Collectibles On SI

This Stat Will Make You Rethink What You Know About Football Cards

Maybe this won't surprise most, but the sports card market may not care about stats

Adam Palmer

Sep 9, 2024; Santa Clara, California, USA; San Francisco 49ers running back Christian McCaffrey (23) watches injured from the sidelines in the second quarter against the New York Jets at Levi's Stadium. Mandatory Credit: David Gonzales-Imagn Images
Sep 9, 2024; Santa Clara, California, USA; San Francisco 49ers running back Christian McCaffrey (23) watches injured from the sidelines in the second quarter against the New York Jets at Levi's Stadium. Mandatory Credit: David Gonzales-Imagn Images / David Gonzales-Imagn Images

Christian McCaffery has not played in the first two games of this season and we are getting into the Madden Curse territory. Realistically, the 49ers are a Super Bowl contender, so having your best player sit at the start of the season so he is healthy for the playoffs could be the right move. However, its always fun to keep the story of the Madden Curse going.

McCaffrey over the past few years has been known as a touchdown scorer. He has been notorious for this for finding the end zone. Go back to week 12 of 2022, for the next 17 weeks he would score at least 1 touchdown. That was week 12 of the 2022 season, all the way through the playoffs and up until week 9 of the 2023 season. Since that streak ended he has scored in every game other than 2 games last season.

Now that is a lot of touchdowns but did you know there is a player with almost as many yards and after this week offically has more career touchdowns than McCaffery?

His name is Alvin Kamara.

Why is this relevant for cards?

Drafted in the same year of 2017, Kamara's PSA 10 Prizm rookie card cost around $90-$100 while McCaffery's is $185-$200. We can have the conversion about why position players are so much lower in price than QBs another day, but it is important to notice that McaCffery's rookies are basically double the price. With the fact they are basically putting up the same exact amount of stats as each other since they were drafted.

Maybe it is because Kamara hasn't played in a Super Bowl, or maybe its because he wasn't on this year's Madden cover, but we know it can't be because of his stats. Sometimes within the industry things are hard to explain, even when you write it all out and think about it for a while. This is one of those examples that doesn't make a lot of sense.

Obviously 4 touchdowns in week 2 helped that number and the fact McCaffery hasn't played also helps the Kamara stats. However, if the Saints continue to play as well as they have so far this season, it could be a good opportunity to buy some Kamara cards while the season is rolling.

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Adam Palmer

ADAM PALMER

Adam has been a sports content creator since 2016, initially focusing on creating sports-related graphics for his Instagram page. In 2018, he transitioned to writing and podcasting about sports cards. Since then, he has worked both independently and with companies within the industry, producing podcasts, videos, and written content on sports cards.

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