CGC Cards Featured Card of the Month: 2018-19 Panini Select #7 Shai Gilgeous-Alexander
Posted on 12/5/2024
Sport: Basketball
Set: 2018-19 Panini Select
Card: #7 Shai Gilgeous-Alexander
What makes it special? NBA All-Star Shai Gilgeous-Alexander took an interesting path to stardom, beginning his basketball career as a kid growing up in Ontario, Canada. He was raised by two athletic parents: His father won the Toronto city basketball championship in high school and his mother competed in track and field at the 1992 Summer Olympics. Gilgeous-Alexander was born into sports and was even coached by his dad in basketball as a young man.
His talent was clear but the competition in his hometown was lacking, so Gilgeous-Alexander moved to the US and attended high school in Tennessee as a junior and senior. He earned national attention from some of the biggest college basketball programs in the country, eventually choosing to play for the Kentucky Wildcats. After only one season in Lexington, Gilgeous-Alexander was already on NBA scouts' radar, so he declared for the 2018 NBA Draft.
Selected by the Charlotte Hornets with the 11th overall pick, he was traded that same day to the Los Angeles Clippers. He'd spend only one season in L.A. before being traded to the Oklahoma City Thunder, where he's become one of the brightest young stars in the league. Gilgeous-Alexander made an immediate impact in Oklahoma City, becoming the team's top scorer and leading the franchise to the playoffs in his first season.
The 26-year-old guard faced some setbacks due to injury but returned better than ever, earning back-to-back All-Star appearances in 2023 and 2024. Last season, Gilgeous-Alexander led the Thunder to the best regular season record in the Western Conference (57-25). The young Thunder team faltered in the playoffs, but Gilgeous-Alexander finished the season as the MVP runner-up and was selected to the All-NBA First Team for the second consecutive season.
So far this season, he's once again one of the leading scorers in the NBA and Oklahoma City is leading the Western Conference standings again, as well. The future looks bright for Gilgeous-Alexander and the Thunder, as he and his teammates look to take the next step and compete for titles, potentially bringing Oklahoma City its first-ever NBA championship.
Did you know? During the 2022-23 season, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander became the youngest player in NBA history to average at least 30 points on 50% or above shooting from the field, which beat the previous record held by Michael Jordan from his earliest years in the league. Following his record-setting season, he earned the Northern Star Award for Canadian athlete of the year in 2023, which was only the second time a basketball player from the country was given the prestigious national award.
Total graded by CGC Cards: There are several examples of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander's Select rookie card, including a few parallels with different colors and background designs. Of the base Select #7 version, there are 35 graded examples of the standard card in the CGC Cards Population Report, as of early December 2024. CGC Cards has also graded 3 different parallels of the same card: Silver (1), Red (2) and Zebra (1).
CGC Cards median grade: CGC 9
CGC Cards highest graded: Out of 39 total graded examples, there are a handful of Gem Mint 10s, but none have earned the coveted grade of CGC Pristine 10. There are 4 base examples graded CGC Gem Mint 10, and each of the 4 total parallels earned grades of CGC 9.
Sales highlights: Two examples of the Select #7 base rookie card graded CGC 9 realized $17 and $12 through Fanatics Collect in April 2024 and June 2024 respectively. In addition, the lone Zebra parallel graded CGC 9 (pictured above) realized $552 through Fanatics Collect in November 2023.
Related Link: More CGC Cards Featured Card of the Month articles
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