PSA Football Cards: Values by Grade and Grading Costs

PSA football cards are NFL cards that PSA has authenticated, graded and sealed, and their price depends on three things: the player, the exact card, and the number on the label. SportsCardsPro market values from Sept. 25, 2026, listed as raw / grade 9 / PSA 10, with how many times the grade 9 price a 10 sells for:

• 2000 Playoff Contenders Tom Brady autograph #144: $19,567 / $50,634 / $297,916 (5.9 times).
• 1998 Playoff Contenders Ticket Peyton Manning red autograph #87: $297 / $1,073 / $6,948 (6.5 times).
• 2017 Panini Prizm Patrick Mahomes II Silver Prizm #269: $977 / $1,753 / $7,476 (4.3 times).
• 1976 Topps Walter Payton #148: $238 / $916 / $1,997 (2.2 times).
• 1981 Topps Joe Montana #216: $109 / $255 / $650 (2.5 times).
• 2018 Panini Prizm Josh Allen #205: $96 / $155 / $544 (3.5 times).
• 1986 Topps Jerry Rice #161: $70 / $143 / $399 (2.8 times).
• 2020 Panini Prizm Joe Burrow #307: $15 / $28 / $110 (4.0 times).
• 2020 Panini Prizm Justin Herbert #325: $7.65 / $21 / $70 (3.3 times).
• 2015 Topps Jameis Winston #500: $1.24 / $12 / $30 (2.6 times).

The pattern: for these 1970s and 1980s cards a PSA 10 is worth 2.2 to 2.8 times a 9; for the modern cards it is 2.6 to 6.5 times, highest for the autographs. Our rookie card pages show how to confirm each card before you price it.

From Wikipedia's list of most expensive sports cards, nominal sale prices:

• 2017 Panini National Treasures Patrick Mahomes Platinum Shield rookie patch autograph, 1/1, BGS 8.5: $4,300,000, July 2021, PWCC Marketplace.
• 2000 Playoff Contenders Tom Brady Championship Rookie Ticket autograph, #8/100, BGS 9: $3,107,372.40, June 4, 2021, Lelands.
• 2020 Panini National Treasures Justin Herbert Platinum NFL Shield autograph, 1/1, BGS 8.5: $1,800,000, Sept. 11, 2022.
• 2020 Panini National Treasures Joe Burrow Platinum NFL Shield autograph, 1/1, BGS 9.5: $1,700,000, Sept. 12, 2022, private sale.
• 2017 Panini National Treasures Patrick Mahomes Black rookie patch autograph, #1/5, BGS 9: $840,000, Jan. 30, 2021.

All five are modern, serial-numbered autograph cards, and all five were graded by Beckett (BGS), not PSA. The top of the football market is driven by print runs of one to 100 copies, not by the base rookie card.

Yes. PSA grades football cards on the same 1–10 scale it uses for every sport, and publishes a football section in its price guide (one of the top search results for this topic). Football is also the sport where grading grew in 2025: GemRate's count, reported by Sports Illustrated on Jan. 4, 2026, had football up 11% while basketball fell 23% and baseball 14%. What each PSA grade means is on our PSA grading scale page.

PSA charges per card by the card's value after grading. The September 2026 menu, as reported on Sept. 9, 2026 by Sports Illustrated and Heavy (via Yahoo Sports):

• Standard: $59.99, 90–100 business days, cards worth up to $1,000 (open from Sept. 14, 2026).
• Priority: $79.99 (SI printed $79.00), 70–80 business days, up to $1,500.
• Express: $199, 20–30 business days, up to $2,500.
• Premier: $599, 7–10 business days, up to $10,000.
• Premium: from $999, 5–7 business days.

The cheaper Value tiers have been paused since June 2, 2026. Shipping both ways, insurance and upcharges come on top; our PSA grading cost page lists them.

Grading pays when the graded price minus the raw price is more than the fee and shipping. Using the SportsCardsPro prices above and PSA's September 2026 fees:

• 2015 Topps Winston and 2020 Prizm Herbert: even a PSA 10 ($30 and $70) is worth less than, or about the same as, the $59.99 Standard fee added to the raw price. Not worth grading for resale.
• 2020 Prizm Burrow: only a 10 pays ($110 against $15 raw), and only by about $35 before shipping. A 9 loses money.
• 2018 Prizm Allen: a 9 adds about $59, roughly the fee; a 10 adds about $448.
• 1981 Topps Montana and 1986 Topps Rice: a 9 adds $146 and $73 respectively, so a clean copy is worth sending at Standard.
• 1976 Topps Payton: a 9 ($916) fits Standard's $1,000 cap; if you expect a 10 ($1,997), it belongs in Express ($199, up to $2,500), because PSA charges more when the grade pushes the value past a tier's cap.
• 2017 Prizm Silver Mahomes: a 9 ($1,753) is above Priority's $1,500 cap, so Express; a 10 ($7,476) needs Premier ($599).
• 2000 Contenders Brady autograph: even raw ($19,567) it is above Premier's $10,000 cap, which leaves the tiers that start at $999.

Before paying any fee, check centering and corners with our grade-it-yourself checklist.

• Vintage stars' rookie cards in good condition: Payton, Montana and Rice above sell for $70 to $238 even raw.
• Modern stars' premium rookies: Prizm Silver parallels and Contenders rookie ticket autographs, such as the Mahomes Silver ($977 raw) and Manning Ticket ($297 raw).
• Serial-numbered autographs and patches, especially 1/1s: every record sale listed above is one.
• Base rookies of current players in top grade only: a raw 2020 Prizm Burrow is $15; the value is in the PSA 10.

Cards of most other players, especially base cards from recent years, sell for a few dollars or less. The sports card price guide covers other sports.

It is the safer way to buy an expensive card, because someone has already checked it is genuine and unaltered and the grade is printed on the slab. The trade-offs:

• You pay for the grade. A PSA 10 costs 2.2 to 6.5 times a 9 in the table above, so decide whether you want the card or the number.
• Check the certification number on PSA's cert lookup; it should return the same player, year, set and grade. Figoca's guide (March 4, 2026) says the lookup is free and needs no account.
• A matching cert number does not prove the slab is real. Figoca warns that counterfeiters copy real numbers onto fake holders; our PSA slab page has the physical checks.
• Where they are sold: the other top results for this search are GameStop's graded card listings and eBay's PSA football category. Compare asking prices with recent completed sales of the same card in the same grade.

Take one straight photo of the front and one of the back, so the year, set and card number are readable. StarLens reads the player, set and number from the photo. Then match the result against the checks on this page before you trust any price.

Research and drafting for this page were assisted by AI and checked line by line against the sources listed below. Every price names its source and date. Some sites we wanted to cite (PSA, SportsCardsPro product pages, eBay, GameStop) refused automated access on Sept. 25, 2026; where that left a gap, the page says so instead of guessing. If you find an error, tell us and we will correct it.