cards I have depicting college images.

2009-10 was the last year where Topps and Upper Deck were allowed to produce cards. NBA gave the license to Panini, exclusively. (A HUGE mistake, but that's a different topic). I have very few cards from this season, less than 100. The rookies I have have college images.

2010-11 was when I started to watch the games regularly again- especially during the playoffs. I resisted getting back into the cards, but I've since gotten some 217 of them after the fact. None depict draft day photography. Panini seems to favor college images, or Rookie Photo Shoot images.

2011-12 saw the second lockout. Smaller than the first, the game play after it actually got better- so much so that I'm as hooked on the game as I was before the first lockout, if not more. Panini chose not to include ANY rookies in 2011-12, for some stupid reason known only to Panini. It's disgraceful. 

2012-13 is when I got back into the cards full time. While I get less cards than I once did, I think I appreciate them more. I actually even read them all now! (Back in the early 2000s, I was getting them so fast I didn't have time to read them, really!) Panini issued 44 card packs of Hoops for $2; I couldn't resist that. Now I'm back full time. Panini still favors Rookie Photo Shoot or even Summer League images, but two sets included draft day images. Hoops included them for all 2012-13 rookies, and Prestige included them for some. Hoops was the first set issued that year- it was on the shelves by time I went to Lake George NY in the first week of September, unusually early to have a set on the shelves.

In both 2013-14 and 2014-15 Panini used Rookie Photo Shoot images exclusively. 

I began typing this post around 3:30 PM, and it's now 7:07 PM. The Pre-Draft show is already on, and I can't wait to see the new names that I'll be chasing for my collection for years to come! 

Thanks for reading!