Following the Denver Broncos’ 33-30 overtime win over the Buffalo Bills in the AFC divisional round, a major quarterback shake-up quickly reshaped the point spread — and sparked unexpected interest elsewhere.
With rookie starter Bo Nix’s season-ending injury, Denver turned to backup Jarrett Stidham, a move that flipped the Broncos from 1.5-point favorites to 5.5-point underdogs against the New England Patriots.
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Stidham, a 2019 fourth-round pick by New England — who spent 2022 with the Las Vegas Raiders before backing up Russell Wilson and Nix in Denver — hasn’t started a game in more than two years. The Corbin, Kentucky, native is 1-3 as an NFL starter and has passed for 1,422 yards, 8 touchdowns and 8 interceptions in 20 career games played.
But some, namely sports card collectors, are bullish on Stidham’s sudden upside. According to Card Ladder, a platform that monitors sports card market trends and sales histories, Stidham has had the largest week-over-week value change of any athlete (min. five cards sold), rising 788.48%. Some collectors engage in “prospecting,” or buying as early as possible on players they believe will rise in value, hoping to sell high after on-field performance. But Stidham is a known quantity suddenly thrust into a potentially career-defining circumstance.
On Sunday, Stidham will become only the seventh quarterback since starts began being tracked in 1950 to start a playoff game in a season when he didn’t start in the regular season.
Being a heartbeat away from the Super Bowl was enough for one collector to spend $2,000 on a Stidham rookie patch autograph card numbered to three on eBay, mere hours after the Nix injury news broke.
With Denver turning to Stidham in the AFC Championship, collectors are betting big on his moment. Andrew Arnold/eBay
Andrew Arnold, owner of Texas’ Beast Sports Cards, sold the card. Arnold told ESPN that he picked up the Stidham card during the Dallas Card Show, which ran Jan. 15-18. Arnold wasn’t specifically targeting Stidham cards; it was included in a larger lot of “older cards” Arnold bought. When Nix got hurt, Arnold immediately put it up for sale.
“I thought it would sell for $1,000 or so, initially, after he was made the starter,” Arnold told ESPN. “But [someone] wanted it badly, so they paid the full asking price.”
It’s not the most ever publicly paid for a Stidham card, which was $3,300 in April 2020. According to Card Ladder, Stidham’s high public price falls far short of the other three starting quarterbacks’ playing this weekend: Sam Darnold’s, $10,300 in September 2021; Matthew Stafford’s, $55,000 in February 2022; and Drake Maye’s, $164,700 in November 2025.
There are currently three 1-of-1 Stidham rookie cards for sale on eBay with six-figure asking prices: the non-autographed 2019 Panini Prizm Black Finite ($500,000 or best offer), the on-card autographed 2019 Panini National Treasures NFL shield card ($450,000 or best offer) and the autographed 2019 Panini Prizm Sensational Signatures Black Finite card ($225,000 or best offer).
If Stidham can take Denver to Super Bowl LX in San Francisco, his market might skyrocket.
“At the end of the day, I’m not focused on anything but Sunday, what is my job on each and every play,” Stidham said Wednesday. “How can I help my teammates succeed on Sunday? I don’t care about anything else other than the next five days and what my job is.”
Broncos head coach Sean Payton endorsed Stidham in the same news conference.
“He’s going to rip it, and that’ll be our approach,” Payton said. “He’s got this calm demeanor that suits him well. … I felt like our [No.] 2 [quarterback] was inside the best 32 [in the league].”
