These are not your trading cards from back in the day. You remember opening up and finding that stale piece of gum while you flip through to find a rookie card of one of your favorite players. The trading card market has changed dramatically, and the VP Of Panini America, Jason Howarth, is here to break it down for you. Jason and Shawne discuss how the global market of trading cards has impacted the value of cards today. Howarth then describes how NFT's the future of trading cards. And what is next with the NIL in collegiate sports?
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Are you ready for this? Sean Merriman A one hand effect.
Boom boom, boom, out go the light. This is Lights
Out with Sean Merriman. What's up, guys. We're back again
with another Lights Out podcast with me Sean Raymond and UH.
We're going to one of the hottest industries in I
(00:21):
would say the country, probably in the world. Um at
the great deck growing and something I did when I
was a kid, UH, and that's collecting cards, trading cards.
They we got Jason Holworth, the VP of Panini America
trading cards. Myself, I have a deal in partnership with UH. Panini.
They had been great partners in mine over the course
of this past year, so a couple of years now
(00:43):
and UH doing some great things, launching some new products
and UM. Like I said, it's one of the hottest industries.
Heard a friend of mine, Gary Gary V, talking about
it maybe about five or six years ago, before this
industry even got big. UM. So we'll have Jason Haworth
coming on a day, who's a VP of Panini America,
and talk about the expansion growth and their plans and
(01:05):
what they're planning on doing. You know, Actually, I gotta
deal with you guys, I got like three or four
more signings on my um yep, on my deal over
that I've been been working with you guys for a
for a while now. Yeah, absolutely, so well, thank you
for signing those cards that are important to the fan
base for sure and to us of course. So so
let me so let me ask you always and just
(01:26):
something I wanted to know, how do you guys kind
of you know, know what's hot and know what's in
the market, know what's needed. Right, So even when I
do signings myself, do you guys you know, just know
the temperature of the market and certain guys might have
a big game or certain guys might have a big
social media presence because you know, I still every day
on social media people ask me to sign stuff. But
(01:48):
how do you guys like evaluate you know, how you
know what what cards or what athletes to go after
and do deals with. Yeah? Yeah, so I mean obviously, um,
you know, we're how on the active on the active side,
so active players and rookies, Um, you know, the rookies
tend to predominance, you can imagine, are predominantly heavy on
(02:09):
the offensive side of the ball. Uh. You know, collectors
like people that score touchdowns. I disagree with that. I
like dudes that sack quarterbacks as well. So but you know,
so we're have you on the rookie side, on the
skill position side, and then as we dig into the
veteran side of that, you know, you start to see
more of the defensive players, and then you've got the
legend component and the legend component. I want to say,
(02:31):
we probably have maybe a hundred and fifty legends that
we you know, or retired guys that we you know,
we dig into our you know, our group and it
and it really varies depending on what we're you know,
what we're looking at. But we we tend to have
more flexibility on the retired guys from a defensive player
(02:51):
because they hadn't been they hadn't been featured so much
as an autograph trading card during their playing you know,
during their playing years or as a key, so you know,
getting guys like you or Troy Polamala or you name it.
I mean Troy didn't have an autograph card for years.
I mean he almost I think he the last few
(03:11):
years he played, he didn't have an autograph card. You know.
Then when he retired, we were able to get him
to start signing cards. So, um, you know, good balance there.
And then obviously fan favorites and you're certainly one of those.
Does does a fan base dictate a lot of that?
So like, obviously Troy play for the Steelers and they
have a ridiculous fan base, right, So do you have
(03:34):
is there like a difference in a guy that's same
equal talent and you know, obviously Troy Pallymala is going
to go down as one of the best safeties ever.
But you know, take a you know, guy that's not
Troy Polamala, but it was really good four or five
six Pro Bowls that play for um, you know, Green Bay,
or a guy to play you know, four or five
to play for the Dog, you know, somebody with a
(03:54):
smaller fan base. Is that that changed the situation? The
fan base definitely changes the position, definitely changes the situation.
But I think that you know, there are guys that
you know, if you're a standout player, it almost doesn't
matter what team you're from, right I mean obviously there
are teams that are certainly more collectible and then other teams,
and that always plays into it. You wouldn't be surprised
(04:16):
on who those are. But I mean last year the
hottest rookie was Justin Herbert. So from a fan base perspective,
I mean, and that's the thing is like on the
rookie side, it doesn't matter, right, Like on the rookie side,
you know, I mean, would we would would we have
loved to seeing Trevor Lawrence in the New York Jets uniform.
Sure it's the New York market, but you know, he's
one of those guys that can translate, you know, against
(04:37):
Jacksonville regardless. So the rookie class tends to this, well,
we might root for them to be on certain teams
in certain markets because there's that exponential you know. I
think about, you know, the year Dakins Zeke came into
the league and they happened to be Dallas Cowboys, Like
do they I mean, obviously that was huge because it
was the Cowboys and then you had two really great
(05:00):
keys performing, you know, at the same time on that team,
So that just elevated it a bit more. Um, you know,
teams certainly, you know, having the impact, but they're definitely
guys if they're hot rookie, it almost doesn't matter, you know.
I think about Kyler Murray with the Arizona Cardinals when
he came out still hot, you know, no, no, okay,
So let me let me ask you this. So one
(05:21):
of my best friends the other day, Um, he's a
huge and I got the cards in here and stuff
like that of my own. Um, and a lot of
these guys are friends of mine with people that I know.
So I'm like, hey, yo, dude, signage for me. So
I got you know, ten fifty, I gotta justin Herbert,
you know, Rookie, I got all. I got some stuff
in there myself. But one of my one of my
boys that pulled the other day, one of uh, I
(05:42):
think Lee um one of the balls prisms he and
I think the car was worth eighteen and nineteen grand
is something along those lines, right, So I mean, obviously,
I mean we've seen that Lebronze goal for millions, and
some of these cards out there go for millions of dollars.
But was so if you get a card like you know,
(06:02):
um ball from from the Hornage, what's the next level up?
Like Sea goals to it? You know, Rookie here a
couple of All Star games. How does a market dictate
how much that that card is um is worth. Yeah. Absolutely,
the market totally dictates it. And I think that that's
the other thing that's kind of evolved in the trading
card space is that you know, before those high value
(06:24):
cards used to just be about that rookie card that
had the autograph signature on it. Maybe it was limited
to five or you know, one of one with an
NBA logo. Man, But now what you're seeing and you're
referencing our prison brand, our prison brand is a monster,
like you know it? What where did that? Where did
that come from? Like? What? Like honest, because I have
a whole I got a couple of packs in here myself.
(06:47):
How how did you guys put that as the How
did that come about? When you put that as the
elite package? Yeah? So, I mean we introduced prison in
teen and it took it had to get its legs,
and there was you know, some people that had mixed
feelings over it. But you know, in the last three
or four years, it's just absolutely blown up because of
the powerallels. And to your point, you get a beautiful
(07:08):
those cards are beautiful, but you get a beautiful parallel
or red version of pink, version of blue, version a
purple version, of green version, you name it. You know,
they all have certain levels of value based on the
color parallel it is, and so you know that dictates
some of that. And then obviously who the player is.
And so you know clearly, you know, they're three guys
(07:31):
that you know, could arguably have stood out this year
minus injuries, you know, in this NBA rookie class, LaMelo
being one of them for sure. So I mean did
go on to win Rookie of the Year. So um,
you know, so that's obviously going to drive the category
and drive the market. What's but what's amazing is we
what we're talking about was the fact that I mean
it's about autographed and but that that prison version and
(07:54):
that parallel version is so sought after because it's such
a and you know, tied to the right air. But
that's what drives dot value on the card. Fox Sports
Radio has the best sports talk lineup in the nation.
Catch all of our shows at Fox sports Radio dot
com and within the I Heart Radio app search f
s R to listen live. No, So I got mind
(08:18):
set to me and it's you know, I got my
ten or one of one or whatever it is. So
I I get that point. Let me let me ask
you about this because I just recently over the past
year got into the n f T s UM because
you explain, because I know what it is, but maybe
there's some people out there that don't fully understand what
n f T is and how important it is that
you got sure. So it literally we launched our blockchain
(08:42):
platform in January and back then, and it's hard to
believe it's like literally eighteen months ago, right, I mean,
no one had any idea what n f T was.
I mean we didn't even make it it like as
a high like as a high point of like, hey,
this is a message point to the consumer, is hey,
there's a non fund bill token tied to this card
on this blockchain platform. Because everyone was so focused about blockchain.
(09:06):
You know, blockchain is super important. The n f T
is the engine that makes the asset live on the blockchain. Right,
There's an asset that's tied to it so that you
can track it wherever it goes. That's the non vlungible token, right.
That was super important when we started to look at
n f T s and blockchain, what it meant, like
how we would integrate it into trading cards. We saw
(09:28):
a ton of value in that, Hey, it would perform,
it would carry a ledger of knowing who owned the
best Kobe Bryant card. You know, you'd be able to
track that. If you opened up a physical card, you
wouldn't know who has the best Kobe Bryant collection or
any you know, for anything or that matter. You know,
blockchain and n f T allows you to track that
over a ledger of time to see where, you know,
(09:49):
who owns that asset. So that was super important to
us when we kicked it off. The other part that
was really important was helping collectors understand the value of
the asset. And so early on, you know, they didn't
understand you know, the value of an n f T
asset you know, on the blockchain compared to a physical card.
So what we did was we when we launched it,
we tied we built a hundred cards set and we
(10:12):
had a physical card tied to every one of those assets,
so they got the value of the physical card. You know,
National Chargers version. You mentioned that one of one really
nice clean looking card thick has a piece of memorability
in it, player autograph on it, So they knew the
value of that physical card and then they weren't so
(10:33):
sure of what the n f T value was, but
you could see a premium coming with it because there
was a digital element tied to it. So that was
that first phase, first step. Then we went into like
purely launching just n f T blockchain assets that just
lived on our site and they were scarce, like that's
the other part. The DNA of of trading cards has
always been scarcity. There's been other n f T s
(10:56):
out in the market that you know, who've gone up
with huge numbers and have saturated the marketplace. You know,
We're focused on building a level of scarcity so that
we can replicate the physical value of a card to
the n f T space um through scarcity, So that
was super important to us. We started with just individualized
cards on the n f t um blockchain, making those
(11:19):
cards available on our site at Panini America dot net.
And then just four weeks ago we introduced our first
pack product, which was our NBA n f T pack products,
and that's been on fire. We literally just launched our
sneaker Spotlight n f T packs this morning and they
sold They sold out in a minute, like it was
you know, how how long do you think that's gonna last? Right?
(11:41):
Because the very first person I seemed talking about how
big trade and could now obviously I collected when I
was a kid and stuff like that, but it kind
of had a period where it died down a little bit, right,
and then it came back on. The first person I
seemed talking about it was Gary V. That that was
I might have missed other people, but you know, he
had to loud his voice, right, He was the one
that was only that think it was in two thousand
fourteen or fifteen. He was like, hey guys, these trading
(12:04):
cards are coming back around, and it's so how long
do you think that it's going to be big like this?
Or do you see it not only being this big
and getting bigger? It's getting bigger. So what the difference
between what happened when we were kids, right, is like,
you know, I grew up in the eighties collected cards.
You know, the trading card companies just oversaturated the marketplace
(12:25):
with with cards, so that all those cards that we
collected as kids, thinking that they were going to be
valuable weren't because it was super saturated. The markets changed
and shifted so that you've got unique numbering on cards now, Um,
so you know exactly that there's only six hundred of
these cards in the world, or four of these cards
in the world, or a one of one is truly
(12:46):
a one of one, right, So you've got that part.
And the other side that's different from you know, back
in the day when we were kids, is that the
market has expanded. Right. It used to be that you
just walk into your own hobby store and that was
your commune city. You didn't know what was happening outside
of that space. Now you've got case breaking happening, things
happening online, You've got guys opening up product online. So
(13:09):
it's really become a global community where people can see
what's happening in the space. And the market has totally grown,
you know global. We we've we launched our social platforms
in China in August of nineteen and then are direct
to consumer platform in China right in the middle of
the pandemic in March of March, and that's grown exponentially
(13:32):
over there. So we've seen the global marketplace expand in
terms of their excitement for trading cards and as we
balance out that supply and demand, making sure that we
maintain that level of scarcity. Is the market grows, the
scarcity in some cases still say it still stays the same.
So that's not changing. Um. And then you've got great
personalities you think about, you know what's happening. You know
(13:54):
in the football space, You've got the young guys coming up.
You've obviously got those guys that are the that dreams
that are kind of you know, still playing, that mean
everything to the world. You know, I'm from Boston, so
I'm gonna use Tom Brady as an example. You know,
that's it, man, what I'm getting off of. You know, listen,
I remember those games. Those games were rough, man, you know,
always had me nervous. You and LT and you know,
(14:19):
Philip Rivers those guys, it was. It was rough. But
you know so but I mean, so you've got those
guys that are there and established, and then you've got
guys coming up, whether that be Patrick Mahomes or Justin
Herbert last year. You know that that continue to evolve
our you know, um, you know, those are the guys
that are driving the category now, um. You know, and
(14:39):
those are the those are the ones that are going
to continue to build the marketplace. Overall on the football side,
and then I'll obviously on the basketball side, guys like
Luca don Chick is just you know, I mean, they're huge.
So that's what that mel was my next question. You're
talking about the global expansion, mean you guys getting bigger,
Like take somebody like Luca, right, do you the un
(15:00):
now go into maybe his country internationally and launched something
specifically with him or you're like, you're going with these
guys that it's that the role map. Um No, we
we when we launch a product, it's a global product.
You know, from a trading card person right off the top,
it's it's global right away. Absolutely. So Luca is one
of those guys that's an exclusive Panini athletes, so he
(15:20):
signs memorabilia for us as well. And obviously, you know,
had a great game of a few days ago. I'm
losing track of the days here, Um, what's happening in Tokyo.
But obviously great game the other day. Um, you know,
that continues to just grow his popularity, you know, globally,
what he does on the world stage, you know, in
addition to just the NBA stage. So what's so what's next?
(15:42):
I mean, obviously the guys working on global, the n
f T s are getting bigger. Is there something coming
in the market that people are not really paying attention
to as much? I'm not asking you to give up
you guys secrets and next moves, but is there something
you're seeing that people aren't really paying attention to in
this space yet that you guys see coming. So, I mean,
obviously UFC we launched our first product here um a
(16:03):
few months about two and a half months ago, and
that's been absolutely on fire. Our next UFC product drops
this week, our UFC Select product. We're seeing a lot
of growth there. Um, They've got some great personalities. I
mean everyone always talks about Connor, but there's some great
fighters across then. You know, it's reel. It's reel. All
these guys were would be you know, even you know
(16:26):
John Jones it there's a couple of big personality would
say about ten guys that would do extremely well when
it's time. Yeah, absolutely, So, I mean those guys are
you know, are driving the space right now, and I
think that's a growth opportunity and people are getting excited
about that. Um, you know, like I said, we just
introduced our first product and and it went great. I
(16:48):
have no doubt Select is going to crush it here
when it launches here in the next couple of days. Um,
you know. And then the other side is, you know,
obviously what's happening in this n I L space. The
N I L space is wild West? Right, twenty six
days old. Um, hard to believe, but you know, we
were jumping into that and dialing in as you know, historically,
(17:09):
what what's happened in the collegiate space, and we've been
the exclusive partner on the college side for six years now,
is we've never put a guy in their uniform when
they're current college athlete. We have to wait for them
to clear for the draft, you know, go pro, and
then we fall back into dropping those guys into their
collision uniforms. So you see Trevor Lawrence in a Clemson
(17:29):
uniform at this point. You know, what's happened as of
July one is this wild West. You know, this wild
West in terms of you know, now you can get
current college athletes do something with them. I was wanting
to know about that, right, So now is that completely
because I read the other day the quarterback for Alabama
head offers up to a million dollars of endorsemental kind
(17:52):
of you know, a couple of different things of cols
to a million a million dollars for you guys, does
that change the does that is that even crazy? If?
For you guys now, it's crazier right now because there's
no parameters in place. And what we're working really hard
to do is put some parameters in place so you know,
so that there's at least some infrastructure, especially because trading
cards are probably the most relevant, you know, to the
(18:15):
collegiate athlete. Right you tie the college athlete to their
school when you can, and you put them on a card,
and that makes it super compelling. And there's only you
know two or three you know brands that can really
or products that can really do that. Trading cards, video games, jerseys,
right like those are the three that are the the
big three. And what happened was, you know, when the
(18:38):
when the n C double A said hey, everyone, you
figure it out on your own, Like everything that you
thought might have happened completely changed. So you know, last
week we announced an exclusive with one Team Partners to
handle group licensing UH for the college athlete under n
I L. So that will help give us a larger
infrastructure that's more kind of in line with what you
(19:00):
do from a trading card perspective. So you're not just
focused on the you know, the most marketable athletes. You're
not just focused on the Heisman watch list. You've got
this wide depth to build a really compelling product. That's
the first step. You know, we announced that last week
and then today we just announced our partnership with the
College Licensing Company CLC to bring out of Alabama, North
(19:24):
Calina something right, Yeah, they're in it. They're in Atlanta,
they're in Georgia, Georgia. So CLC through CLC, we just
introduced co brand opportunities within our within our contract. So
what that means is essentially is now we can go
out to that college athlete and put them in their
(19:44):
in their collegiate uniform. Naturally, we have to still submit
the product to the schools and the schools have to
approve it, but that's no different than what we have
to do already. So you know, and that that pieces evolving.
You started where you know, before July one, people were
say sing, you won't see co brand, it will never
be co branded. College athlete, can you know, benefit off
(20:06):
of their school marks. But in the case of trading cards,
it's the most relevant because that's where it's the most compelling,
right And so you know, it's not just like a
card dealership saying like, oh, hey, I want to use
a guy in its collegiate uniform. This is like literally
we're doing it already with guys you know, in their
collegiate uniform once they jump to the you know, once
(20:27):
once they jumped to the pros. The college athlete connected
to their school marks, you know, for college sports fans
is super compelling. And that exists for trading cards and
for video games and for you know, for you know,
for jerseys. Those are the things that are going to
be the most relevant from a licensing perspective, and that
those are the ones that make the most sense. That
needs to start to pay that way for co brand opportunities,
(20:51):
you know, where you get the school I P which
we already have, and we marry that to the college athlete.
I think that honestly, I mean, I don't know how
you guys see it. What's the plans with that? To me,
it just opens up the flood gates to more stuff
you guys can do. Um, you know, me being having
a nickname like lights Out and being in college and
(21:11):
it being a big deal. I can only imagine what
you know, what have what it could have happened been, um,
and you guys get involved and that, you know, and
uh and that kind of branding and stuff like that.
So Jason, Man, I appreciate you for coming on and
you've got tons of stuff to do. UM. Thank you
too for you guys and being a you know, great
partner and just great people over there and always taking
(21:33):
care of it. I got probably a couple more signs
with you guys throughout the year and just just awesome
work with man and congratulations launching all this stuff. And
it's only gonna get bigger from here. So yeah, thanks,
I appreciate that. And like I said earlier, I mean, man,
we appreciate you signing those cards. I mean those are
super important to the fans of you and you know,
to football fans overall, So we appreciate what you do.
(21:55):
You gotta man, appreciate it. Thank you, Thanks Sean, Thanks
guys for listening to another lights Out podcast for me,
Shawn Merriman. UM, And that was cool for me because,
just like a lot of people in this country, I'm
trying to figure out what the hell exactly what the
hell uh and n f T s and how it
works and how do you value it? Uh? So that
(22:16):
was some great insight. UM. Want to thank Jason again
for coming on uh and just spread that information because
I think that, um, you know, this trading card industry
is gonna be something that's gonna it's big now, but
gonna be even bigger in the near future and great
stuff they're doing over there. So thanks guys. Listening to
another lights Out podcast me Seawan Merriman. Uh. Keep leaving
(22:37):
those great reviews, uh, those comments. I look at all
of them. And when you guys see a video online
or social media and you like what you're here, man,
toss me a repost or retweet, and UM, I'll make
sure I get you guys retweeted as well. So thanks
again
Are you ready for this? Sean Merriman A one hand effect.
Boom boom, boom, out go the light. This is Lights
Out with Sean Merriman. What's up, guys. We're back again
with another Lights Out podcast with me Sean Raymond and UH.
We're going to one of the hottest industries in I
(00:21):
would say the country, probably in the world. Um at
the great deck growing and something I did when I
was a kid, UH, and that's collecting cards, trading cards.
They we got Jason Holworth, the VP of Panini America
trading cards. Myself, I have a deal in partnership with UH. Panini.
They had been great partners in mine over the course
of this past year, so a couple of years now
(00:43):
and UH doing some great things, launching some new products
and UM. Like I said, it's one of the hottest industries.
Heard a friend of mine, Gary Gary V, talking about
it maybe about five or six years ago, before this
industry even got big. UM. So we'll have Jason Haworth
coming on a day, who's a VP of Panini America,
and talk about the expansion growth and their plans and
(01:05):
what they're planning on doing. You know, Actually, I gotta
deal with you guys, I got like three or four
more signings on my um yep, on my deal over
that I've been been working with you guys for a
for a while now. Yeah, absolutely, so well, thank you
for signing those cards that are important to the fan
base for sure and to us of course. So so
let me so let me ask you always and just
(01:26):
something I wanted to know, how do you guys kind
of you know, know what's hot and know what's in
the market, know what's needed. Right, So even when I
do signings myself, do you guys you know, just know
the temperature of the market and certain guys might have
a big game or certain guys might have a big
social media presence because you know, I still every day
on social media people ask me to sign stuff. But
(01:48):
how do you guys like evaluate you know, how you
know what what cards or what athletes to go after
and do deals with. Yeah? Yeah, so I mean obviously, um,
you know, we're how on the active on the active side,
so active players and rookies, Um, you know, the rookies
tend to predominance, you can imagine, are predominantly heavy on
(02:09):
the offensive side of the ball. Uh. You know, collectors
like people that score touchdowns. I disagree with that. I
like dudes that sack quarterbacks as well. So but you know,
so we're have you on the rookie side, on the
skill position side, and then as we dig into the
veteran side of that, you know, you start to see
more of the defensive players, and then you've got the
legend component and the legend component. I want to say,
(02:31):
we probably have maybe a hundred and fifty legends that
we you know, or retired guys that we you know,
we dig into our you know, our group and it
and it really varies depending on what we're you know,
what we're looking at. But we we tend to have
more flexibility on the retired guys from a defensive player
(02:51):
because they hadn't been they hadn't been featured so much
as an autograph trading card during their playing you know,
during their playing years or as a key, so you know,
getting guys like you or Troy Polamala or you name it.
I mean Troy didn't have an autograph card for years.
I mean he almost I think he the last few
(03:11):
years he played, he didn't have an autograph card. You know.
Then when he retired, we were able to get him
to start signing cards. So, um, you know, good balance there.
And then obviously fan favorites and you're certainly one of those.
Does does a fan base dictate a lot of that?
So like, obviously Troy play for the Steelers and they
have a ridiculous fan base, right, So do you have
(03:34):
is there like a difference in a guy that's same
equal talent and you know, obviously Troy Pallymala is going
to go down as one of the best safeties ever.
But you know, take a you know, guy that's not
Troy Polamala, but it was really good four or five
six Pro Bowls that play for um, you know, Green Bay,
or a guy to play you know, four or five
to play for the Dog, you know, somebody with a
(03:54):
smaller fan base. Is that that changed the situation? The
fan base definitely changes the position, definitely changes the situation.
But I think that you know, there are guys that
you know, if you're a standout player, it almost doesn't
matter what team you're from, right I mean obviously there
are teams that are certainly more collectible and then other teams,
and that always plays into it. You wouldn't be surprised
(04:16):
on who those are. But I mean last year the
hottest rookie was Justin Herbert. So from a fan base perspective,
I mean, and that's the thing is like on the
rookie side, it doesn't matter, right, Like on the rookie side,
you know, I mean, would we would would we have
loved to seeing Trevor Lawrence in the New York Jets uniform.
Sure it's the New York market, but you know, he's
one of those guys that can translate, you know, against
(04:37):
Jacksonville regardless. So the rookie class tends to this, well,
we might root for them to be on certain teams
in certain markets because there's that exponential you know. I
think about, you know, the year Dakins Zeke came into
the league and they happened to be Dallas Cowboys, Like
do they I mean, obviously that was huge because it
was the Cowboys and then you had two really great
(05:00):
keys performing, you know, at the same time on that team,
So that just elevated it a bit more. Um, you know,
teams certainly, you know, having the impact, but they're definitely
guys if they're hot rookie, it almost doesn't matter, you know.
I think about Kyler Murray with the Arizona Cardinals when
he came out still hot, you know, no, no, okay,
So let me let me ask you this. So one
(05:21):
of my best friends the other day, Um, he's a
huge and I got the cards in here and stuff
like that of my own. Um, and a lot of
these guys are friends of mine with people that I know.
So I'm like, hey, yo, dude, signage for me. So
I got you know, ten fifty, I gotta justin Herbert,
you know, Rookie, I got all. I got some stuff
in there myself. But one of my one of my
boys that pulled the other day, one of uh, I
(05:42):
think Lee um one of the balls prisms he and
I think the car was worth eighteen and nineteen grand
is something along those lines, right, So I mean, obviously,
I mean we've seen that Lebronze goal for millions, and
some of these cards out there go for millions of dollars.
But was so if you get a card like you know,
(06:02):
um ball from from the Hornage, what's the next level up?
Like Sea goals to it? You know, Rookie here a
couple of All Star games. How does a market dictate
how much that that card is um is worth. Yeah. Absolutely,
the market totally dictates it. And I think that that's
the other thing that's kind of evolved in the trading
card space is that you know, before those high value
(06:24):
cards used to just be about that rookie card that
had the autograph signature on it. Maybe it was limited
to five or you know, one of one with an
NBA logo. Man, But now what you're seeing and you're
referencing our prison brand, our prison brand is a monster,
like you know it? What where did that? Where did
that come from? Like? What? Like honest, because I have
a whole I got a couple of packs in here myself.
(06:47):
How how did you guys put that as the How
did that come about? When you put that as the
elite package? Yeah? So, I mean we introduced prison in
teen and it took it had to get its legs,
and there was you know, some people that had mixed
feelings over it. But you know, in the last three
or four years, it's just absolutely blown up because of
the powerallels. And to your point, you get a beautiful
(07:08):
those cards are beautiful, but you get a beautiful parallel
or red version of pink, version of blue, version a
purple version, of green version, you name it. You know,
they all have certain levels of value based on the
color parallel it is, and so you know that dictates
some of that. And then obviously who the player is.
And so you know clearly, you know, they're three guys
(07:31):
that you know, could arguably have stood out this year
minus injuries, you know, in this NBA rookie class, LaMelo
being one of them for sure. So I mean did
go on to win Rookie of the Year. So um,
you know, so that's obviously going to drive the category
and drive the market. What's but what's amazing is we
what we're talking about was the fact that I mean
it's about autographed and but that that prison version and
(07:54):
that parallel version is so sought after because it's such
a and you know, tied to the right air. But
that's what drives dot value on the card. Fox Sports
Radio has the best sports talk lineup in the nation.
Catch all of our shows at Fox sports Radio dot
com and within the I Heart Radio app search f
s R to listen live. No, So I got mind
(08:18):
set to me and it's you know, I got my
ten or one of one or whatever it is. So
I I get that point. Let me let me ask
you about this because I just recently over the past
year got into the n f T s UM because
you explain, because I know what it is, but maybe
there's some people out there that don't fully understand what
n f T is and how important it is that
you got sure. So it literally we launched our blockchain
(08:42):
platform in January and back then, and it's hard to
believe it's like literally eighteen months ago, right, I mean,
no one had any idea what n f T was.
I mean we didn't even make it it like as
a high like as a high point of like, hey,
this is a message point to the consumer, is hey,
there's a non fund bill token tied to this card
on this blockchain platform. Because everyone was so focused about blockchain.
(09:06):
You know, blockchain is super important. The n f T
is the engine that makes the asset live on the blockchain. Right,
There's an asset that's tied to it so that you
can track it wherever it goes. That's the non vlungible token, right.
That was super important when we started to look at
n f T s and blockchain, what it meant, like
how we would integrate it into trading cards. We saw
(09:28):
a ton of value in that, Hey, it would perform,
it would carry a ledger of knowing who owned the
best Kobe Bryant card. You know, you'd be able to
track that. If you opened up a physical card, you
wouldn't know who has the best Kobe Bryant collection or
any you know, for anything or that matter. You know,
blockchain and n f T allows you to track that
over a ledger of time to see where, you know,
(09:49):
who owns that asset. So that was super important to
us when we kicked it off. The other part that
was really important was helping collectors understand the value of
the asset. And so early on, you know, they didn't
understand you know, the value of an n f T
asset you know, on the blockchain compared to a physical card.
So what we did was we when we launched it,
we tied we built a hundred cards set and we
(10:12):
had a physical card tied to every one of those assets,
so they got the value of the physical card. You know,
National Chargers version. You mentioned that one of one really
nice clean looking card thick has a piece of memorability
in it, player autograph on it, So they knew the
value of that physical card and then they weren't so
(10:33):
sure of what the n f T value was, but
you could see a premium coming with it because there
was a digital element tied to it. So that was
that first phase, first step. Then we went into like
purely launching just n f T blockchain assets that just
lived on our site and they were scarce, like that's
the other part. The DNA of of trading cards has
always been scarcity. There's been other n f T s
(10:56):
out in the market that you know, who've gone up
with huge numbers and have saturated the marketplace. You know,
We're focused on building a level of scarcity so that
we can replicate the physical value of a card to
the n f T space um through scarcity, So that
was super important to us. We started with just individualized
cards on the n f t um blockchain, making those
(11:19):
cards available on our site at Panini America dot net.
And then just four weeks ago we introduced our first
pack product, which was our NBA n f T pack products,
and that's been on fire. We literally just launched our
sneaker Spotlight n f T packs this morning and they
sold They sold out in a minute, like it was
you know, how how long do you think that's gonna last? Right?
(11:41):
Because the very first person I seemed talking about how
big trade and could now obviously I collected when I
was a kid and stuff like that, but it kind
of had a period where it died down a little bit, right,
and then it came back on. The first person I
seemed talking about it was Gary V. That that was
I might have missed other people, but you know, he
had to loud his voice, right, He was the one
that was only that think it was in two thousand
fourteen or fifteen. He was like, hey guys, these trading
(12:04):
cards are coming back around, and it's so how long
do you think that it's going to be big like this?
Or do you see it not only being this big
and getting bigger? It's getting bigger. So what the difference
between what happened when we were kids, right, is like,
you know, I grew up in the eighties collected cards.
You know, the trading card companies just oversaturated the marketplace
(12:25):
with with cards, so that all those cards that we
collected as kids, thinking that they were going to be
valuable weren't because it was super saturated. The markets changed
and shifted so that you've got unique numbering on cards now, Um,
so you know exactly that there's only six hundred of
these cards in the world, or four of these cards
in the world, or a one of one is truly
(12:46):
a one of one, right, So you've got that part.
And the other side that's different from you know, back
in the day when we were kids, is that the
market has expanded. Right. It used to be that you
just walk into your own hobby store and that was
your commune city. You didn't know what was happening outside
of that space. Now you've got case breaking happening, things
happening online, You've got guys opening up product online. So
(13:09):
it's really become a global community where people can see
what's happening in the space. And the market has totally grown,
you know global. We we've we launched our social platforms
in China in August of nineteen and then are direct
to consumer platform in China right in the middle of
the pandemic in March of March, and that's grown exponentially
(13:32):
over there. So we've seen the global marketplace expand in
terms of their excitement for trading cards and as we
balance out that supply and demand, making sure that we
maintain that level of scarcity. Is the market grows, the
scarcity in some cases still say it still stays the same.
So that's not changing. Um. And then you've got great
personalities you think about, you know what's happening. You know
(13:54):
in the football space, You've got the young guys coming up.
You've obviously got those guys that are the that dreams
that are kind of you know, still playing, that mean
everything to the world. You know, I'm from Boston, so
I'm gonna use Tom Brady as an example. You know,
that's it, man, what I'm getting off of. You know, listen,
I remember those games. Those games were rough, man, you know,
always had me nervous. You and LT and you know,
(14:19):
Philip Rivers those guys, it was. It was rough. But
you know so but I mean, so you've got those
guys that are there and established, and then you've got
guys coming up, whether that be Patrick Mahomes or Justin
Herbert last year. You know that that continue to evolve
our you know, um, you know, those are the guys
that are driving the category now, um. You know, and
(14:39):
those are the those are the ones that are going
to continue to build the marketplace. Overall on the football side,
and then I'll obviously on the basketball side, guys like
Luca don Chick is just you know, I mean, they're huge.
So that's what that mel was my next question. You're
talking about the global expansion, mean you guys getting bigger,
Like take somebody like Luca, right, do you the un
(15:00):
now go into maybe his country internationally and launched something
specifically with him or you're like, you're going with these
guys that it's that the role map. Um No, we
we when we launch a product, it's a global product.
You know, from a trading card person right off the top,
it's it's global right away. Absolutely. So Luca is one
of those guys that's an exclusive Panini athletes, so he
(15:20):
signs memorabilia for us as well. And obviously, you know,
had a great game of a few days ago. I'm
losing track of the days here, Um, what's happening in Tokyo.
But obviously great game the other day. Um, you know,
that continues to just grow his popularity, you know, globally,
what he does on the world stage, you know, in
addition to just the NBA stage. So what's so what's next?
(15:42):
I mean, obviously the guys working on global, the n
f T s are getting bigger. Is there something coming
in the market that people are not really paying attention
to as much? I'm not asking you to give up
you guys secrets and next moves, but is there something
you're seeing that people aren't really paying attention to in
this space yet that you guys see coming. So, I mean,
obviously UFC we launched our first product here um a
(16:03):
few months about two and a half months ago, and
that's been absolutely on fire. Our next UFC product drops
this week, our UFC Select product. We're seeing a lot
of growth there. Um, They've got some great personalities. I
mean everyone always talks about Connor, but there's some great
fighters across then. You know, it's reel. It's reel. All
these guys were would be you know, even you know
(16:26):
John Jones it there's a couple of big personality would
say about ten guys that would do extremely well when
it's time. Yeah, absolutely, So, I mean those guys are
you know, are driving the space right now, and I
think that's a growth opportunity and people are getting excited
about that. Um, you know, like I said, we just
introduced our first product and and it went great. I
(16:48):
have no doubt Select is going to crush it here
when it launches here in the next couple of days. Um,
you know. And then the other side is, you know,
obviously what's happening in this n I L space. The
N I L space is wild West? Right, twenty six
days old. Um, hard to believe, but you know, we
were jumping into that and dialing in as you know, historically,
(17:09):
what what's happened in the collegiate space, and we've been
the exclusive partner on the college side for six years now,
is we've never put a guy in their uniform when
they're current college athlete. We have to wait for them
to clear for the draft, you know, go pro, and
then we fall back into dropping those guys into their
collision uniforms. So you see Trevor Lawrence in a Clemson
(17:29):
uniform at this point. You know, what's happened as of
July one is this wild West. You know, this wild
West in terms of you know, now you can get
current college athletes do something with them. I was wanting
to know about that, right, So now is that completely
because I read the other day the quarterback for Alabama
head offers up to a million dollars of endorsemental kind
(17:52):
of you know, a couple of different things of cols
to a million a million dollars for you guys, does
that change the does that is that even crazy? If?
For you guys now, it's crazier right now because there's
no parameters in place. And what we're working really hard
to do is put some parameters in place so you know,
so that there's at least some infrastructure, especially because trading
cards are probably the most relevant, you know, to the
(18:15):
collegiate athlete. Right you tie the college athlete to their
school when you can, and you put them on a card,
and that makes it super compelling. And there's only you
know two or three you know brands that can really
or products that can really do that. Trading cards, video games, jerseys,
right like those are the three that are the the
big three. And what happened was, you know, when the
(18:38):
when the n C double A said hey, everyone, you
figure it out on your own, Like everything that you
thought might have happened completely changed. So you know, last
week we announced an exclusive with one Team Partners to
handle group licensing UH for the college athlete under n
I L. So that will help give us a larger
infrastructure that's more kind of in line with what you
(19:00):
do from a trading card perspective. So you're not just
focused on the you know, the most marketable athletes. You're
not just focused on the Heisman watch list. You've got
this wide depth to build a really compelling product. That's
the first step. You know, we announced that last week
and then today we just announced our partnership with the
College Licensing Company CLC to bring out of Alabama, North
(19:24):
Calina something right, Yeah, they're in it. They're in Atlanta,
they're in Georgia, Georgia. So CLC through CLC, we just
introduced co brand opportunities within our within our contract. So
what that means is essentially is now we can go
out to that college athlete and put them in their
(19:44):
in their collegiate uniform. Naturally, we have to still submit
the product to the schools and the schools have to
approve it, but that's no different than what we have
to do already. So you know, and that that pieces evolving.
You started where you know, before July one, people were
say sing, you won't see co brand, it will never
be co branded. College athlete, can you know, benefit off
(20:06):
of their school marks. But in the case of trading cards,
it's the most relevant because that's where it's the most compelling,
right And so you know, it's not just like a
card dealership saying like, oh, hey, I want to use
a guy in its collegiate uniform. This is like literally
we're doing it already with guys you know, in their
collegiate uniform once they jump to the you know, once
(20:27):
once they jumped to the pros. The college athlete connected
to their school marks, you know, for college sports fans
is super compelling. And that exists for trading cards and
for video games and for you know, for you know,
for jerseys. Those are the things that are going to
be the most relevant from a licensing perspective, and that
those are the ones that make the most sense. That
needs to start to pay that way for co brand opportunities,
(20:51):
you know, where you get the school I P which
we already have, and we marry that to the college athlete.
I think that honestly, I mean, I don't know how
you guys see it. What's the plans with that? To me,
it just opens up the flood gates to more stuff
you guys can do. Um, you know, me being having
a nickname like lights Out and being in college and
(21:11):
it being a big deal. I can only imagine what
you know, what have what it could have happened been, um,
and you guys get involved and that, you know, and
uh and that kind of branding and stuff like that.
So Jason, Man, I appreciate you for coming on and
you've got tons of stuff to do. UM. Thank you
too for you guys and being a you know, great
partner and just great people over there and always taking
(21:33):
care of it. I got probably a couple more signs
with you guys throughout the year and just just awesome
work with man and congratulations launching all this stuff. And
it's only gonna get bigger from here. So yeah, thanks,
I appreciate that. And like I said earlier, I mean, man,
we appreciate you signing those cards. I mean those are
super important to the fans of you and you know,
to football fans overall, So we appreciate what you do.
(21:55):
You gotta man, appreciate it. Thank you, Thanks Sean, Thanks
guys for listening to another lights Out podcast for me,
Shawn Merriman. UM, And that was cool for me because,
just like a lot of people in this country, I'm
trying to figure out what the hell exactly what the
hell uh and n f T s and how it
works and how do you value it? Uh? So that
(22:16):
was some great insight. UM. Want to thank Jason again
for coming on uh and just spread that information because
I think that, um, you know, this trading card industry
is gonna be something that's gonna it's big now, but
gonna be even bigger in the near future and great
stuff they're doing over there. So thanks guys. Listening to
another lights Out podcast me Seawan Merriman. Uh. Keep leaving
(22:37):
those great reviews, uh, those comments. I look at all
of them. And when you guys see a video online
or social media and you like what you're here, man,
toss me a repost or retweet, and UM, I'll make
sure I get you guys retweeted as well. So thanks
again
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