Bull

@WaxMetrix @CardPurchaser I was going to pass on this but you have me rethinking

2025/26 Topps Chrome Cactus Jack NBA Basketball Analysis & Deep Dive With a bit of a sordid past, the Cactus Jack brand is back for another round of NBA product. The first round was an ultra-limited drop only available at this year's NBA All-Star festivities. Entirely different format, entirely different beast. But those are currently available on the secondary market at a bonkers price point of $1850 for a 2-pack, 8 card box. On the other end of the spectrum, WWE fans crapped all over their recent, fairly forgettable offering of Cactus Jack WWE. With a similar structure to this upcoming NBA release, that WWE version dropped at $400, promptly faceplanted, and hobby boxes are currently sitting at $260/box on the secondary market. So now Cactus Jack NBA finds itself standing directly between two wildly different realities. One where artificial scarcity, hype, and FOMO send sealed wax prices into orbit. The other where collectors wake up from the simulation and realize they're holding a glorified Chrome side quest nobody asked for. So which path does this one take? The red pill or the blue pill. Blissful ignorance or painful reality. I have some ideas. And some numbers. Let's see where they take us. Welcome to 2025/26 Topps Chrome Cactus Jack NBA. If you need more of this kind of product analysis in your life, please consider following me on Substack, where I have over 100 new product breakdowns in my catalog, in an easily navigable format. @SlabSquatch" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">substack.com/@SlabSquatch Part 1: The Basics Pre-order window opens tomorrow, Tuesday May 19th 12 ET via EQL. So no need to be online the second they drop. Just hit up the Topps site within 60 minutes if you're interested. 20 packs/box, 4 cards/pack at a price of $490. Part 2: Production Total Cards in product: 3,030,000 Total boxes produced: Hobby- 37,875 boxes (3,156 cases) This is a nicely limited product. For context, these numbers are on par with 2024/25 Finest Basketball at 3.1m total cards, which was an unlicensed dumpster fire, but at least it was short-printed. The most recent Finest NBA (the good one) had production of 3.68m. So Cactus Jack will be in that same scarcity neighborhood, but with even less supply. Part 3: Heat Map Before we jump into the numbers, I have to say...the cards look fantastic. Cactus Jack products have always been a bit polarizing with the design. I think this one looks phenomenal. Here's where this product gets interesting... Parallels/Box- 9.8 Numbered cards/Box- 5 (4 # base, 1 # insert on average) Inserts/Box- 7.5 Rare Inserts (Astrovision & Cactus Mode)- combined 1 per case on average. So far so good. Autos- 0.25 (1 auto per 4 boxes, or 3 per case) Oh. OK. At first glance Cactus Jack Chrome looks legit with ~10 parallels/box, 5 of which will be numbered. Then reality smacks us in the face. This has shades of Cosmic Chrome. One auto every 4 boxes will be hard for buyers to digest from a nearly $500 box. Though inarguably a popular product, this is the fundamental issue that keeps Cosmic Chrome from going stratospheric. But it already has a pedigree of being a more chase-insert driven product. It will be interesting to see if Cactus Jack finds that same lane without the same volume of insert chases. My guess is no. On the bright side of this, when you hit an auto, you know they are quite rare. At this point, I'm not quite sure if the base autos will be numbered, but their print runs will only be ~75-100 copies ea. Part 4: Value Map Based on preorder pricing of $490/box. $/card- $6.13 $/parallel- $50.03 $/# card- $97.31 $/auto- $1,930.04 Part 5: What Would the Squatch Do? This one is tough to call. The checklist and overall set design are dope. The cards looks great and give off a cool, sinister vibe. Very Travis Scott. Anyone who's been into sneakers knows something about the Cactus Jack counterculture. I think the brand will resonate much harder with the basketball crowd than it did with WWE, even though Travis has been known to make some cameo appearances in WWE events. The much more limited NBA All-Star Cactus Jack boxes are going for absurd prices despite having fewer cards in the box. This won't be that. Though I think there will be room for these boxes to organically rise in price, artificial scarcity will blur the lines. There will be inevitable shenanigans with failed EQL entries, ludicrous secondary market pricing, and Topps repricing nonsense on drop day. So it will be hard to tell what is real demand vs manufactured chaos. But underneath all of that, I do think there is genuine staying power here. At pre-order pricing of $490, I think these are a safe stash. I don't see them going the WWE route of post-release price deflation. As a $490 rip, they could be tough. But there will absolutely be some legitimate nukes in here. I also think the superstar autos carry the product long-term. Though the rare inserts are cool, especially Astrovision, they're just not dripping with multi-thousand-dollar energy. Honestly, of all the inserts I think "Utopia Highlights" is the best looking and it's not even one of the scarce ones. The most rare is "Cactus Mode", but to me it looks eerily similar to a base card from 2021 Skybox Metal Universe Champions. Part 6: So where does Cactus Jack ultimately land? Probably somewhere between the red pill and the blue pill. Not the fantasy. Not the nightmare. Just a legitimately solid product with an unfortunate amount of manufactured chaos that may or may not consume it. These are not an 8x your money sealed product like the ultra-scarce NBA All-Star Game version. They also don't feel destined to flatline like Cactus Jack WWE. It wouldn't surprise me to see these settle in the $600-$800 range. I don't think these are a $1k+ box in the way that Cosmic didn't really end up there...at least not yet. Honestly, if these guaranteed an auto per box, these would easily be $1200-$1400. But maybe that will be the one thing keeping prices somewhat grounded. Part 7: The Print Runs Base production: ~23,650 ea Numbered parallels: As of yet, none of the checklist sites have a complete list of numbered parallels. So here's what that looks like: Teal Speckle /299 Pink /250 Aqua Shimmer /199 Lasers /175 Blue /150 Sonar /125 Green /99 Purple Mini-Diamond /75 Gold /50 Cactus Jack Refractor /41... (I'm assuming these are numbered and the print run calculates to /41. I'm not embedded in my Travis Scott Lore. Can anyone tell me the significance of a Travis Scott refractor being /41?) Orange /25 Black /10 Red /5 Red Mini-Diamond- 5 Superfractor /1 Unnumbered parallels: White- ~1,080 ea Refractor- ~760 ea LogoFractor- ~380 ea Unnumbered Inserts: Utopia Highlights (40 card CL)- ~2,370 ea Jacked Up (40 card CL)- ~2,370 ea LA Flame Legends (20 card CL)- ~2,525 ea Rare Inserts: Astrovision (20 card CL)- ~125 ea Cactus Mode (20 card CL)- 32 ea Autos: Base Auto Variation (49 card CL)- ~75 ea Cactus Ink (49 card CL)- ~75 ea #thehobby #SlabSquatchAnalytics #2025ToppsChromeCactusJackNBA

@JoeHamacher @CardPurchaser @Topps Yes that is def enough damage. It may take a few months to replace but I would send it in to Topps.

Need some advice @CardPurchaser and others. Just pulled this from a Target box and noticed a nasty issue on the front. Is it enough for @Topps to deem replaceable?

@bane_cam @CardPurchaser Incredible pull congrats

One of my good friends just hit out of a Mega!!!! literally hands shaking #thehobby @CardPurchaser #BowmanChrome #StephenCurry 1/1

@matthewhberry @CardPurchaser You ripping?

Cosmic Lunar box 👀 @CardPurchaser

@WaxMetrix You doing a breakdown on the Toy Story product? Think at $220 its a max buy

I didn't have a lot of faith in Gamestop "offering to buy" another company with 5x the market cap. But after watching this interview my faith is close to zero. It seems like a ploy. And this certainly doesn't seem like the guy that should be leading a Gamestop/Ebay conglomerate. youtu.be/Bmj2PaxX24E?si…

@Rillzzzy @CardPurchaser Insane pull congrats. 15K card?

@CardPurchaser I just won the lottery in my cosmic box I’m shaking 🫨

Show us any 1-of-1 from your collection…

@CardPurchaser If I can beat the bots then yes

You going to pre-order any Topps Chrome Platinum this year? #ad 2025 Topps Chrome® Platinum Baseball thetoppscompany.sjv.io/L0xDxL

@OffDaHook35 One of my best pulls ever out of a 2023 Series 1 Jumbo will never sell it. Think he is insanely underrated

Corbin Carroll is so damn good Undervalued in the hobby or naw?

@DeLo_021 @CardPurchaser For the Undertaker and Shawn Michaels the new Topps Royalty will be awesome. They have a dual auto in it

@CardPurchaser Need some help! If building a collection of Ric Flair, Undertaker, and Shawn Michaels … which cards should I target? Thank you!

@stonksandcards I think it gets to $1500 a box after the product gets ripped

2025-26 Cosmic Basketball has moved to a floor of $1000. The official release day is tomorrow 4/29. Do you think these go up or down as they start to get ripped and people have them in hand?

@CardPurchaser Yes Cosmic is on my favorites no matter what sport

Are you going to enter the Cosmic Chrome WWE EQL drop today? $229.99 per box

@CardPurchaser Some WNBA Prizm yesterday a hobby box it was bad

What is the last pack of cards you ripped?

@NOLABALLER @CardPurchaser I have 5 of these UPCs. Bought them when they were around $300 each. Great long term hold imo

People still haven’t caught on to the crazy values in these celebrations UPC boxes. $12,000+ upside on one card from box not including any packs. What would you do if you had these boxes? Would you rip and grade or stash them away for the long haul @CardPurchaser

@Connor_J_Hughes Disaster Boston is a better fit/player

Sources: The #Jets are selecting, with the No. 30 pick, WR Omar Cooper

@Willpa11 Yikes Cooper over Boston not going to play out well

Bailey, Sadiq, Cooper in a vacuum is a really nice haul

@stonksandcards Yup can see these getting to $2k a box. Won 5 with the preorder and will do everything I can to keep these sealed

I was just looking at the checklist for autos again and it’s lowkey absurd Obviously Cooper Flagg and Kon Knueppel carry the product BUT LeBron James Stephen Curry Victor Wembanyama Nikola Jokic SGA also have live on card autos among others. Going to do my best to keep these sealed

@Topps @RheaRipley_WWE Please make this EQL so we have a chance at it. Pre order is gonna be chaos if you don’t.

FIRST LOOK: Rhea Ripley's 1-of-1 autograph in Topps Cosmic Chrome WWE 💫

@CardPurchaser Definitely in for the max boxes on this one.

2025 Topps Chrome® Platinum Baseball pre-orders scheduled to release Tuesday, May 5

@CardPurchaser It looks pretty rough from early breaks

Are you going to rip any Bowman Basketball this year?