1998 Playoff Contenders Ticket Exchange Peyton Manning ROOKIE AUTO /200 BGS 8.5

The Playoff Corporation incentivized collectors to build sets as it unleashed a new three-tiered approach to its annual Playoff Contenders series. Playoff comprised the 300-card set of 100 Leathers, 100 Pennants, and 100 Tickets (though only 99 Ticket cards made it to production). Any collector who completed one of those sets could send the cards to Playoff, which stamped the back of each card with a gold serial number as part of its Registered Exchange program. Collectors had the most difficult time completing the Ticket portion of the set because Playoff debuted Rookie Ticket Autos, bringing collectors pricey base rookie autos of top draft picks for the first time. But eight collectors met that challenge and received Registered Exchange stamped sets in return (for comparison, Playoff stamped 51 Registered Exchange sets of the Pennants and Leathers). With such scarcity, the Registered Exchange examples of the 1998 Rookie Ticket Autos remain some of the most coveted Rookie Ticket Autos ever produced. Peyton Manning leads the rookie class of 1998 as that season’s No. 1 overall draft pick, and as his only base rookie auto, the Contenders Rookie Ticket Auto draws a crowd of collectors any time it becomes available. Therefore, collectors should expect a capacity crowd to descend upon this month’s Premier Auction as PWCC presents Manning’s No. 4 Registered Exchange Rookie Ticket Auto. Manning’s hard-signed autograph also boosts this BGS 8.5 example, as the signature received an Auto 10 designation—an assessment this set does not often receive. Those qualities, along with the scarce /8 production run, will likely make this rookie auto one of the hottest tickets in the bidding.