An Oddball One of One (it's also 183/600), Shaun King Style

Some of you may remember that I used to PC former Buccaneer QB Shaun King. He only really played a lot during 1999 and 2000, but during those two years (especially late 1999) he was pretty electric and did some great things for Tampa Bay during those years and I was always stunned to see him replaced so quickly with the much older Brad Johnson.  It does make his cards pretty cheap though so I guess that's a nice benefit!

Anyway, a bunch of 1/1's of his popped up on Ebay recently.  The best one is listed at $50 which is way too much, but I found a much cheaper one that I liked and bit the bullet.  It's from a rather unique set and I had some Ebay bucks so I also grabbed a parallel of the set to show some of the differences too!  That might sound weird now, but I'll explain later in the post!

Here's the front of the 1/1:

And here's the back:

I'll let those images standalone in their awesomeness and explain the set below.

Basically, this set (2000 Sage Hit Prospector) was four parallel sets, one Diamond, one Diamond Die Cut, one Emerald, and one Emerald Die Cut.  Each set was #'d to something, with the Diamond set (what my 1/1 is from) numbered to 600.  You can see the numbering on the front of the 1/1 I got, which says 183 of 600.  Which is odd, since that doesn't seem to be a 1/1.  But ahhh...there's an explanation.  To better demonstrate it, here's my 1/1 side by side with # 193/600:

Note these two cards look pretty different.  The 1/1 is stamped, has silver instead of gold tinting, has a different image, has red instead of black behind King, AND it says "Top Passer Rating" below his name.  Turns out that for certain numbers out of 600 with personal relevance to a player's career, Sage made special 1/1's that looked different and had different content on the front and back.  So my card is 183/600 AND 1/1, but the emphasis for me sits in 1/1 since it's a special card all its own.  I posted about the set on Blowout and someone called this a precedent to "Ebay 1/1's" (i.e. it's not a 1/1 but it's his college jersey number so it's a 1/1!), and I sort of agree.  But I like the Sage went the extra mile to make the 1/1 cards look extra special, instead of just making the numbering the focus.

Here are the backs side by side.  The cards are reversed though - the 1/1 is on the left and 193/600 is on the right:

Again, the 1/1 gets the red treatment, and the little snippit (which is far smaller) goes into detail about the 183 passer rating that King had in college.  They also changed the box at the bottom.  On the 193/600 it's a quote, on the 1/1 it explains the concept of the Solitaire cards and how they're all uniquely crafted to make them special.  I think it's a neat touch and certainly helped me to understand the set!

As cool as the card is, I currently have it listed on Listia to see if I can get a ton of credits for it.  If I get them that's awesome and I'll bid on more cool stuff.  If not I'll hold onto this rarity and will perhaps build on it in the future when I've got more money to play with.  For now I just wanted to share the strange set itself though - certainly one of the more unique uses of serial #'s I've seen in my time with the hobby!