Episode 211 – Timeless Moments: Mosaic A Look Through the Glass

In this week’s Timeless Moments episode, Russell and Adam dive deep into the evolution of Mosaic basketball cards — from its humble beginnings as a Prism parallel to the fully-fledged product we know today.

We look at the original 2014–15 Mosaic parallels and how they morphed over the years, touching on sticker autos, rookie cards with missing logos, and the design consistency (or lack thereof) from 2016 through 2019.

Russell breaks down the rise and fall of value in certain Mosaic products, shares his personal collecting experiences (including a numbered Luka rookie snag), and gives insight into inserts like Jam Masters and Bang! — some iconic, some hilarious, and some seriously underrated.

From comic book vibes to oversized heads and flaming basketballs, this episode covers it all with a mix of nostalgia, hobby perspective, and a touch of self-deprecating humour.

🎧 Listen now to hear:

• Why Mosaic holds a unique spot in the collecting timeline
• How WNBA Mosaic compares to NBA
• Inserts that hit (and some that miss)
• What Russell thought was the next Net Marvels…

📍 Available wherever you get your podcasts!

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Transcript

00:18.79
Adz
Welcome everybody to episode 211 of the You Can't Comp This NBA Trading Card Podcast, where your hosts Adam, Amy and Russell Gibson And we're back with another timeless moment.

00:34.61
Adz
Welcome, Russell.

00:35.69
Russell Gibson
Hello, how are you, Adam?

00:37.22
Adz
I'm good, I'm good. Welcome to everybody on on YouTube and on all platforms that that we broadcast to.

00:40.51
Russell Gibson
Yep.

00:43.94
Russell Gibson
Thank you for tuning in.

00:44.02
Adz
ah it's it's ah It's a different one this week where where it's a bit timeless, but it did have a beginning, I think.

00:52.22
Russell Gibson
Yeah.

00:53.26
Adz
the we're We're here to talk about the Mosaic era, I guess.

00:58.84
Russell Gibson
Yeah, I thought it'd be good to talk about this set because for me, there's enough to talk about.

01:03.27
Adz
hu

01:03.80
Russell Gibson
And also too, I feel like it's a product that has changed and it's also evolved. And now there's some pockets of value and maybe there's some stuff that's overpriced. so I thought I would sort of just really quickly run through that.

01:13.43
Adz
Okay.

01:15.37
Russell Gibson
So if you go to Instagram, if you go to our ah profile or or onto our page, the date that this was posted up was the 11th of May.

01:28.54
Adz
Yeah, you actually put the the episode title at like 211 mosaic.

01:29.89
Russell Gibson
The first...

01:34.17
Adz
Look at that.

01:35.38
Russell Gibson
Well done.

01:36.77
Adz
Timeless moments, 2.11 mosaic basketball.

01:39.53
Russell Gibson
If you see a picture of Dikembe Mutombo with a yellow and red background, you've found the right post. So let's start there. And hopefully I've got these in order. So this will work out really well. So as Adam alluded to at the start, this was originally in 1415 Prism.

01:56.35
Russell Gibson
And it wasn't its own set as we now know it. It was just part of...

02:00.26
Adz
There's a parallel.

02:01.32
Russell Gibson
It was a parallel, correct? Yeah.

02:02.70
Adz
Yeah.

02:03.46
Russell Gibson
And I think for me, I just really liked them. And I think really it's just as simple as that for me. Whenever I see mosaics, they're in WNBA prism too.

02:13.08
Adz
Okay.

02:15.72
Russell Gibson
This is a segue at the start of the show, but in WNBA, they're actually a low numbered parallel.

02:21.06
Adz
Okay. So they, yeah, I think as a parallel, they hit different to me.

02:22.53
Russell Gibson
Yeah.

02:24.97
Russell Gibson
Yeah, absolutely.

02:25.47
Adz
Like they they have a different feel about them.

02:26.08
Russell Gibson
Yeah.

02:27.11
Adz
Yeah, you're right.

02:27.24
Russell Gibson
Do you like them or is it something for you just kind of a bit like whatever?

02:28.82
Adz
I like them. I like them.

02:30.34
Russell Gibson
Yeah.

02:30.79
Adz
I don't love them, but I like them a lot.

02:32.25
Russell Gibson
Yeah, okay. Because I think that's the to mention here too. I suspect I'm more in the minority on my love for Mosaic compared to other people.

02:40.71
Adz
They're a good parallel.

02:40.95
Russell Gibson
Yeah, so yeah.

02:42.38
Adz
Yeah. I first came across them in twenty sixteen seventeen Prism.

02:43.14
Russell Gibson
So...

02:44.77
Adz
Yep.

02:46.36
Russell Gibson
Yeah, that's right.

02:47.78
Adz
yeah

02:48.42
Russell Gibson
So I think for me, the the OG in terms of the 14, 15, I think it's a really great set.

02:53.85
Adz
yeah

02:54.16
Russell Gibson
And you can pick them up for... like they're They're cheap. They're not like... hard to come by or anything like that. You know, I'm sure some of the the key guys going to be a bit more expensive, but then there's that. All right. So then we, so for me, I skipped 16, 17.

03:07.54
Russell Gibson
There was nothing really in there that I liked a lot. And the other reason why I didn't include a photo is that because really the, in the design, it didn't change between 16, 17, 17, 18 and 18, 19 that much.

03:20.35
Russell Gibson
You can almost like get a bit confused over which set this card should go into.

03:22.68
Adz
yeah yep

03:26.45
Russell Gibson
I did want to highlight though. So if you go to the next picture, the rookie autographs in them. So I think they look really good. Despite the fact that they're a sticker autograph, they still, some of the sticker autographs look good and some of them look bad. And this is an example, in my opinion, of like one that looks really good.

03:46.32
Russell Gibson
um

03:46.42
Adz
yep

03:47.08
Russell Gibson
The really funny thing about these cards though, is that they do not have the rookie logo on it. So if you skip to the next picture, you can see it's,

03:54.04
Adz
ah

03:55.48
Russell Gibson
the exact same design, but one's got a rookie logo and one doesn't.

03:57.14
Adz
Yeah, but it's a rookie logo.

03:59.33
Russell Gibson
And so that for me is ah like a funny little wrinkle too, because I think, I think that actually devalues the card in that if you don't put something that needs to be put there right in people's faces, they, they forget or they don't, you know, they don't remember.

04:03.14
Adz
Wow.

04:14.75
Russell Gibson
And then,

04:15.62
Adz
No rookie shield. It's like, is it really?

04:17.15
Russell Gibson
It's not a rookie card.

04:17.70
Adz
Yeah, exactly.

04:18.20
Russell Gibson
Yeah. And so I think that's a like that's a really like sort of funny one there. um Yeah, again, the design doesn't change basically over three years. so skip forward to the next one. Then we've got the Don on this one here.

04:30.89
Russell Gibson
So this for me is an interesting one because if I'm just sort of flicking back between them, as you can see there, there's a little bit of a difference there in terms of the design, but you know it's it's nothing major that you'd sort of you know write home about.

04:42.31
Adz
No, this is, and this is where it was a, some, so ah like a prism mosaic. Like it was, it was really just a prism card.

04:46.94
Russell Gibson
Yeah. So this was its own set.

04:48.98
Adz
Yeah.

04:49.36
Russell Gibson
Yeah.

04:49.44
Adz
It's

04:49.52
Russell Gibson
And when you bought this 16, 17, 17, 18, 18, 19, it was a very small box and it only had the parallel prism parallels in it or the mosaic parallels in it.

04:53.26
Adz
a box.

04:56.05
Adz
Yeah.

05:00.61
Adz
Yeah.

05:01.67
Russell Gibson
And so you didn't get any base.

05:01.89
Adz
Yeah.

05:03.80
Russell Gibson
There was no insert sets. it was none of all this stuff. It was just like, and so you got one autograph per box and And it was kind of cool little rip because you could buy 18, 19 at the start. I think they were like 300 Aussie dollars off David Adams.

05:19.86
Adz
Yeah.

05:20.08
Russell Gibson
So if if you had an account at that time, I'm guessing that would have been like a hundred bucks. Like literally they were just giving this stuff away.

05:25.18
Adz
Wow.

05:26.59
Russell Gibson
And so remember, Obviously, this is before the boom, but that also had Luca Autos in it. It had Luca numbered rookie cards, all right?

05:33.14
Adz
Crazy, right?

05:34.17
Russell Gibson
Yeah.

05:34.46
Adz
Yeah, for sure.

05:35.19
Russell Gibson
So I purchased this off eBay secondhand. The reason I purchased this numbered to 99.

05:40.55
Adz
Yep.

05:40.67
Russell Gibson
My rationale for this was that this fit into my my cost profile.

05:45.07
Adz
o

05:45.25
Russell Gibson
and I was like, look, even though this is an eight, it's still low numbered.

05:47.97
Adz
yeahp

05:48.87
Russell Gibson
Well, relatively low.

05:50.67
Adz
yeah

05:50.80
Russell Gibson
And actually, look, I don't check the comps on this that often, but the last time I checked it, actually, it hadn't moved up or down. So I haven't actually... Made money out of it. I haven't lost. ah The fact I haven't lost money is actually what makes me happy.

06:02.51
Adz
good

06:02.59
Russell Gibson
Alrighty. Moving on to the next one. Now, this is for me where it gets really interesting. So this is when they started making it a hobby and then they added in retail, the big booster boxes, the, the blaster boxes that, you know, it sort of got all padded out, but what they also did too, which they do a little bit with select, they did these wild inserts and they did some, know,

06:21.67
Adz
Yep.

06:24.90
Adz
Pretty cool.

06:25.02
Russell Gibson
ones that absolutely were terrible, but they also did some that were really cool. And again, this might be just speaking to my own sort of biases around, you know, what I like and what I don't like, but I loved and NBA Jam growing up.

06:33.79
Adz
Yep.

06:38.52
Adz
Yeah.

06:38.64
Russell Gibson
And so they just completely tapped into that. So the first card there is Tracy McGrady.

06:44.07
Adz
The Jam Masters.

06:45.45
Russell Gibson
jam master and then moving on to the next one this is in chronological order so that's jason richardson and then that is from 2021 and so if you look at this one though and if you just directly comp that to the tmac card just look at their head sizes so tmac's head here is in proportion but you've clearly got that nba jam theme coming you know with

06:54.23
Adz
Yep.

06:59.73
Adz
Yeah.

07:03.62
Adz
Yeah.

07:06.99
Adz
Giant head starting to.

07:09.07
Russell Gibson
Well, the ball in the background, the ball's on fire, you know, he's on fire, all that type of stuff.

07:11.87
Adz
Yeah.

07:12.95
Russell Gibson
But then here, like, they're going into full big head mode, right? And so, again, it's got that beautiful mosaic parallel going on there.

07:16.83
Adz
Let's see.

07:20.79
Adz
Yep.

07:21.98
Russell Gibson
But then you go to the one after that, that LeBron James one. So that is from 2324.

07:27.68
Russell Gibson
And so my at the time favorite was the Tracy McGrady version one. And I bought a lot of these. Like I've got boxes and boxes of these.

07:35.84
Adz
Yeah.

07:38.52
Russell Gibson
And my actual thing was, do you remember that um comic book card that they did that absolutely went crazy? It was called Net Marvels.

07:47.14
Adz
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. The Marvels were great. Yep.

07:49.06
Russell Gibson
I thought this was the next one that was going to like go crazy.

07:49.28
Adz
Net Marvels. Yep.

07:51.58
Russell Gibson
And I was completely wrong about that, by the way. But you know I've got a massive box of Jam Masters. I'm not too sad about it. But then this one here, which is actually really interesting because they look amazing to me.

08:03.01
Russell Gibson
Black, to me, always signifies low-numbered. They're absolutely not low-numbered.

08:08.44
Adz
Yeah.

08:09.19
Russell Gibson
But they look amazing. And you can pick these up for a couple of bucks.

08:11.52
Adz
They look cool.

08:12.97
Russell Gibson
And so in the pandemic, going back to the TMAX set,

08:17.21
Adz
Yeah.

08:18.48
Russell Gibson
The green LeBron, so not even the silver Mosaic, I bought one of those for $100.

08:24.63
Russell Gibson
And this Jam Masters LeBron, which I probably think is a better card or more aesthetically pleasing card, I think I paid like $10 or something like that for it.

08:24.92
Adz
Okay.

08:28.92
Adz
Yeah.

08:33.85
Russell Gibson
You know, like just, you know, you know figuratively nothing.

08:34.95
Adz
Wow. Okay.

08:38.34
Russell Gibson
yeah

08:38.74
Adz
Yeah.

08:39.53
Russell Gibson
um Moving on to the next one. Again, we're keeping in with the the inserts on these. I think this is corny. I think this is really cool. This is the bank shot one.

08:51.35
Russell Gibson
So whilst they curated a really good set of dunkers on this one here, what they did was they, they went for shooters. So if you're looking for a subset, which highlights shooters, you know, this is you know where you want to go for this.

09:03.32
Adz
Yeah. The bank shot gets called bank.

09:06.52
Russell Gibson
Yeah. The other one that you might look for in shooters is a splash out of Don Russ, but,

09:13.15
Adz
Oh, I did like the splash ones.

09:14.66
Russell Gibson
Yeah, if you want to keep in Mosaic, this is the shooter one out of that.

09:14.67
Adz
Yeah, they were good.

09:17.74
Russell Gibson
So this is featured from the 2324 product.

09:20.80
Adz
Yeah.

09:21.91
Russell Gibson
Moving on, this is actually a relatively new insert that they just put in. So clearly also new to the NBA, the in-season tournament. If you enjoy that sort of like sneaker art, if you enjoy the art that goes into the courts, look, for me, these cards are not going to be worth a cent. In fact, I'd almost say these is going to be a bad purchase.

09:43.92
Adz
Mmm.

09:44.57
Russell Gibson
However, I think these cards look really good and in hand, they're fantastic.

09:48.81
Adz
Yeah.

09:49.43
Russell Gibson
I haven't collected the set just for the fact i didn't want to do the outlay and also just the time investing into, you know, picking all these up. But actually I could imagine um scrolling through those, that would actually be like a really cool little set to pick up on that one there.

10:01.91
Russell Gibson
Now moving into the next one. So ah this is from last year's Mosaic and actually these are technically a case hit. And so if you are in the market for extremely cheap veteran card case hits, these are called silver sparkle mosaic.

10:23.03
Russell Gibson
And so I picked up a Bradley Beal for like a dollar. I picked up a Brandon Ingram for about $1. $2 or $3, something in that range, like just stupid.

10:34.78
Adz
Yeah.

10:35.20
Russell Gibson
Yeah.

10:35.62
Adz
Okay.

10:36.07
Russell Gibson
And so if you're prospecting on some cards that actually are low pop and you think that might be collectible in the future, this is something I think you could look at.

10:43.91
Adz
Yep.

10:45.91
Russell Gibson
I probably think the better play here, though, is not so much purchasing on like lower end vets. You just go for like the big dog. So you go for the LeBrons. You go for the Anthony Edwards. You go for the Lukas. You go for the Steph Currys.

10:58.81
Adz
Yeah.

10:59.29
Russell Gibson
You go for like the key rookies or maybe you go on some like rookie rookies that you're prospecting. I think that's the play for this particular subset.

11:04.94
Adz
Yep.

11:07.50
Russell Gibson
Yeah. Now this next one is he a ah case hit that was like very collectible in its time. And look...

11:12.71
Adz
Oh, that's the, is that a one of one? Yeah.

11:14.82
Russell Gibson
No, this is the Genesis. So it's an unnumbered case here. Again, clearly a lot of this stuff here is Darren Fox. And this is not about Darren Fox. just, these are the cards that I had on hand of the cards that I wanted to talk about.

11:26.60
Adz
yeah

11:26.74
Russell Gibson
And so, yeah, look, same thing again. If you're looking to get these, these are a lot more expensive so that you're sort of looking that sort of a hundred dollar range for these type of cards. Yeah.

11:37.20
Adz
yeah

11:37.30
Russell Gibson
But if you want to buy the rookies of these, actually, i think that's a really um shrewd pickup in terms of, you know, getting case hits. Because I think the thing about Mosaic is that not every card in Mosaic is collectible.

11:43.63
Adz
Good idea.

11:47.70
Russell Gibson
You know, for obvious reasons, they printed the life out of this stuff.

11:49.91
Adz
with With that parallel, just out of curiosity, does it have that revolution feel to it?

11:52.20
Russell Gibson
Yeah.

11:54.75
Adz
is Do you think that's why people might not be on it? Because the parallel is too busy? Just try and keep looking at them.

12:00.97
Russell Gibson
Yeah.

12:02.32
Adz
I think they're quite aesthetically pleasing, but

12:04.83
Russell Gibson
Because I think the Genesis is a ripoff of a Nebula.

12:08.38
Adz
Yeah. That's why I was like, have you got a one of one nebula?

12:10.03
Russell Gibson
And actually, in I think the photo, the way I took it, it actually is, it's probably overexposed.

12:11.22
Adz
Yeah.

12:15.74
Adz
Yeah.

12:15.83
Russell Gibson
But when you hold it in your hand, it's actually more of a deeper, darker card.

12:20.34
Adz
Okay.

12:20.81
Russell Gibson
So that's actually, it's a terrible photo, to be honest.

12:21.12
Adz
That's cool.

12:23.12
Russell Gibson
Yeah. All right. Now, this last one, I wanted to talk about this. So this is a very broad strokes card. conversation about mosaic autographs. And actually this is a part of the product, which I think is grossly overvalued.

12:31.88
Adz
Hmm.

12:35.61
Russell Gibson
And so these sell for, in my opinion, just too high because I don't think the actual mosaic set is that particularly collectible. I think it's if just in general, I think in general, it's sort of like a tier two or a tier three set that you would collect.

12:44.56
Adz
for autographs or just in general?

12:50.54
Adz
Sure, sure, that makes sense.

12:51.82
Russell Gibson
And I think if we look back at basketball cards in 20 years and we do call this, you know, a junk wax error, you know,

12:59.61
Adz
Junk slab error is what we're in

13:01.17
Russell Gibson
Don Russ, you're going to put into that. You're going to put in Mosaic. You're going to put in like Phoenix. You're going to put in Flux, all that type of stuff. Look, probably Mosaic's a little bit higher than some of that other stuff.

13:10.54
Adz
Yeah, yeah.

13:14.00
Russell Gibson
Hoops goes into that, you know, lower tier.

13:15.12
Adz
hoops Hoops and Donrass are obviously the the two culprits there, but yeah, you're right.

13:18.47
Russell Gibson
Yeah, but I just feel like, yeah, I just feel like for me, like some of the prices on these sticker autographs that go in Mosaic, for me, it's just too high.

13:19.04
Adz
you're like It's down in that, yeah. You're right.

13:25.82
Russell Gibson
so I'm like, look, if you really like the card, and look, it's aesthetically pleasing, I get that.

13:31.89
Adz
Yeah.

13:31.90
Russell Gibson
If you really like the card and it's your boy, okay, fine, overpay for it. But also too, it's like, Could you get an on-card NT for the same price?

13:41.70
Adz
Yeah.

13:43.10
Russell Gibson
Could you get on-card flawless? like You'd be surprised sometimes about how cheap some of this flawless stuff goes for it. It's a little bit criminal some days, to be honest.

13:50.26
Adz
Yeah, that's true.

13:52.52
Russell Gibson
Maybe this is what we could do for another Timeless Moment. so What are your bargains that you can find out there in flawless? What are the bargains you can get out there in NT?

13:59.74
Adz
And ways to to look for them. Yeah, good idea.

14:01.32
Russell Gibson
Yeah. Sort of the, you know, the flip side of this particular conversation we're having now.

14:02.19
Adz
Good idea.

14:05.39
Russell Gibson
So that's the end of my rant.

14:05.72
Adz
Yeah.

14:08.86
Russell Gibson
Would you like to add or subtract anything?

14:11.31
Adz
Look, I think you you you have one one card that we haven't yet seen that we can tie this all up in a bow with.

14:19.63
Russell Gibson
Oh, thank you.

14:20.20
Adz
i am very I am very much a – I do like the aesthetics.

14:21.06
Russell Gibson
Yeah. Yeah.

14:25.08
Adz
As I said, Mosaic is ah is a lovely thing.

14:25.83
Russell Gibson
Yeah.

14:27.20
Adz
It started off as a parallel.

14:28.84
Russell Gibson
yeah

14:28.98
Adz
It moved and became its own thing.

14:31.21
Russell Gibson
Yeah.

14:31.73
Adz
I think there's a place for it. I think it looks good.

14:34.51
Russell Gibson
yeah

14:34.91
Adz
um And I agree with a lot of what you've said with regards to the, like you don't go into Mosaic for autos.

14:42.74
Russell Gibson
yeah

14:43.31
Adz
You go for these cool looking parallels and that bit of glitz to a card without it being too busy.

14:48.05
Russell Gibson
Yeah.

14:49.15
Adz
So I think it's ah it's a nice parallel, nice variant.

14:49.88
Russell Gibson
yeah

14:52.70
Adz
And it's nice there's a set dedicated to it Yeah.

14:55.31
Russell Gibson
Actually, can we finish off with not a card from mine? So this is actually from at Ultimate Collectibles Australia.

15:02.17
Adz
Yep.

15:02.32
Russell Gibson
And the reason I'm citing this is because he actually put up a Shaq picture. And one of those pictures is a Shaq PSA 9 gold.

15:11.68
Adz
Yep.

15:11.94
Russell Gibson
And the reason I wanted to highlight this one.

15:12.24
Adz
I've got the photo up here. Yep.

15:13.75
Russell Gibson
So we were just talking about the uncollectible sticker autographs of Mosaic.

15:17.86
Adz
Hmm.

15:17.99
Russell Gibson
1718, 1819 actually had enca veteran autographs

15:24.43
Adz
Whoa.

15:25.07
Russell Gibson
And so, for example, this one here, it's an on-card shack, number to 10, because the gold, this is actually the the right gold too.

15:29.65
Adz
Oh, it's the gold. ah

15:33.08
Russell Gibson
Yeah. So, um as much as I was just saying that some of these are, know, underrated, look, you're going to pay a lot for that on-card gold.

15:36.15
Adz
Wonder. Yeah.

15:40.63
Adz
that's That's an on-card gold shack.

15:41.95
Russell Gibson
but

15:43.57
Adz
Like, oh.

15:44.95
Russell Gibson
And so, I think, you know, that for me, the the contrast here is like Prism Autograph. So, okay, I wouldn't be spending a whole lot of money on a Prism Autograph. However... an on-card mosaic that's numbered to 10.

15:55.00
Adz
It's on-card.

15:57.77
Russell Gibson
There's also the camo to 25, which I think is like excellent, but I never pulled the trigger on that for me.

16:00.57
Adz
yeah the Yeah, the gold, the on-card. Do you think they might be undervalued?

16:05.32
Russell Gibson
Yeah.

16:07.26
Adz
Maybe people do see the the value in them being on-card. But i yeah, I for one, seeing an on-card auto like that would, yeah, f profit that for sure.

16:14.39
Russell Gibson
Yeah. Thank you, Adam.

16:17.63
Adz
Thank you for for another awesome timeless moment.

16:20.74
Russell Gibson
Yeah. Yeah.

16:21.42
Adz
um Thanks, everybody, for for listening. If you've got any any feedback, any comments to make, please drop them down below on the YouTube comments and we will respond to everything.

16:23.84
Russell Gibson
Yeah. Tuning in.

16:33.23
Adz
Keen to hear everyone's thoughts.

16:35.14
Russell Gibson
Peace.

16:36.34
Adz
But until then, we will see you next time.

16:39.94
Russell Gibson
pace