Want to collect someone who’s very affordable and relatively solid on the field?
Atlanta Falcons defensive lineman Adrian Clayborn made a case for himself on Sunday night against the Dallas Cowboys when he did something that’s only been equaled or topped by three other players since 1982 when the sack became an official NFL stat. He had six sacks of Dak Prescott — just one short of the NFL record — and he wasn’t boisterous about the big game afterward.
“I only have one move and it worked,” Clayborn told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “I play the same way every game and it lucked out for me today.”
The record of seven was set by Hall of Famer Derrick Thomas in 1990 and only Osi Umenyiora and Fred Dean had six. Thomas also had a six-sack game in 1998.
Clayborn was the 20th pick in the 2011 NFL draft out of Iowa, taken by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers where he played four seasons before signing with the Falcons in 2015. Entering yesterday’s game, he had 22.5 sacks in his seven-year career. His eight this season is already a career high.
On cardboard, he’s not super-plentiful — fewer than 350 total cards — but thanks to that first-round status he did have a number of certified autographs early on. He’s got more than 100 auto cards and 25 Rookie Cards that can be found in 2011 NFL releases. His standard RCs can be found in Absolute, Adrenalyn, Bowman Sterling, Certified, Crown Royale, Elite, Limited, Gold Standard, Gridiron Gear, Plates & Patches, Playbook, Threads, Contenders, National Treasures, Prestige, Prime Signatures, Rookies & Stars, Score, Timeless Treasures, Topps, Topps Chrome, Topps Rising Rookies and Totally Certified.
The best of those might be his Contenders card, which is a short-printed auto limited to 114 copies. Other autos in that lineup include Playbook, Plates & Patches, Totally Certified, National Treasures, Timeless Treasures and Prime Signatures.
He hasn’t appeared on an autographed card since 2015 when he was included on a single card in 2015 Donruss‘ Signature Series insert set and that was his only card made at all — ink or not — that year. It’s also the only card he has noting his presence on the Falcons, though it uses a Bucs photo.
You can pick up a number of his autos for less than $2 on sites such as COMC.com, and you can find some of his key rarer cards there for less than $25 — you just won’t find any Falcons cards.
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