“Linsanity” Effect Brings 2010-11 Prestige Basketball Printing Error Back to Light

The sudden onset of Linsanity has sent fans and collectors all over the globe scurrying back to last season’’s NBA-licensed products from Panini America looking for Jeremy Lin gems that as recently as last month were little more than hobby afterthoughts.

And that international hunt has brought back to the surface a printing error that occurred in 2010-11 Prestige Basketball, the first product from Panini America’’s second season as the exclusive NBA trading card manufacturer.

Released in September of 2010, 2010-11 Prestige Basketball included a wrong-back printing error that inadvertently placed autograph authentication copy on the backs of every base Rookie Card in the set. None of the base RCs were intended to be autographed and none of the base RCs were autographed.

The autograph authentication copy wrongly placed on those card backs was intended for the Bonus Shots autographed RC parallels.

It was pretty big news at the time and Panini America Customer Service officials have communicated the mistake directly with collectors in the months since. But with Lin driving interest in all of last season’’s NBA releases (including 2010-11 Prestige Basketball), we felt it necessary to bring it up again. Now as then, Panini America regrets the error.