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NBA players suing Topps! D. Rose sign 10,000 for $25 each.

Wow is this why pack prices are so high? Posted over at SportsCollectorsDaily.
Topps gives Mcgrady $50 for each auto to 1,000, Derrick Rose $25 to sign 10,000 and so on.
From SportsCollectorsDaily

A dozen NBA players have filed a lawsuit against Topps contending that the company reneged on a contract to provid a set number of autographs for its trading card products.

How much Topps was willing to pay for certain NBA players' autographs is just one of the interesting tidbits to come out of a lawsuit filed last week in New York on behalf of 12 athletes who say the company owes them money.

Attorneys representing Derrick Rose, Brandon Roy, Tracy McGrady and others claim that Topps must honor an obligation to pay them for a certain number of autographs they agreed to sign last year.

The lawsuit filed in New York says that between February and September of 2008, the players entered into an arrangement to sign between 500 and 10,000 autographs at fees ranging from $3 to $50 each. Topps apparently supplied some of the cards needed for the players to sign, but then notified them in March of this year that it no longer wanted the original number of signatures and would only be paying for those that had already been signed by the players. Two months earlier, the NBA had agreed to an exclusive arrangement with Panini to become the NBA's sole trading card provider beginning in the fall of this year, ending Topps' NBA license.

The suit is seeking $298,560 in money it claims the players are owed, plus attorney's fees, costs and interest.

Rose, who had yet to be drafted by the Chicago Bulls when he signed the deal with Topps in May of last year, stands to lose the most according to the suit. The Memphis All-American agreed to sign 10,000 cards for Topps at a price of $25 each. Court papers indicate Rose signed 5,500 items and attorneys claim that leaves him with a balance due of $112,500. According to the suit, McGrady was paid the most per autograph – $50 for 1,000 items. He signed 250, leaving $37,500 unpaid whlie Roy signed 3,000 of 5,000 at $18 each and is owed $36,000.

Also listed as plaintiffs in the suit and the number of autographs they agreed to sign according to the court papers are D.J. Augustin (4,000 autographs at $8 each), T.J. Ford (500 autographs at $6 each), Danilo Gallinari (4,000 autographs at $10 each), Antawn Jamison (500 autographs at $10 each), DeAndre Jordan (4,000 autographs at $3 each), Brook Lopez (4,000 autographs at $8 each), Robin Lopez (4,000 autographs at $5 each), Anthony Randolph (4,000 autographs at $7 each) and Russell Westbrook (2,000 autographs at $12 each). The players are listed as having signed roughly half of the original number in the agreement except for Jamison and Ford, who were contracted to sign only 500, but did not sign any, nor were they paid by Topps.
For collectors, the suit would seem to indicate that coveted autographs of Rose and Roy, while not rare, won't be as plentiful as once thought.

Comments

  • Interesting article. I guess maybe Rose and some of these NBA stars are low on cash like you and me?


    Always looking for Vintage Yankees & NASCAR


    Eric
  • This was posted last week, but it is still pretty unbelievable.
  • WOW!!! image Thats a lot of autographs signed in that short period of time image I can only imagine how many autographs these players have in total between all the companies.

    Thanks for sharing!
  • WaltWalt Posts: 1,275 ✭✭✭
    Maybe topps is sick and tired of these guys signing late and them having to issue redemptions. I think you would be hard pressed to find a TMac auto in
    beckett that books for 50 bucks, that is crazy. I wonder what UD is paying real stars like MJ and Lebron!


  • << <i>I wonder what UD is paying real stars like MJ and Lebron! >>



    Ya know...

    And yes, if those players were found to sign late, they shouldn't get anything. Matter of fact, they should be the ones getting sued in my opinion. If a contract says sign this many autographs by so and so date, then they should follow that.
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