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I think one of the problems
today in the hobby

is that kids today
are just looking at it for investment value.

I'd rather collect newer cards

'cause they're excellent
potential for investment.

I think all the old cards
are great.

I mean, they're worth
a lot of money

and they do bring some
spirit of baseball.

Well, some of the kids
are getting--

Maybe they're too
sophisticated to be collectors.

Now they want to be investors,

which is really he wrong
approach to a nice hobby.

A hobby is a hobby is a hobby.

You know,
it's like collecting rocks.

What are you going to do,

buy one and sell one
the next day?

You know, you collect them
to admire them and look at them.

COVID 19 pandemic
has taken its toll.

The same can't be said
for the sports trading card industry.

Two
LeBron James cards

and a Giannis
Antetokounmpo card

each sold for
more than $1,000,000.

$190,000,
do I hear 200?

200 I have. How about 220?
220 I have. Let's go 240.

The trend is celebrities

who play trading card games.

There's over
four seconds left, just broke the $73,000.

I know this is
a lot of money,

but this is what everybody
has been wanting lately.

The final cost
could exceed $10 million.

I'm at $340,000.

Final call.

Last chance.

$360,000.

A record $6.6 million.

$12.6 million.

This makes it the most
valuable sports card of all time.

-How's my shirt looking?
-Good.

- How's my hair?
- Great.

Thank you.

So I'm Paul Sullivan,

for 13 years I was
the "Wealth Matters" columnist

at theNew York Times.

In March of 2018,

I decided to look at
the trading card market.

The resulting column
was titled,

"Some Traders
Study Stock Prices.

Others monitor the '52 Mantle."

I end up writing 608 columns
in 13 years.

You know, over a million words.

You know, talked to
some 5000 people.

But I remember
this one because,

when it was something
like trading cards,

there's always a
"why now?" component,

like, why would I write
about this now?

And the reason
I wrote about it is because

PWCC was introducing this index.

So an index that they had
created with trading cards

and it was modeled
on the S&P 500.

At the time that
I wrote this column,

the PWCC Index
had beat the S&P 500

by almost two times as much.
They had double the returns.

And so that was striking.

Whenever I'd write
about these things like trading cards,

they always fell into
a category that I come back to again and again.

And that was
passion investments.

You know, people always hope

that they're going
to buy something

and it's going to,
it's going to boom.

But for you to do it in
any sort of intelligent way,

you have to know
that you just love this thing.

You just love this thing.

And if it increases
in value, great.

And if it doesn't, well,

you have this thing
that you love.

Collectors have been buying up full stocks of baseball cards,

basketball cards
and Pokemon cards

and then reselling them online.

COVID was something that,
you know, nobody obviously expected to happen, right?

And when it happened, there's
a lot of chatter in our industry

thinking the market's
going to crash.

And then come April,

everyone started getting
into their old collections.

Thanks to
the surge of livestream sports card sales,

the sports card trading market
is projected to grow from $14 billion in 2019

to nearly $100 billion
by the year 2027.

You know, the Jordan
documentary was coming out, so there was hype on that.

I've never seen
another documentary do anything like what that did.

Before the boom,
a Michael Jordan rookie was $35,000

the height of the boom,
$800,000.

Wayne Gretzky's 1979
O-Pee-Chee rookie card

that one sold at auction
for just under 1.4 million.

We had a Brady
sell for 2.88 million,

privately sold a LeBron
for 5.2 million.

Patrick Mahomes
cards sell for 4.3 million.

If you were in on the right
product at the right time, you made money.

In the last six months

trading cards,Yu-Gi-Oh!,
Pokemon andMagic,

we've sold $8 million worth.

$8 million in two auctions.

Record breaking sales,
including one today, a card sold for $5.9 million.

This industry just
went absolutely crazy.

We were selling
two cards per second.

We did 2 billion
in sales in 2020

and 2 billion in sales
halfway through 2021.

We went from
25 employees pre-COVID, to now over 110.

Pre-pandemic, It was
a struggle at that time.

We worked on margins
like five, 10% before.

Now you can average
like around 80 to 120000 at shows.

Through the pandemic,
the governments printed trillions of dollars

to try and help the economy
and stabilize the economy,

but that's going to create
inflation down the road.

And one of the things that
you hedge against inflation

is by buying hard assets.

A lot of the people that are
doing the buying are in that,

you know, demographic
that grew up in the '80s,

going to all these shows
and they love sports cards.

So all those
confluence of events

are coming together
over the last 18 months

to create this perfect storm
that we're seeing.

About 15 months after
writing that first column on baseball cards,

I received an email
from a reader

who said, you know,
"I have a-- I don't think you got the full story."

Five grown men were fighting
over trading cards

outside the Brookfield Target.

The fight all starting at the Wauwatosa Target

over claims
the man in all black

let people cut the line
to buy sports trading cards.

When a business gets hot,
a hobby gets hot,

there's always a seedy element
that might be jumping in

to take advantage
of the situation.

There was even
a man who pulled a gun on another customer

just to get Pokemon cards.

Target trading card collectors
turned Target into a sneaker camp out war zone.

We've learned
this shooting happened

after a shoplifting incident
inside of this Target,

involving Pokemon cards
and a pizza.

Target is reportedly
taking trading cards off of their shelves.

So now you've got these
retail flippers lining up at Target.

They're going in,
they're gonna buy a $30 box.

Immediately go to eBay,
flip it for 100, $150.

It's all about
supply and demand.

A scarcity that's driven up
the price of a box of new cards like this one, about $400.

There's a big majority of it,
they're doing for return on investment.

This is almost like
the golden ticket, Willy Wonka theory.

Then you've got people
just scamming each other online.

There have been times,
even online from these last couple of years

where people have purchased
one of these vintage boxes

and they've cracked it open
and it's been fake cards.

It's fake.

Logan Paul paid three
and a half million dollars for Pokemon cards.

They're fake.

A fake resealed
booster box... - It's a resealed box.

Get the
out of here, bro.

That's not good.

A man from Georgia spent $58,000

of a COVID relief fund loan
on a Pokemon card.

People are insane.

These were two submissions
that we had to us.

Two Jordan rookies.

But everything about
this card is fake.

They got us, guys.

About a five minute
smash and grab.

We have had
scary situations, scary characters

come through here

and we've actually
had a recent situation where...

You got to cut that.
Okay, cut that second thing.

The markets for nostalgia
have been distorted by adults.

Full stop. And it's
trickled down to kids.

That says something
really sad about

where we are with
these childhood hobbies

that give, you know,
texture to to our early lives

and give us stories to tell
when we're adults.

All right, guys,
welcome back in.

Another a new podcast,
Sports Cards Nonsense,

brought to you by
The Ringer Podcast Network.

As always, I'm your host,
Mike Gioseffi.

As always, he is my wife's
third favorite cousin...

And your favorite
best friend? - MIKE: Fair.

Jesse Gibson is my name.
Thank you, sir. - There you go.

Now that we've
established bloodlines,

what are we doing today
by means of actual content?

- What's the story?
- We got to do Hobby 101.

I think we just start
by explaining the ecosystem.

Let's go right
from the streamline.

So where does this whole thing
trickle down from?

Yeah, I want to know
about manufacturers.

- Distributors.
- Okay.

Basically everything there
is coming from top down.

Short answer,
starts with manufacturing.

Topps, Panini,
they make the cards.

They send them out
to distributors

who do just that,
distribute the cards.

Then come into play
the retailers,

local card shops
and breakers, retail locations.

And then at the
end of the day, right,

the most important part,
the collectors.

From there you kind of
have options on what to do with the cards.

You can grade them,

use different auction houses,
secondary markets.

So there's definitely
a streamline of things,

but at the end of the day,
it then just comes down to the collector, right?

If there's nobody who
has a love and a passion for these cards,

everything above
that is useless.

So that's really where the
true lifeblood of this hobby is.

Okay, so that's
where we are now.

But can we maybe
take it back a little bit?

How did this all begin?

Yeah. Get his name. - Yeah. I mean, I can...

I've got a little bit of
wiggle room if we need it.

Wanna just
lead him a little bit?

So these are some of the highlights

in our upcoming vintage
platinum night sports auction.

This is a 1912 Plow's Candy
Ty Cobb card.

This is an extremely rare set.

There's only a handful
of examples known

and this is the highest
graded example of a Ty Cobb.

This will sell for 200,000
plus in the auction.

Uh, this is a 1951 Bowman
Mickey Mantle rookie card.

This is an example of what
the cards did look like

before '52 Topps came out
and changed the game.

And this card will bring
around $400,000 in the auction.

So I think the first
trading card is known as a "Peck and Snyder",

and it was the
Cincinnati Red Stockings.

So initially, you know,
cards were packaged with tobacco products,

then it graduated
to candy and gum.

In 1915, you get
the Cracker Jack set,

1933, you get
the Goudey Gum Company

producing the
historic Goudey set.

And then Topps really
shifted the market in '52

and created the modern era
of card collecting

using imagery of the players,
statistics on the back,

created that larger size.

The Mickey Mantle story
is one that--

It almost sounds
like lore, right?

It almost sounds like
people made this up.

"Oh, the most expensive
card of all time was dumped in the ocean."

Yeah,
so the tale goes that

Topps produced the
second series of '52 Topps,

and they weren't able
to get them distributed to stores in time.

And eventually
at some point in the '50s,

they put them on a barge
and went off the coast of New Jersey

and just dumped
all the '52 Topps cases.

If there was one
'52 Topps case left right now,

it would sell
for over $10 million.

Yeah.

In 1965,
Topps buys Bowman.

Really making them king.

Then you have Panini
first entering the game in Italy with soccer cards.

'70s and '80s.
Fleer and Topps are battling it out,

even had Fleer suing Topps,
claiming they're a monopoly.

By the '80s
even into the '90s,

everybody's interested,
advertising everywhere.

Baseball cards are in
every kid's hand at one point.

So in the '90s,
you know, we had this mass production.

There was a ton of demand
for it and they over-printed basically everything.

And so, you know,
values went down on sports cards across the board.

So that was what's
called the junk wax era.

The basic economic forces
played out the way they're supposed to play,

except that nobody had
any transparency into supply.

This is pre-Internet, right?

Everybody thought they were
the only ones that had 12

you know, an upright
Ken Griffey Jr. rookies,

but we all had 12 Griffey's.

So they tried to
create more rarity

and so they started
serial numbering cards.

That leaned into
signing of cards,

and then jersey patch cards,

game used jersey cards.

It's not just a piece
of cardboard now.

It's, "Wow, this is a piece
of Jordan's jersey, his autograph." You know?

Now we could keep
a piece of history.

2005 rolls around,
Fleer declares bankruptcy.

So now we've got Topps,
Upper Deck, Panini kind of all competing.

And then really the back
half of that decade,

we see Panini start
to get super aggressive, getting licensing,

which would obviously
not allow other manufacturers to make cards.

Then, at that point,
It is all Panini for everything except baseball.

And that's what Topps
was left with.

Topps had baseball,
Upper Deck had hockey,

Panini kind of everything else.

Then in 2021, that's really
when everything starts to change, right?

Fanatics enters the game.

Here you've got a ten ton
monster just coming in

that is already just the player
when it comes to apparel,

now they're coming
into the card game.

You know, decades ago,
Fleer thought Topps maybe was a bit of a monopoly.

Well, now Fanatics comes in
and acquires baseball,

basketball and football
licensing exclusive,

which is just unheard of.

I mean, these really are
going to be the people

who set the table for
the card market going forward.

Okay, so Fanatics
gets all this licensing.

What's going to go on
with Panini?

What happens
with Topps now?

Do they just go out of business?

Topps,
for the first time in over 70 years,

will not produce
officially licensed Major League Baseball cards.

Fanatics moving
beyond commerce.

They're going
to be the exclusive trading card producer

for football cards,
baseball cards and basketball cards

I've already seen on YouTube
a couple of places,

guys are saying, "All right,
so what's the downside here? What could happen?"

I think their current approach

- will absolutely
destroy the hobby. - I do too.

They're going to want
to hit some home runs

very, very early on
to gain collectors trust

as they navigate through
being basically the monopoly in the trading card industry.

Honestly, at this point,
I think there's room for some skepticism.

Like, are they going to come in
and just make this big business and totally ruin everything?

A hobby we all have
loved for years.

Or do they come in and it's,

"Hey, we're going
to really make things a little bit more professional."

Josh Luber,
the founder of StockX,

is going to be the person
who is going to run this new company,

Sneakers going legal,
an accessible investment opportunity,

a democratized stock market.

He's a collector,
more so than even I am.

So that actually
instilled in me

that this isn't just
big corporate America coming in to rule the hobby.

This is like a dude
who loves the hobby.

So I think he'll keep the
restraints on some things.

My name is Josh Luber.

I am currently the co-founder
and Chief Vision Officer for Fanatics Trading Cards,

which is a new business
that I started with Fanatics and with Michael Rubin

to, uh, to make trading cards.

It is majority owned
by Fanatics,

but also is owned by
the leagues and players associations

that are equity partners
in the business as well.

We raised $350 million,
a $10 billion valuation,

which is pretty extraordinary,

considering we hadn't
even started to change the business yet.

And now we get to go
and build a business.

We take over the licenses when
the current licenses expire.

So Topps
has two more years on baseball

and Panini has four more years
on basketball and football.

People have talked openly
that maybe we would buy those companies.

If that were to happen,
we would take over those licenses earlier.

If not, we'd be on the sidelines
until those licenses kick in.

But the starting point is
that we're now a physical trading card company

and we have the licensing
for baseball, basketball and football.

But I'm sure we'll do
a lot of other things as well.

But, like, how cool is that?

And it's got a sticker
from whatever store.

it was, $49,99.
It was crossed out and sold for $14 99.

There's two types
of people, right?

These either people
that are collectors and people who are not.

And particularly
our generation,i t was around stuff, right?

I mean, we can talk all about,

like, the newer generation
and digital and NFTs and the whole thing,

but like, we grew up
in the heart of Nike basketball advertising.

And the fact that
we get to come back and it cycles change,

but now that we're the ones
that are creating culture,

our generation are now
the ones that are creating culture,

so we get to
bring this stuff back.

I started collecting cards
back in late 1974

with my earliest memories
of the ice cream man, basically.

That was
your local hobby shop.

There's like these
corner stores, bodega,

and they just have,
like, loose packs there.

And I remember not eating lunch
and then using my allowance to just open packs.

I still remember
the second grade

and running into 7-Eleven
with a friend

and he pointed
at theGarbage Pail Kids

and he said, "Have you
ever seen these before?"

And I said, "No."
And so we grabbed a couple of packs

and open them up in the car
and I was hooked.

There was a tiny
little card shop

that opened right around
the corner from my house.

You'd walk in, there was
just packs everywhere.

The price of packs were crazy
at the time, you know, packs of cards costing $2.

The card shop
that I went to as a kid

was definitely your
stereotypical 1990s card shop.

Things everywhere.

You know, an owner who kind of
just had the shop as,

you know, a thing on the side
really more for enjoyment than turning a profit.

That nostalgia
when you get back into it, you remember that feeling.

you remember
going into the card shops,

the smell of it,
you remember all that.

And so, you know,

when I got back
into the industry, it brought all that back.

Your hobby wouldn't
exist in the state that it is without the stores,

Card stores are
still the lifeblood.

I mean, you go from
manufacturer to distributor to the card store,

Local card shop's
a billboard for the industry,

and the more billboards
for the industry,

the more people
recognize, "This is still available to me."

And there's a sense
of community.

- You ready? Okay.
-All ready.

My name is Dani Sanchez,
also known as SuperDuperDani on YouTube.

I am a full time
Pokemon content creator

and I've been making videos
for over ten years now.

Not bad.

Hey guys, I have nine packs

of legendary collection,
which is--

Why do I sound so weird?
Is that even me?

What happened
in the last ten years?

I don't know.
I blacked out.

I had gotten these cards
from a comic shop in my hometown

and they happened to have
a selection of vintage cards.

Three packs for $10.

Now, these boxes
don't sell for less than, like, $30,000 for a whole box.

Oh, cool.

I don't have this card.

Back in the day,
people weren't collecting cards like they are now.

Like the pristine,
mint condition.

Like, not a single bit
of edge wear.

Like, it did not matter
back then that I had the cards on a table and just, like,

set them on the table
to line them up.

Since the individual cards,
some of them are worth hundreds of dollars,

like it's way
higher stakes for them to be in gem mint condition.

-Oh, wow.
-

- Oh, wow. Wow.
-

Like that! Like that!

You're not supposed
to slam the cards on the table like that.

It is bad vintage card
opening etiquette, Dani.

Look at that. -

Little does she know that
Charizard just sold for $15,000, gem mint.

That was a comment
that was left one month ago

on this video
that's ten years old.

What is Pokemon?

Okay. Okay.

Honestly, I don't know
how to explain Pokemon,

because I assume
that everybody's heard of it in some capacity.

Pokemon.

So Pokemon is... is a...

Are you ready
to be the ultimate Pokemon master trainer?

Yes!

Random people
in parks chasing things.

I don't know. Card games.
Not for me, but really popular.

Pokemon was a game
and I think Charizard

is the most desirable card.

The most wanted card here.
Is that true?

Does the most damage.

And it's able to kill
any Pokemon in one hit,

Charizard is a dragon-like
character in Pokemon.

I think it's a dragon.

Do you guys know?

Pokemon is the biggest
entertainment franchise in the world.

Bigger than Marvel.

Pokemon is bigger
than Marvel Universe.

If you realize
how huge the scale is.

So I'm not competitive.

I'm also, like, not
into sports anymore,

and it's really funny for me
to see people, like, idolize

a human being who plays a sport
so much that they would want a piece of memorabilia

with part of his jersey
that he wore in a game on it.

That's crazy.

"LeBron James wore this jersey!"
"Wow!"

You know what I mean?

In the card world, we make
a very distinct distinction.

There's sports
and there's non-sports.

I'm Bob Means, Director
of Trading Cards at eBay.

And, you know,
we see a world where

what happened in trading
cards is going to happen in other collectibles.

We're already seeing it.

Even if you just step
away from sports trading cards for a second,

you can see it happening,
what we call non-sports trading cards.

So this is going to be
Star Wars cards.

It's going to be
Garbage Pail Kids.

Recently, and most interesting,
is Marvel cards.

Marvel's red hot
out there right now, right?

You've got all
the shows streaming.

You've got all
the movies coming out, massive blockbusters.

Well, we're seeing people
go buy the cards.

Yeah,

It's a Madonna rookie, right?

It's at eight.
I'm not sure if there's any higher than that.

But like, Madonna, right?

This is one of my
all-time favorite cards

that I think is going
to be a massive card,

which is Kim Kardashian.

So this is her rookie card.

The die-cut is numbered to 50.

I think I have like
maybe 15 or 16 of these.

I was buying
the non-die cut for like,

I don't know,
a couple of hundred bucks two years ago,

and now it's a couple thousand.

But I got to tell you,

the first time that she,
like, picks this up and looks on her Instagram,

and is like,
"Oh how, how cool, like, my rookie autograph card."

This is one of my all time
favorite cards.

I've been trying to corner
the market on this card.

This is Muhammad Ali
and the Beatles.

In 1964, this Dutch company
made this card.

But there's only ten of this.

There's two versions.
There's the vertical and the horizontal.

It's the Beatles
and Muhammad Ali.

Like, it's as iconic
as any people ever.

This is an Abraham Lincoln
rookie card.

It's a pencil drawn set
from 1887.

That's James Monroe.

That's John Tyler, probably
a lesser-known president.

Yeah, they were
called trade cards.

There's actually some that have
like an advertisement in this area.

This is a marketing piece
they used in the 1800s.

And some of them survived.

I think I have maybe one
of the largest Jimi Hendrix collections in the world.

This whole box is all Hendrix.

So...

his is like-- And it's like,
this, like, fabric card. This is a ten.

This is, I think, the only ten
from the '72 set.

But it's Jimi Hendrix, right?

Like Jimi Hendrix
as iconic as any athlete ever, right?

I mean, we're familiar
with like, stuff like this, right?

But like, this is just,
same era, like,

as important as,
probably even more important

than, you know,
these guys. Yeah.

So anyway, I think non-sport
cards are a big deal

and are going to continue
to be a big deal.

Sports Cards
Nonsense listeners,

we have Mr. CVO himself
of Fanatics, Josh Luber,

joining us at this moment.

Mr. Josh Luber is here.

Mike...

So Josh, obviously a topic
we get a lot on the podcast and just in general,

I'm an investor,
I'm a collector.

You know, the one
can't survive while the other,

'cause the investors
are ruining it or vice versa.

What are your thoughts?

Can these things kind of
live together and coexist?

Does one have the right
and the other doesn't?

Where do you stand
on that issue?

This is a age old issue
in every industry.

And I mean,
when we started StockX in the sneaker industry,

we got all of this, right?

All the people said,
"Oh, people are just here to flip shoes and make money."

And that's okay, right?
There is a blurred line.

Very, very few people,
I think, in trading cards are from one or the other.

You know, I consider myself
more on the the collector side,

but hey, man,
if I have an opportunity to flip something

and make a couple bucks
on something that I think is a good deal,

or maybe I don't think
it's going to go up more,

then I'm going to take that
and I'm put that money back into buying something else

that I'd rather have
and own as a collector.

So where is that line?

I mean, it's so blurred.

Yeah, I agree,
because I don't know

anybody who is just one
or the other at this point 100%.

And just a couple of truths
around the matter,

like collectors
benefit from investors

because now your collection
is worth more and investors

obviously benefit
from the collector side

because now I have somebody,

there's a demand,
they're creating the hype.

So I do I think
the further this thing grows

and as the industry continues
to take to take off,

I think we just keep seeing
those things coexist and kind of flourish together.

That's what I would expect
and I think it continues to become even more blurred.

And and I think that that's
a good thing to happen.

So we're at
Bleecker Trading today,

and we're set up for a
two day pop up event.

So we brought some cards here.

Sports cards,
obviously my specialty,

some football,
in this case Mahomes, Tom Brady.

and this case we have
some nice basketball,

Giannis RPA, Kobe, Lagerman,
and Luka one of one up here,

and more basketball
and a mix of baseball.

Black Jaded Wolf, take one.

That was great.

I grew up in in the Philippines.
My parents are doctor and nurse.

I remember during school time
and obviously the time difference

like, 13 hours,
the playoff is going on at like 8:00 here.

It's 8:00 in the morning
in the Philippines.

So I have, like, my parents
bought me this portable TV,

no volume, but, you know,

I'm, like, in between my books,
I'm watching the playoff game, you know?

And then when I moved here,

I found sports cards.

Through time, kind of fades,
it gets lighter and lighter.

We're into investing
part of the hobby.

It's a very nocturnal job.

You know,
I actually don't go to bed

till, like, probably 4:00
or 5:00 in the morning.

I read who's hot and who's
playing well, you know?

I have a photographic memory,
so that kind of helps me.

Yes. So I said I wouldn't
be doing this if I don't have that skill.

Basically,
you have to know what sells.

You have to know
what people want.

You have to know what sells.

And we have to
fall in love with players.

You can't because that's
who we're investing in.

We have to like
who we're investing in.

And so-- But you also
can't fall in love with the cards itself.

Yeah, I think that's
the best advice

that I was given to me when
I was getting into the hobby

was, "You can't do this
and be a collector

"also, you know, full time."

So I kind of stopped
collecting myself.

But I do love
certain players and...

I'm more like,
"Oh, I don't think this player has peaked yet."

Everybody's telling me to sell
those bigger Lukas.

Those few cards alone
could be like few million.

So it's like people, like,
sold it and invest in real estate.

But, you know, to me,
the sports market is like the hottest market.

I would rather invest
on the market that I know

front and back,
you know, and stable.

So right now,
everybody's telling me to sell those cards,

but I'm just not ready yet.

But I am not a hoarder
of those cards.

It's just more like,
I just don't think it's time.

That's it.

We'll see.

You know, that is the only thing
worse than not answering is when he doesn't answer and texts you.

Oh, brother, what are you doing?

- Going through my house.
- You look great.

We have a film crew here.

They want to know
in the words of the man, the myth, the legend,

Chris Vernon,
why we're so great. Why?

Why do we have
the best podcast ever and why you found us?

That's what they want to know.
Simple questions.

I went through, like,
what every parent did,

in terms of kids
wanting to get on TikTok

and, you know,
with the way stuff is now,

I guess with everybody's
like algorithms,

When I would get on TikTok

sports card stuff
started coming up on my preview.

- Yeah.
- So in a way, you popped up there

and you were
talking about cards

and it was some kind of
negative, opinionated thing.

-Yeah, that sounds right.
- And I was like,

"Yo! Who is this dude?"

And you know, I'm like...

"Why? Why, why don't they
have some kind of huge audience?"

That's a really, really
great question you asked.

- True story.

I reached out to Bill
and I said...

- Oh.
- ..."I don't know why

"people don't know
about this guy."

I was like, "But he is
wildly entertaining.

"There is a niche that...

"nobody is on."

Literally, cards
are how I support my family.

And honestly, that's how
even when I was super broke back in the day,

baseball cards,
selling my card collection

is how I was able to buy
my wife's engagement ring.

So it's more than
a podcast, a hobby.

It's more than just collecting.

Like these things
are an investment, yes,

but it's really become
a major part of my life.

All right.
So that is the bank box.

Most of these are kind of
what I would call like assets.

I bought them
with the intent of,

"Hey, they're going to get
flipped at some point."

Mays rookie's
probably 30 grand,

like ten or 12 for
the LeBron at this point,

the Kobe's like ten,

another Willie Mays,
probably 15,000.

So that's actually my
only Michael Jordan auto,

Jordan, LeBron, whatever.

Second greatest player
of all time

Larry Bird one, obviously.
Kevin Garnett too.

And there's no hometown bias.
I'm just telling you facts.

That's probably like 25K.

And there's kind of like
the pecking order, like,

"Hey, I need X amount
of dollars. Cool."

What's getting sold?

This is like, sell the house,
sell the dogs.

Well, one of the dogs

and then start selling the stack
of cards because I'd prefer to keep the Brady stuff, so...

I mean, best guess.
probably in the 300 to 400,000 range, all in.

With the inflated
value in cards,

it kind of brings
a whole different energy

to card collecting
that wasn't there before.

So while I love
collecting these cards

and like opening these cards,

there's now like collectors

like myself are having
a really hard time finding cards

and finding them
for an affordable price,

because there's this whole

other community
that's now taking money

as like a way more
serious part of this

than just like,
collecting these for fun.

So we are going to
the Frank & Son card show.

I am bringing a chunk
of my bulk cards.

Like, 2 to 3000 bulk
Pokemon cards,

and I'm going to attempt
to trade them

for some sealed cards

or for some other cards
that I don't have in my collection.

What I'm hoping

to get in exchange
for them is either

some Fusion Strike cards,

like a Fusion Strike
booster box,

which is the newest set,
it just came out yesterday,

or some Pokemon Celebrations.

And those boxes
have been so hard to find.

Those are ones that are
all nearly always sold out

at Target and Walmart
and Best Buy and anywhere you're trying to find them,

Let's go make a deal.

What's going on, everybody?

We are here at
the Frank & Son card show.

This is in Los Angeles,
California.

I have nearly 3000 common
and uncommon Pokemon cards

and this is a very,
very heavy box of cards.

Today, the mission is to trade
in this gigantic box of both Pokemon cards.

I really want to make
this trade and honestly, these cards are a little heavy,

so I would be happy
to get them off my hands.

So I'm thinking
that whatever booth

is wanting to buy these
or trade for them will have Fusion Strike.

So I think that's probably
going to be my go to.

I don't know what's
going on with the Celebrations Ultra-Premium,

That's like $120 box.
They have it for 350,

So I have, I think it's
a couple of thousand.

I didn't get a chance to,
like, count it out.

But do you guys
do trades for, like,

Fusion Strike
or some Celebration?

Yeah, absolutely.

Yeah. Yeah.
We can work with you.

You can put that
towards anything you want.

Yeah, pretty much
anything at the booth.

Packs, singles, boxes...

So the Pokemon Center
exclusive Fusion Strike Elite Trainers...

That one? Yeah, those ones
are going for, uh, $80.

- So they're retail 50, right?
- $50, yeah.

Would you be willing
to make a deal

to exchange it for that box?

Yeah, I mean,
I could do that for that, if you want?

- If you want.
- Okay, cool. All right.

Yeah, I'll take that.

Whoo!

I just keep--
It keeps contact with you.

- Like, "What are you doing?"
- You're-- Don't touch the mic, bro.

I would have sworn
it was this way.

It's going--
We're going down this way.

He's in the new
strip mall at the end.

Now, how long
has he been open?

Chris has been open
like six months, I think. Nine months.

Does he sell
celebrity cards?

- Do you think there's any?
- I don't know.

But if there's Pop Century
we're ripping in.

Oh, absolutely.
I'll get the box.

- Unbroken bonds.
- Okay.

Yeah. This is such
a new world to me that...

Yeah. So this is actually
Jesse's first time in the shop.

- Being here is like--
- Is it overwhelming?

I realize why I don't come here

because I'm, like, going through
like, your boxes over here,

of all the graded stuff,
I'm like,

"I want this,
I want this, I want this."

I mean, I would spend
a fortune here, honestly.

That's the point.
That's what we're looking for.

So we carry all sports.

We got football,
basketball, baseball.

That's going to be
your big three.

We also have hockey, soccer.

They're blowing up
both of those.

WNBA has its own brand.

Golf, NASCAR,
UFC is blowing up, Formula One.

Not only do we serve cards,

it comes in memorabilia form.

You can open up
helmets, jerseys, basketballs,

all sorts of stuff.

Like, for--
So super high-end,

this is stuff we talked about
on the pod this week.

- It came out today.
-Okay.

Panini One and One basketball.

-Okay.
- 1500 a box, it has two cards...

It could have something
like really big in it, though.

- Like worth thousands.
- Oh yeah.

Looks a little
mellow downtown...

There are gonna be
cards in there that are five digits, easily.

- I just don't love--
- There's such a part of me that wants that.

For 1500 dollars?

What have you got?
What if I pulled the LaMelo out?

- 30,000?
- See? I like the spine.

-Yeah.
-Oh, my God. Could you imagine opening that?

Because... Oh, man.

Mavericks. Luka Doncic.

Okay, we want
something big though.

Please, please,
please, please, please, please.

Oh, my gosh.

They heard us! They heard us!

So ripping is just
opening packs.

That's what we get
addicted to, you know?

It's just a rush
of getting going to the next pack

and then chasing the
the best card, you know,

that you could
pull in that product.

When I started
getting back into cards,

I bought probably
20 different boxes,

different sports,
different price points just to see.

And I printed off
the sell sheets and I tried to sit there

and actually open up the packs

with the sell sheets
to try to understand what was going on.

And even with that,
I was completely lost.

This is one of the reasons

why it's hard for people
to jump back into the market

who were cut their cards
as a kid in the '80s and '90s.

And you show up
now and you say, "Wait,

"there were three trading card
sets when I left. There were five.

"Hold on, there's
50 of each sport? I..."

But a lot of people
are now coming in

and they're trying to
understand the market quickly.

I found what
a lot of people have been doing

is they go and just
watch breaks.

Just Simmons,
Swift, Miller...

A Farfetch'd
and then an eyeball right there.

Shiny Star V, Hidden Fates...

C-3PO. Chewie!

We got an Otto
on the back.

Oh, no, that's Porter,
never mind.

Amar Stoudemire,
Kent Bazemore, Ersan Ilyasov...

Greg Newsome. Jalen Duren.

Whoo! One Mac Jones!
One of One Mac Jones! Let's go!

Let's go! Let's go!

Oh, my gosh. Oh, my gosh.
Oh, my gosh.

Oh, my gosh. Oh, my gosh.

Oh, my gosh. Oh, my gosh.
100,000 plus!

Oh, my gosh.

They can very quickly
understand certain product

and see what comes out of it
by just watching you know, repetition,

Breaking,
in its simplest terms,

as the breaker, I get boxes
and cases of cards

go in front of the camera,
live stream, live chat, sound,

sell 'em to individual people,

rip it open for
the community to see it.

And then I ship the cards
to the owners.

68. There you go.

So we spread the love.
That goes to...

Now,
in addition to Breakers,

and this is what's sort of
what's amazing about it,

is you also have
content providers.

What's fun about it,
is like everybody's opening boxes,

and they're all, like,
ripping packs and seeing what they get.

So it's sort of like
you have the excitement

where people are like,
"Oh my gosh, I got this."

And you have
the other guy going, "Darn, I wanted that box."

And that I think now becomes
sort of like a content

that people are doing
when they're opening boxes and seeing what they could get.

- Ready?
- Go.

Okay, starting with one.

Okay, first card,

Trae Young base.

-Non-auto.
-Non-auto.

And Isaiah Stewart.

This is a rough box.

-It's probably, like, $300.
-It's $300 out of the 15 you know,

but it's okay,
it's part of the hobby

and, you know, so...
Mm-hmm.

- Oh, man. Elleby.
- Who is this one? Elleby.

It's a blue panel,
which is rare,

but it's Elleby.
Probably, like, 30 bucks.

- How much was the whole box?
- 1500.

- That's 1500?
- Thank you for reminding me the price.

- That's gonna be hard to follow.
- Whoo!

It is going to be
hard to follow.

Okay. Last box.

Here we go.

Downtown LaMelo Ball!

That's the best chase
for the Downtown.

Oh, my God.
I'm getting goosebumps.

So I'm kind of shaking a little.

The first thing in
my head is "Grade it."

See if it's gradable.

So without grading this card,
it's probably 20,000.

But if you luckily
gem it, PSA ten,

it could be like,
a 30, $40,000 card.

But it's also a card
that I don't mind holding for a little bit

during the playoff
or even a few years.

You know, how he pans out.

Grading has changed everything.

It's all a matter
of condition now.

You may pull a card
out of this box.

It's brand new,
but it's off-center.

Maybe it has
a slight imperfection printing-wise,

and it gets a PSA nine.

For first edition Charizard,
a PSA nine is maybe $50,000.

If you hit a ten,
it's $300,000.

My name
is Peter Steinberg, I am the CEO of SGC grading.

So a grading company
are basically the individuals who are telling you

what you're buying,
what you're selling, what you hope to own.

So when you see a grade,

you can assume that
that card is authentic, first off.

Its original.
So it has not been altered since it was manufactured.

And basically from there
we grade it on its condition

on a 1 to 10 scale,
ten being the best.

So
the first thing I always tell people,

look at the card centering,
obviously.

First thing people see.

Then you look at the front
and back of the card

and you zero in on the corners.

Then after that
you can have a card

that looks like a seven,

but the card has
four eyeballs to it

and you'll see it on
like the Jackie Robinson.

It'll be way out of focus

and it really brings
the card grade down.

You got to look at
all those aspects

and it all comes to
a cumulative grade then.

Value is determined
essentially by scarcity, condition and desirability.

What someone's
willing to pay for it, whose card is it?

Is it a Hall of Famer?
Is it one of the greats?

You know, something
can be a one of one,

but if nobody wants it,
it doesn't really have much value.

So these are some
of my graded PSA cards.

All of these,
I did pull myself from booster packs.

This is a mint nine

Lugia first edition
from Neo Genesis,

the rarest card
in the Neo Genesis set.

Honestly, when I sent this off,

I thought it was
going to get a ten

and that would have
been fantastic

because a PSA ten of this card,
a gem mint version of it,

sold for over
$100,000 last year.

I feel like I was robbed,
'cause I'm looking at this card

and I cannot distinguish
what would have given it a nine.

That's a life-changing
amount of money

just for one single
grade number difference.

In the end,

this was graded
by an individual.

Somebody could have
been having a bad day. You never know.

Wai-wait, no.
Wait for the cameras.

So like, for example,
the Alec Bond's a solid card.

What does it sell for first?
What's it worth?

So it looks like it's selling
for like 20 to 30 bucks.

So for 20 to $30,
if you grade it,

say you get a ten,
it's a one and a half time, maybe two time multiplier.

Okay.

To me,
that's right on the edge of probably not grading,

because if it doesn't
come back a ten, you're grading money's wasted.

I feel like if that card tens
it'll sell for about $60.

So therefore,
you're putting a lot of money into grading it

just to make
an extra five bucks.

But he's a rookie,
so I would also say he's a good rookie.

- So hold it.
- Hold on to it.

If he plays better next year
and all of a sudden it's selling for 50 bucks raw.

Okay. And SGC ten
would probably get 100.

- Cool. Then it's worth it.
- All right.

A little bit more expensive.

This is 300 a box.

Oh, honey!

There's a lot of cards
in this, though.

So that is my big
hit of the day right there.

Last card, because
Jesse was holding it,

Anthony Edwards base Prizm.

It's a $30 card ungraded.

But what do you think
if you got a PSA ten?

So that's what I'm
gonna look up now.

I'm gonna guess
it's 400 bucks.

I think I'm going to
grade that and take a shot.

- I would actually seal it.
- Deal.

if one or two of these
actually grade out like I hope they will...

Yeah. Then maybe
we've got 60%, 70% of our money back.

And again, we did...
We came down here, we goofed around,

we spent the afternoon.

I'm going to end up
losing 100 bucks.

- Yeah, but--
- Not the worst way to spend--

That's what I mean,
not the worst way to spend time.

And if one of
those guys goes off in the meantime.

- Yeah.
- You're going to end up breaking even pretty quick.

Your left. My right.
Give me that pack. Right.

- That's the one.
- That's the sweaty pack he's been holding.

But there's cellophane...

This is a 2018 Prizm hobby box,

which I'm
totally addicted to,

particularly until the
black Luka is pulled.

Someone else needs to pull
the black Luka so I can stop opening up boxes.

Got to imagine
if anyone can find it.

It's got to be
probably $4 million

and it's probably
in a box somewhere.

In the last case,
I pulled this...

Which is Luka purple ice to 149.

That was a huge hit.

I've had six cases for,
like, 4000 apiece.

This has a chance to ten.

There's one corner
that they're grading pretty tough these days.

So we'll see when
I finally send that in.

Each one of these boxes
has whatever that is, 50 slabs

and then all of those
and all of that,

those are all slabs.

That was a ridiculous deal
that I bought.

That's all Peyton Manning.

I just feel like Peyton Manning
was so undervalued.

It was like 200 grand
for, basically,

all, Pay... Like, yeah,
it's like 2000 Peyton Mannings.

Uh, and I later learned

that the person
bidding against me

was Peyton Manning.

And I'm like, I said, "Bro,
I would have given you half the cards,

"so we didn't have to pay
this much money for it."

You know, we could have,
like, split it,

Let me see if I--
Let me search.

Um...

Nope.

Bad luck.
Not one Trae or Luka.

There it is,
ladies and gentlemen,

the news that Fanatics
is acquiring Topps has come true.

I predicted it was
going to happen and I am so excited

Fanatics is buying
Topps trading card business for $500 million.

Fanatics buys Topps
for $500 million.

-I am stoked.
-I'm with you.

I feel like that is what
the hobby needed.

In a remarkable way,

y-you managed
to get this license and now you're buying Topps.

We're always thinking about
how can we reinvent a business

that's going to be better
for all the constituencies involved.

You can't change
the whole industry and the economies,

but you can at least try
to manage the supply

and demand of the products
that you create.

And that is an important part
of not only the through line looking back,

but now what we get to do
moving forward and doing that.

All right, Josh,
I got to know something.

You know I love the non-sports
side of this card hobby.

What's the deal?

Is there any truth to rumors
that are floating around out there

that Fanatics
may be coming out

with some kind of
non-sports card company?

You know, I mean, rumors
are rumors for a reason.

That's a yes.

Hang on.

What are we saying here?
Is that a yes?

Just go ahead and say
you heard it here first, folks.

Yes, it is happening.

You guys should feel free to
put whatever words in my mouth make sense, right?

I mean, that's what
you know, that's what good journalists do, so...

But I will say that I am
also huge fan of non-sport cards

and believe that very much
as a collector.

And so, I don't know,
maybe those things will converge.

That's a yes. Breaking news.
Next question.

Yes. Yeah, Yeah, okay.

We got what we needed there,
I will say--

So, Josh,
bringing it back to reality,

aside from
Jesse's fantasyland,

you know, obviously
you guys are acquiring

all the licenses, deals
are being announced,

Fanatics is going to be
the kingmaker.

You guys are going
to do everything.

But you know, and rightly so,

there's a ton of criticism,
skepticism.

Probably, skepticism
is more of the word.

How do you guys deal with the
though of, "Well, you know,

"we're going to produce more,
we're going to produce less,

distribution may change."
Whatever.

Like how does that balance work
on the Fanatic side of things?

Look, you know, Topps has made
baseball cards since 1952.

And from the moment
that we even started thinking about this business

that was always
at the forefront

was that Topps would continue
making baseball cards.

And in the conversations
with Major League Baseball

and Baseball Players
Association and everybody related to it,

everybody was
was in full agreement there.

Uh, how we move forward,

what sub-brands are created,
how we work with other sports,

you know, all of that is TBD

as we figure out
the right way to grow the hobby.

You know, there's a lot
just like baseball is about tradition,

there's a lot in
the trading card world that's about tradition,

and, you know,
we're not going to...

We're not going
to mess with that.

We do have to figure out
how to grow the hobby.

But those two things
can coexist.

And you know that I went there.

I saw you, like with Steve Aoki.

I was like,
"Wait, is this actually..."

Like, "He's... What?"

Yeah, there's
a good community, right?

We're opening Pokemon cards
at a charity event, okay,

on a stage,
on this livestream... - Mm.

Check out this video.
Okay. Here it is.

Here we go.

- What is a Char?
- Are you impressed?

She's like,
"What is a Char?" -

- What is Charizard?
- Charizard.

They opened, I think,
like $500,000,

up to $1,000,000
in Pokemon boxes.

And that was
the rarest card all day that was pulled.

I was there with Steve Aoki
and King Pokemon.

Okay. Who is King Pokemon?

You had me at "Steve Aoki."

I have probably the world's
number one Pokemon collection inside this case,

Gary is
a bigger-than-life individual.

He was one of
the first people who started collecting Pokemon.

You know,
he's just a beloved fixture in the hobby.

I mean, you go to
conventions with Gary

and people line up to get
his autograph hundreds deep,

and he's just kind of
the ambassador

of goodwill
for Pokemon in our country.

Hi, how are you doing in school?

How you doing in school?

The better you do in school,
the more collectible cards you get.

That's why
I got a pile of Pokemon cards like this.

Yeah, well, my name
is Gary Haase.

In the Pokemon community,
I'm known as King Pokemon.

I can't tell you
how many times

people have told me that
that Pawn Starsepisode got them back into the hobby.

Well, we're here on
Las Vegas Boulevard

near downtown
Las Vegas, at the Gold & Silver Pawnshop.

This is where they film
the Pawn Starsepisodes.

So how much
do you want for these things?

I'm looking for right
in the area of $500,000.

The amount
those exact same cards,

that same collection
would be worth today

is about $15 million.

But anyway, no deal was--
No offer was made and no deal was made.

When I moved,
I had packed up a bunch of boxes

that I had left
with my parents,

and in there, I honestly,
I don't remember

what I stowed away in there,

but there is a lot of boxes
that I just left behind

because I didn't have
the space for them.

That reminds me,
I do need to call my parents,

'cause I am actually
really interested to see what's in those boxes.

The prices of these trading
cards are fluctuating so severely

that I don't know if I am able
to, like, properly quantify for you a value

that my whole collection
would be worth.

It's estimated anywhere
from 100,000

to $300,000 worth
of Pokemon stuff in my collection.

So right here we have...

I think for me
it's kind of like...

I can appreciate that
I now happen to have something

that's worth a lot of money.

Like, obviously that's cool.

It was a complete accident,

but that's not why
I started collecting

and it's not why
I'm still collecting.

So I think it's important
that you have that group of core collectors

and if the market were to crash,

it would be because the price
of those cards is so high

that people who are
genuinely interested in it as a hobby

can no longer afford it.

This happens in in every market,
which is that

when people are buying
and it's hot is when more people want to get in.

So I wonder is where is
the next wave of people that's coming in?

And we have to
be a part of that.

Like, we have to market
the whole industry now,

as we're creating
baseball, basketball, football cards

And I do think we're starting
to see the next generation of card shops

really cater to
the next generation of collectors and kids.

I was just out in L.A.,
I had a chance to go visit Burbank,

and what they built
there is is phenomenal.

Hey, cutie pie,
I'm in the middle of filming.

I got a documentary crew
in here right now talking to the Cardfather.

So can we talk later, honey?

My daughter.
She takes priority.

Okay. My name's Rob Veras.

I go by the Cardfather.

We're at Burbank Sportscards.

Basically, I've been doing
this longer than anyone else.

It's a very young population

coming into the category
right now,

So I'm kind of an O.G.

Kind of the Cardfather,
I guess.

And just try to spit wisdom
whenever I can.

Let's just say you walk in
and you're like, "I really like Russell Westbrook."

You grab a box,
they're going to start at a dollar.

It's basically
a walk-in database.

Check this out.

Now you're seeing the heartbeat
of Burbank Sportscards.

What you're going to see here
is 42 million cards.

The whole building
is also on eBay.

You'll come over
here and again, you'll see showcases.

These are all Kobe Bryant cards.

This right here
is Kobe Bryant's best rookie card, basically.

Back in '96,
that was the card they were chasing.

It was a very limited release.

Topps Chrome was only
available at Walmart.

Hobby Shops didn't
have this product.

There was only four cards
in a pack.

They were expensive
from the get go.

The odds of hitting Kobe
were slim.

To find it in that
kind of shape

where a kid opened
the pack and cared for the card is crazy.

And this right here

is one of those grail cards
for so many in the hobby.

One of the things that
we worried about as a category

that we might age out,
like stamps aged out.

Maybe this generation
is the last generation.

Maybe we can't compete
against YouTube and video games

and things where kids
put their time.

But the industry
has done a hell of a job

of getting that
generation back

and the generation
before that back.

We actually had
a kids night last night.

Our first one.
Had over 100 kids here.

It was chaos.
It was way bigger than I anticipated.

And the passion
these kids had was crazy.

These kids are on YouTube
opening up cards.

There's card shows where
people descend on these shows

and they're not 40
and 50 year old white guys.

Again, it's much younger.
It's much more diverse.

It's totally cool.
It's like sneaker culture.

Card culture is the same thing.

Came to the card show
so we can get some Simpsons cards.

- How much for your Jokic?
- Uh, I'll do 1000 for that.

And, you know,
like I say, that's 199.

Actually, those Air Jordans
are probably going to sell for over $1,000,000.

-Yeah, of course.
- They are the only photo matched

Air Jordan Ones like photo
matched during a game.

Game worn
with a tiny autograph.

But yeah, the photo matching
is what really sets them over the edge.

There's people
that view collecting, as you know,

it should just be
pure collecting, not about the money

but enjoying
collecting the items and owning them.

But, you know, there's
definitely a monetary aspect.

You know, we're seeing
a lot of that now

as investors are getting
involved in the market

and they're seeing these
as a new asset class.

So they're, you know,
more along the lines of,

"Oh, I'm buying this
as a, as an investment.

I'm buying a, you know,
a Mickey Mantle rookie

instead of a piece of art
that I would have typically purchased."

A rare 1909
Honus Wagner card

officially sold
at auction last night.

The winning bid
a record $6.6 million.

Yeah, Yeah.
I mean, you know, Honus Wagner cards

are going for more than some
of the vacation homes

we're offering
in our real estate division.

And people are certainly
seeing the value

and the investment potential
in this industry.

A mint condition
1952 Mickey Mantle sold for,

get this,
$12.6 million yesterday.

Now, that grading
has been going on

since almost 30 years

from 1992 to current,

most of the high end stuff
has been graded,

authenticated and slabbed.

So you can go back
and look at the population reports

and look at that data
and determine,

"Okay, there's only
12 Roberto Clemente rookies

"that are grade,
you know, 8.5 or better."

"Or there's only nine
Mickey Mantle cards

"that are
mint or gem mint in the whole world."

And so when people start looking
at those population reports

from an investment standpoint,

that's when they start saying
these are severely undervalued.

There's only
ten of these in the world

and he's one of
the greatest players ever.

I should, you know,
put my money here.

And that's what
we've been seeing the last five or six years.

What is the rough value
of these cards sitting on this table,

Oh, just this table
right here? - Yeah.

You have over 10 million
just on this table.

Yeah, so here's
my Jordan hoard

and I control the market
on these.

Here's 15 of them. One,

two,

three.

This is the Rock's rookie.

This is his best card.

This is fluctuated
anywhere between 50 and $75,000.

Number four, Number five.
A nice one.

1968, tops three D

Here is the Queen Mother,
Mac Daddy.

I paid 3.25 million
for that card.

Numbers 14 and 15.

Okay.

My name is Rick Probstein.

I'm the CEO of
Probstein123.

We are the largest
auction house on eBay.

There are tons and tons
of new people.

They are serious investors,
and they're full in on it.

So I live in an
Orthodox Jewish community not far from here,

and I go to the synagogue

and people would be
for the first time, they're like,

"Oh, I heard about that
Tom Brady sale for 2 million.

"I heard about
the Luka Doncic sale for 4 million."

And these are people that,
you know, are affluent people

that are in
the Wall Street world

that that have, you know,

an investment portfolio
with hedge funds.

And they were now
coming to me saying,

"What should I buy
in sports cards?"

I'm Jesse Craig.
I'm the director of business development here at PWCC,

and you're at
the PWCC headquarters.

PWCC is the largest
auction house in the world for trading cards.

Additionally, we have the only
custom vault built for trading cards in the world.

We're just under
$1,000,000,000 in assets

and we have almost
400,000 graded trading cards in our vault.

So it's like,
it's the Fort Knox for trading cards.

So our logistics team

sends out between 500
and 1,000 packages a day.

We have a lot of auctions
that close.

We have fixed price listings,
we have vault fulfillments.

So there's a lot of pieces
that move around here.

Cameras over every station,
you can see cameras up in the sky.

You know, the whole
"eye in the sky."

So we've got, you know,
about 70 cameras in the building.

And if a card moves,
we know where it goes.

This is our imaging stations
right here.

We have manual individual
imaging stations.

They're all custom built
with lighting.

And then we have
what nobody else in the world has,

is we have two
custom-built robots

that do the majority
of our bulk imaging.

So what we have are turrets
that you stick cards down,

they rotate, these suction cups
pick up a card,

these grippers will come over
and grab it, take it over,

flip it to a camera
back there,

rotate it again,
take it down,

and then those grippers grab it
and set it back down in the turret.

So it takes about
seven seconds to shoot a card,

whereas manually

it takes much longer
because you can actually--

It's like set it
and forget it, right?

We've always had the vision

of trading cards
being a legitimate, tangible asset,

and we're the first company
in the world to actually lend specifically

on trading cards as collateral.

I mean,
that's the theory behind

what's behind us in the vault

is this ability
to have liquidity

in a market
that is really an emerging tangible asset class.

Just got a premiere
submission request

for a 2012 Pokemon World
Championship promo card in a PSA nine,

which is a roughly 200K.

That'll be a fun premiere card.

When a market
becomes mature,

there's so much
information out there

that you're able to compare
apples to apples

and you're able to know that,

"Okay, this sold for
$100 a year ago."

All these other fundamentals
point it being worth now $120 or $80.

That's a market
that's functioning properly.

When you have
a collectible market,

it doesn't function like that,
because passion gets involved,

scarcity gets involved,
authenticity gets involved.

Nobody's--
nobody gets physical shares of stock anymore.

You don't have an
authentic share of Apple

and have it up
you know, in your in your office at home.

A baseball card that
somebody is trying to flip,

they're hoping that
they have more information

than the person that's
going to buy it from them.

Just count it. Make sure.
I think it's 850.

- Hey! How are you doing?
- What's going on?

Creating content
and making it relatable.

- Mike? Hi, how are you? Sharon.
- Hi, I'm Jesse.

You don't have any
celebrity cards, do you?

- I do.
- Here we go.

I have a super-fractal
Han Solo.

I'll tell you. You know who
we should get on camera?

- Who?
- Sharon.

This is just about, like,
my most famous favorite person in the hobby.

Hey, so they're filming me,
and I bought them over here.

I said, this is
my favorite person in the hobby.

So I brought them over.
I don't know if they can hear.

I started buying cards again
in early 2019

and Luka had just finished
his rookie season.

He was Rookie of the Year.

I don't know. I was like,
"Look, I was like, maybe this is the guy."

And so for the next two
to three shows I went to,

I bought every Luka Prizm
I could find.

Hundreds of PSA tens
at 70 bucks.

I bought every
parallel I could find,

and I was
at a card show in Virginia,

and I got to a dealer there

who a lot of people
know as Black Jaded Wolf.

This is Sharon.
She pretty much controls the hobby.

I met Josh Luber,
like pre-pandemic,

so he wanted one of my cards.

I asked 20,000 for the Luka
black gold Prizm, one of five.

I was like,
"This is ridiculous."

"I mean, $15,000 and, like,
PSA tens are 70 bucks."

And she goes,
"Well, it's not for sale."

I was like, "Well,
we have it in your case." She's like, "I know."

She's like, "I have it
at $15,000 because no one's going to buy it."

We didn't agree on a price.

His advisor
told him not to buy it.

And this is a guy who'd
been in the industry for 20 years.

15000 dollars?
What's it going to go to? 20,000. 25,000?

He was like, "I don't know.
You got enough Lukas today, man."

And I said,
"All right, fair enough. I'll let it go."

I could have bought
for $15,000. - Which I encouraged you to buy.

I think you have a little
bit of a different story.

But I did tell you to buy it.

Because obviously
then what happened next was

Luka starts
his sophomore season.

He goes nuts.
All of a sudden, he's, you know, you know, god level

and looks like, you know,
potential Hall of Famer

Doncic pulls up. Three pointer.

Bang! Bang! It's good!

What's the card today?
Half million dollars? A million dollars?

A big person in the hobby
did offer close to, like, 750,000 for the card.

But I told him if I ever
want to move it, he'll get first shot.

And then I've tried to buy it
from her like four times since then, so...

But I don't want to pay
a million dollars for it. I want to pay 15,000 for it.

We'll see.

A couple of events
that are coming up

that I'm actually
really excited about.

One of them is an
event called Collect-A-Con.

This time I'm going
with an app called Whatnot.

I'm actually emceeing
one of the stages there.

All right.
What's going on everybody?

Welcome to Collect-A-Con.

We are here at the Whatnot stage

breaking a new Revelation
first edition booster box.

We're going to be
breaking that at 4:30 today, right here on the stage.

Trying to find it.

All day we've been looking
for a box of Pokemon cards.

We have found the one
that we are going to open.

I am so excited.

It's a Neo Revelation
first edition booster box.

How much is this box?

This one went for
a crazy price of $25,000.

25 grand for this one,
this one box of cards? - For one Pokemon box.

This, this set in particular

has a couple of really rare
Shining cards in it,

the Shining Magikarp,
the Shining Gyarados.

Those two cards,
especially in first edition,

would be incredibly valuable
to get in a good grade.

I haven't opened in
forever and I'm so excited.

Ahh!

Oh, I started using
the magic touch.

All right, everybody,

this is the last box
break of the day!

We got Superduper Dani.

We've got Sarah Natochenny
here special guest,

the voice of Ash Ketchum,

here to open
the first pack today.

I absolutely love
coming to these conventions.

I get to see all of my friends.

A lot of my friends
I've made through Pokemon

are from all over the world.

Lugia! Hey! We got a Lugia!

And everybody here
is just absolutely

geeking out on Pokemon,
which is my favorite thing.

I think a lot of us struggle
with finding that

in our own little cities
and whatever.

So, when we all
can come together in one place

and just open packs
and geek out,

it's the best feeling.

All right,
all right, all right.

And... Yeah!

I remember pulling
my first ever holographic card

from a pack
when I was a little kid.

Honestly, what
I'm doing right now,

for my younger self,
is a dream.

Like, there's no--
If I was a little kid looking at my older self,

I'd be losing my mind.

A Goldin is this one.
Now we have one more.

We got a...
A Remoraid and...

No way!

Oh my gosh!
You gotta be kidding me.

Out of the
Neo Revelation box! What!

This is a secret--
A secret rare Shining Gyarados.

This is one of two
secret rares in this set.

And as one of
the most valuable cards in the whole set.

- I can't believe we pulled--
- We pulled the magic card and the Gyarados.

We pulled both of
the Shining cards from this set.

The two secret rares.

That is very uncommon
to get both of them out of the same box.

In my opinion.
I don't know what's going on lately.

It's like,
I'll go through patches

where I'll get absolute garbage
out of these Pokemon packs

and then I'll go through patches
where I just get every single one of the best cards.

It's a beautiful moment.

Oh, here they come.

This is it. I'm so excited.

Hi. Hello. Ohh!

How was the trip?

How's it going?
Yeah, you met the dog.

How are you?
Long time no see. - Good.

My little girl.

Oh, my goodness.
Hello. Oh.

- Oh, come here.
- He's like, "Who are the extra guests?"

Oh, hi.

So we brought
a few things for you.

Thanks for storing these.
I appreciate it.

Well, you're welcome.

And we have some
other stuff here, too.

He just brought
a couple of them.

So you can look through 'em.

From the side, I can
already see some boxes

from like the late
'90s, early 2000s,

and then some boxes
that I opened.

at like the start of my
YouTube career in 2010.

Some little plush toys.

This was hanging up
in my little Poke cave.

We got a Pokemon VHS.

I have not seen one
of these in, like, ten years.

We've got a Skies
red booster box.

This is honestly probably
one of the most expensive booster boxes.

Even the empty box
is almost $500 right now, which is insane.

You'd be able to
sell this on eBay.

- We almost sold it.
- Yeah?

Yeah, It's almost like,
"Don't sell any of my stuff."

This is a two player
starter set from way back,

this is one of the original.

I think was
a base set two, yeah.

Base set two starter deck
from 2000.

This one I think I got from,
you guys remember that comic shop

that was, like, downtown?

Yeah.

- Got this from that comic shop.
- For almost nothing.

I had actually opened
all of these Pokemon products

on my channel
at one point or another,

so this is like a little
tiny time capsule right here.

It's pretty cool that you
knew what you wanted to do.

You guys are also, like,
overwhelmingly supportive, of, like, anything I've done.

So I think having you guys
is part of the reason

why I was able to even do
that to begin with.

Oh, cool.

Yeah, we're just
very proud of her.

I think she's just
following her dreams and making it happen

and we're very proud,
you know?

All right,
you guys want to get some dinner?

Hey, that sounds good.

- All right.
-You know of a place?

Yeah, I know a place.

You know a place?

Uh, let's see
what they're worth.

Holy shit.

That's, uh... Yeah.
Well, you can already see it.

You can already see it
from this graph that it's...

It's, you know, trending down.

I mean, things don't go
straight up forever.

I'm not an analyst.
I don't feel comfortable saying,

you know,
calling a top of anything

just the same as I'm never
comfortable calling the bottom of anything.

But if it was my money,

would I get into this market
right now?

And I love baseball cards.

Probably not.

Would I wait two years and
see how things shake out?

Yeah, I would.

Are we headed for a crash?

Are we headed for a crash?

No, you just you have
to have a lot of people

that want to stop
putting money into it

and don't want those
cards anymore.

And I don't think
that's the case.

Sure, a lot of people
have come into the market,

but there are way
more potential collectors out there that exist.

There's still
a lot of growth to be had.

Athletes are getting involved,

celebrities are
getting involved.

I think it's great
Anything that generates interest

and can bring new people
into the market.

Yeah, if I ever go broke,
I will sell them. It's my backup plan.

There's all types of
celebrities you read about

that collect trading cards
because they grew up with them.

This is my birthday present
from Wizards. I love you guys.

We collect things
for one simple reason

other than profit, nostalgia.

It's all about nostalgia.

It's what it means to you.

The way I view it.
It's art, history, business and sports.

So I tend to think that

looking at the growth
where we've been,

where we've come
and where we're going,

I truly think we're just
at the tip of the iceberg here.

So exciting times ahead,
for sure.

And then the last
part of that,

I guess, to some extent
falls on me

and the people that I work with,

which is that I think
we're all hyper-aware of the mistakes

of the '80s and '90s
of the card manufacturers

with regard to supply
and demand and production.

And so, I think that
sort of two areas

where you might see
the potential for a crash

are both pretty solid
and have good...

good fundamentals
for the future.

But no one can--
No one can predict markets.

No one c-can change markets.

But I think it
looks pretty good. Yup.

This just in,
Sports Cards Nonsense listeners,

We have big breaking news.

Mr. Josh Luber is here.

- Mike?
-Josh, what is the breaking news?

Take it away, sir.
The floor is yours.

We are pretty
excited to launch zerocool.

zerocool is our
trading hub brand

for non-sports, for culture.

We're all in
for supporting people,

brands, IP companies
in the world other than sports.

So zerocool is finally here.

This is VeeFriends,
the first ever release from zerocool.

In ten years when VeeFriends
is as big as Disney and Pokemon combined

and is the largest IP
in the world,

this will be
a $1 million sealed box.

- How about that?
- I'm counting on that $1 million appreciation.

I know you are.

This is our next full set.

Actually comes out
in a couple of weeks

It's from Jackass Forever,

the new movie that came out
about two months ago.

I expect the clearing price
to be in the couple of hundred dollars,

but people can get lucky
and get one of the rare boxes

and hopefully
that becomes collectible

and that's part of it as well.

But new audience
is important part of it and we get to see.

The blind Dutch
auction for this

will open in a couple
of weeks and we roll tide.

So Topps, Panini,
Upper Deck, zerocool

are now your four
trading card companies.

Both the Jackass
and VeeFriends

sold for more on the secondary
market than what the clearing price was.

And so by that sort of,
just sort of, black and white data point,

we could say it is
absolutely a success,

meaning there was
more demand out there

than what was originally
put into the market.

And that's what we want, right?

We want people to care
about the products,

continue to care
about the products,

and our products
do continue to sell

for more than
what they originally sold.

Man, I got to tell you,

I'm very excited to see
where zerocool is going.

I think this is a really cool
first step, though.

I want to see the guys
fromThe Office,

I want to see Seinfeld,

I would love to see
Parks and Rec.

You know,
like all these celebrities

that guys my age
seem to also love.

I think an Oscar category
would be awesome.

Like, if you ever
were nominated for an Oscar, there you go.

I was just, like,
I was trying to think,

where could you
bring in people

that aren't in
the card hobby into it?

Mike, we're doing
a comment box for them.

We'll make one.
I'm going to go get a tissue box from the hotel room

and I'm just going
to set it there.

I'm going to say,
"zerocool suggestions."

You don't have to
ruin that relationship.

Well, we're going
to think about it.

We're definitely
going to think about it.

- I want to go see Luber.
- Okay.

Please welcome to the stage

the co-founder
and Chief Vision Officer of Fanatics Collectibles,

Josh Luber.

And founder
of Omaha Productions, Peyton Manning.

Josh, you know, with Fanatics,

how do you ensure
that hobbyists have an easy

and fun introduction
to the hobby?

For sure,
the goal is growth, period.

You know, this industry
has been around, I mean,

literally, since the 1800s,
and the growth we've had

in the last five, six years
has been extraordinary.

But it's still
a really small number

of people that actually
collect cards,

that actually move
the money in the hobby.

I mean, best guess
is there's maybe two or 3 million people

that have bought and sold
a card, you know, in the past year.

Our goal is, is to
to expand the hobby.

And the number one way,
the starting of doing that is technology.

The key is making it easy

for people to buy
and sell cards.

That's what StockX was.
It was access.

It changed
the sneaker industry because it was about access.

And that's the starting
point is we need to make access for people to come in.

Fantastic, guys. Thank you.
With that, we're gonna bring

Bob Means
and Bryan to the stage.

I actually have a
present for Peyton

- before we do that,
- Please. Go for it.

'Cause I felt really
bad, man, that I...

I feel really bad that I
bought your collection, like, from you.

so I showed in
the pictures backstage,

because there's 2000
cards in the collection.

I felt really bad about that.

So I actually
have a a present for you.

We have a box.

It's a big box.

It doesn't quite
hold 2000 cards.

Your cards are massively
undervalued, right?

So I can't really
give 'em to you.

But we made 2000
cards of me for you.

In all seriousness,
I brought 20 cards for your son.

Of, actually,
from the collection,

that we found 20
cool cards for your son. - That's awesome.

- Thank you very much.
- If you want any cards from me, you can have 'em.

I do. I want that--
I want that set.

There's 18 that
are numbered, right...

When trading cards truly
become integrated into culture,

not only for sports cards
and things that we do, but for non-sport cards,

for making trading cards
of rappers

and musicians and designers
and artists and everything else,

the whole industry
will be 10x, 20x, 50x

of what it is today, right?

There's enough people out there
who believe that.

That's why,
you know, Michael and the Fanatics team,

you know, believed in me
and the vision for it.

And we have
a hard job ahead of us, but...

God, it's fun. We get to
make baseball cards, like,

it's an extraordinary
place to be.

We'll see where
the story goes from here.

It's just the beginning.

I love the hobby.
I love talking to people.

To me, it's beyond cardboard.

It's the story of
you and your dad saw Cal Ripken,

and now you're the
biggest Cal Ripken fan.

It's "one of my students
was a ballboy for the Yankees

"and now has, like,
a Derek Jeter bat somewhere, game used bat."

World Series
game as well.

I wanted to buy it.

That was 15 years ago.
He probably still has it.

We gave each other
a retirement time,

which is five years,

and hopefully teach someone
to handle my business

and I'm kind of going
to be semi-retired, you know,

- and probably
enjoy life a little. - Mm-hmm

It's a deeply developed
hundred-year-old hobby.

It just takes you down
this nostalgic path.

I cannot tell you
how many fantastic friends

I've made in this space
and that I hope to maintain friendships with.

Even if Pokemon isn't
around in the future,

the relationships
that I've made through this will last a lifetime.

The relationships
that I've built.

I think those are priceless.

Deep down,
I'm a collector.

I'm a collector
who's an investor.

But ultimately
I love the cardboard itself.

You know, when I hold 1914
Cracker Jack card with the caramel on the back,

it makes me feel good,
you know?

It makes me feel like I did
when I was a kid, when I started collecting.

I just
love the hobby.

Like, that's what it comes
down to for me.

I invest, I collect.

But then you come into
a card shop like this,

you get a bunch
of kids ripping packs.

They don't care
if it's $1,000,000,000 Charizard

or a 2 cent Mark Maguire card.

It's just a love of the hobby
at the baseline

of almost everything
in the hobby.

That's really what
it comes down to.

♪ No one compares to you

♪ You take my breath away

♪ When I think of you
I smile

♪ Please tell me
You feel the same

♪ I don't care about
Baseball cards

♪ I don't care about
New guitars

♪ I don't care about
Brand new shoes

♪ I don't care about anything

♪ But you

♪ I don't care about anything
Anything

♪ I don't care about anything
But you

♪ I saw you at school

♪ I thought I'd melt away

♪ Oh, the way
You look like that

♪ I'm gonna talk
To you one day

♪ I don't care about
Baseball cards

♪ I don't care about
New guitars

♪ I don't care about
Brand new shoes

♪ I don't care about anything
But you

♪ I don't care about anything
Anything

♪ I don't care about anything

♪ It all means nothing

♪ Nothing

♪ Nothing, it all

♪ Means nothing

♪ Nothing, nothing

♪ You are a shining star

♪ You keep me up at night

♪ I think of you all day

♪ Please, oh please
Treat me right

♪ I don't care about
Baseball cards

♪ I don't care about
New guitars

♪ I don't care about
Brand new shoes

♪ I don't care about anything

♪ I don't care about anything

♪ I don't care about anything

♪ But you ♪