If you watched the end of Wrestlemania and didnt walk away feeling like something fresh was starting, I dont know what to tell you. Everything about the extensive run of the Bloodline remains one of the best, if not THE best wrestling story ever told. Seeing Cody Rhodes hold that title as a new champion for the first time in about 4 years is just a weird but emotional feeling. Not only that, but multiple other new champions were crowned, and we even got a brand new signature open for the program, which was beyond cool in its own right. This feels like the start of a new era, and I must tell you, I am almost more excited to see what comes next than anything.

The End of the Story

Seeing Samantha Irvin, the ring announcer for WWE, struggle to get her announcement of Cody’s win across to the fans is something that showcases how special this moment really was for all involved. This was a historic win, a match that featured a good 3/4s of the WWE Mount Rushmore, and a close on Roman Reigns’ incredible journey as the Tribal Chief. If anything, I think people were just as happy for all he had accomplished as much as they were for Cody to finally get his time on top. The celebration in the ring was something we have never seen on WWE TV before, and it was deserved. The call to keep the belt on Roman another year after WM 39 was the right one, and it paid off in spades.

From a hobby perspective, Roman has seen incredible value increases since the beginning of 2022 and rightfully so. He remains one of the most decorated performers in WWE history, and I would say that even though his cards are insanely expensive already, they are still undervalued. He will continue to be a part of WWE’s movement going forward, and lots of the story with the Bloodline should continue. I think Roman should be in the discussion of top valued stars for a long time to come.

Cody’s cards have had some major ups and downs since his return to WWE, and I think that like Roman, he will see some nice increase in his value as the man to dethrone the Tribal Chief. The main issue is that many of his 2022 autographs are still outstanding redemptions, and that hurts the value with no live cards. For 2023, most of his stuff is live, and after last night there were some interesting sales, but I would expect that as breaks of Impeccable start landing with collectors, they will see some increased value across the board.

As for the Rock and other focuses of this last chapter of the bloodline’s run, he showed this week why he is the Great One. Not only did he put on a great performance in the main event of Night 1, but he also was a primary focus leading up to the show. He was must watch TV every time he was on, and I think we all felt a little bit of that electricity now that he wants to be back in the fold.

His cards have been a controversial topic over the last two years, but undeniably the most expensive. His six figure sale from 2023 will sit alone at the top of the mountain for YEARS to come, and we can all still hope that he will eventually sign for Panini or Topps. Even crazier, as if the fates had decreed his return, Leaf released the first autographed cards of his for the first time in almost two decades, and without much shock, sold for crazy money. I doubt any of his performance here sullies that value, and if he eventually does sign some licensed cards, look out.

Mami is Still On Top

I think there were two predictable outcomes from Wrestlemania, the first being Cody’s win, and the second being the continued run of Rhea Ripley as Women’s World Champion. Let me put this as bluntly as I can possibly put it – as big as Cody Rhodes will be in the future of this company, Ripley will be just as big. I cant state this enough, she is such an incredible presence in WWE, and I expect her to be the top of the mountain when its all over.

Despite Becky Lynch’s best selling book, Rhea remains the champion in one of the only belts not to change hands over the weekend, and even as one of the biggest Becky fans out there – it was absolutely the right call. Even though Becky was noted as having a fever and strep throat through the whole week, they put on a great match to open night one, with Mami eventually getting the job done. Rhea continues her dominance until likely next year, and I think that will be a really fun reign to see carry on. Lots of stones left to overturn.

Prior to the Panini era, WWE cards were dominated by the women, as pervy collectors treated most of the women like Benchwarmers type releases. Their male counterparts saw very little to no value outside of the attitude era stars like Undertaker and Stone Cold Steve Austin. That has changed dramatically, but not completely. All that being said, Rhea Ripley remains one of the top valued stars on any checklist and she undoubtedly deserves it.

I think she also had one of the most interesting weeks from a hobby perspective as well, joining the Fanatics Live stream (as many did) during the festivities at WWE World. As part of the giant convention, Fanatics had many of the WWE’s biggest names sit and sign with them as fans looked on and bid from the crowd or from the app. Multiple pieces of cut up and autographed mat from night one were sold, and multiple pieces sold at close to four thousand dollars to create a new benchmark for items auctioned in this format.

As for Becky Lynch, I think there are a number of question marks on her future, as her contract seems to be up in the next few months. Although I never expect her to leave WWE, I definitely expect some major changes to happen as she continues down her historic run as well. Much to the chagrin of my bank account, her cards are among the most valuable out there, and as her role fades and people like Rhea and Tiffany Stratton shine as the new faces of the company, I think her value will remain high alongside the new guard.

A Woven Web Of World Title For CM Punk, Drew McIntyre, Seth Rollins and Damian Priest

Before the end of the main event of night 2, there was no bigger story in wrestling than the return of CM Punk to WWE after a 10 year absence. Right after Thanksgiving at Survivor Series, Punk shocked the world by appearing at the end of the broadcast, setting in motion a CRAZY path to Damian Priest ending up with the title coming out of Wrestlemania.

Without spending pages of text breaking down the story, the feud between Punk, McIntyre and Rollins was absolutely the best TV every week. Actually, let me clarify that – Drew McIntyre has been the absolute best TV each week. There has been no better man on the mic through this whole thing, and I was actually rooting for him to end up with the belt when the music stopped and chairs were filled. Drew has struggled since his own title reign ended during the Pandemic era, and he has found a new life in every part of his game since the Royal Rumble. With his contract coming up, and no solution in sight, he is on a list of people that I absolutely want to see more of in WWE, especially if they are going to let him feud with Punk to its ultimate end when healthy.

In terms of his hobby future, I still dont see much of a change for Drew McIntyre, even though he should have some really good numbers across the board. The fact is, he is a victim of the situation I explained above, where modern champions dont get the love they deserve in this hobby. His cards are cheap as shit, and they shouldnt be. Now a three time champion, he should have more value to his name than he does, and I hope he eventually gets it.

Seth Rollins has been a staple on WWE TV for a long time, and his run as the Visionary has gone from an unexpected gangbusters success to a supporting role in Cody’s story. Rollins played a key part in the weekend, even bringing his Shield betrayal of Roman Reigns full circle. Much like McIntyre, his hobby value doesnt come close to reflecting what he deserves, but I feel that as the time moves on in cards, that could change. If he retired today, he would be a first ballot HOFer, and that’s not up for debate.

Lastly, Damian Priest is the new champion, and I feel torn. I love what he can do in the ring, but he is about as boring a character as can be. Ripley has been the focus of the group, and Priest has always just been there as a peripheral member from a story perspective. However, his work with Bad Bunny during their story has put him in this spot, and winning MITB this year has been a focal point for their group. The issue is that he feels like a placeholder for now, even though Triple H loves long reigns in his booking, and that will hurt his run in the same way that it hurt Iyo Sky’s run. Unless they find a new direction for him to go, Im not bought in at all for him.

Overall, this weekend was historic in a lot of different ways, and I think history will look kindly at this being both a culmination of the previous era and the start of a new one. We heard multiple times this weekend that this was now Triple H’s show, and that is 100% truth. He deserves an absolute mountain of credit for what he has done, and I think Wrestling Cards have and will continue to see massive correlative results from his booking. To borrow from his catch phrase – ARE YOU READY!?

Let me set the stage. Its 1am, the kids are in bed, the night is over, and you have just finished binging the latest show on Netflix. Things are boring, so you log onto Whatnot to see if there are any breaks going on to keep your interest before going to sleep. Shockingly, multiple rooms are up and running, with close to 100 people viewing and/or participating. You enter one of the rooms, greeted by a full heads up display of craziness. Two guys are on camera in gaming chairs, and the rest of the screen is a still shot of an LED screen with snazzy graphics behind a wall of weird looking boxes with insane names on them.

On the screen is a slider bar where you can bid on any number of things that are flashing across the screen. “Pick 3, choose 1!” a giant dancing astronaut boogies across the screen. The number assigned to the item jumps into the multiple hundreds of dollars, and the buyer spits out numbers which corresponds to cards in a stack. Its all a blur, but after about an hour, all the boxes on the screen get ripped open, and the cards sent to their respective buyers.

This experience is now a major hub in the hobby experience for many people out there. I have affectionately named it the “24/7 Card Casino” not only because of what the experience reminds me of, but also because of how it operates. Hundreds of millions of dollars of product in one space, running at all times every single day of the week. They sell everything from boxes, to cases, to singles, and more, sometimes in formats that might be like learning craps for the uninitiated.

Before I get into my own understandings, let me spell out how insane some of these rooms have gotten. Because products like Prizm and Flawless in the NFL and NBA have become so expensive to obtain, many of the breakers are unable to sell enough slots in an old fashioned “pick your team” setting to run breaks through an entire cycle. Therefore, many have resorted to buying single cards in bulk, grading them, and repackaging them into products of their own. They use these self architected products as a way to get people to buy into a break for just about every product that exists.

Now, when you decide to start gambling in the card casino, most users have to engage in gambling style game, where the host will have a deck of cards with teams to choose out of a large stack. Each card has a city’s worth of teams, so the Minnesota card would have the Vikings, the Timberwolves, and the Twins on it. Because the repack products are multi sport, all teams need to be represented, and this allows the breaker to make it more easy to determine which buyer gets what card broken.

In the past, breakers would sell teams based on the amount of cards they have in a break, and assign a relative value derived from the total cost of the case, plus fees and shipping. Now, the boxes of product being broken almost have as little value in the break as anything, because the repacked boxes from the breaker themselves are almost always the focus.

Its a pretty ingenious way to offset the need for a constant flow of product that is becoming borderline unmanageable in costs because of how many people want access to each allocation of cases released by the manufacturer. Creating your own product becomes a sustainable venture for growth, as long as people continue to trust the results of what is shown on camera.

This is where things get really complicated, as if they weren’t complicated already.

Most casinos are HEAVILY regulated by a gaming commission. Of course there is still an illusion of regulation upheld by the major houses in Vegas, but for the most part, if you go to a casino anywhere in the world, it is usually under scrutiny by some sort of governing body, from the whale spending millions to the casual gambler spending a few dollars, or even just eating in the buffet. This is oversimplifying it grossly, but for the sake of this post, lets digress from the minutiae of the matter.

When it comes to the online card casino that Whatnot has become, there is almost no oversight. There is no regulation outside a set of rules delivered from the owners of the platform. More importantly, so many of their major breaking outfits that are on the platform have had issues, that many collectors have sworn to never go on the platform again. Backyard Breaks, one of the pre-eminent “companies” (in quotes for a reason) has been brought before the hobby social media tribunal so many times that its become a meme. They have been accused of stealing from consumers, rigging breaks, and all sorts of other nefarious things, with seemingly NO repercussions from the overall Whatnot platform oversight. If you go on at 4am on a Sunday, they remain one of the active rooms at all times.

The scariest part is that Whatnot provides tools that seemingly could have impact on oversight, things that these major breakers could use to give more of an illusion of oversight, but few of the rooms actually use the tools. The wheel has become a staple of this entire scenario, where “random” spins determine a team or a player for a slot purchased. Whatnot has a native wheel built into the technology for their platform. Few, if any, of the big rooms actually use it, opting for showing laptop screens or using decks of cards they shuffle casually like a friendly game of poker at your buddy’s house.

Its crazy to believe that there are actual people that trust these breakers to provide a fair and equitable gaming experience, using tools that are befitting of a house game, not a card break with 10k worth of product in one fell swoop. In fact, I believe that the few hundred people who read this will be as shocked as I am, only because the people who have a normal and critical thought process around experiences like this are not the target market for big breaker rooms on whatnot.

The market most of these rooms align to is the same market of people who love daily fantasy sports, love betting on games, and have little interest in actually collecting the cards they “win” from these breaks. Im over generalizing here for a reason – this class of people in the hobby is loathed by most of the circles ive surrounded myself with over the last 10-15 years. Most of the collectors out there see these gamblers as vermin, infesting the hobby they love and making it generally uninhabitable. The problem is, the members of the old guard are generally outnumbered 10:1 by this new class of hobbyist.

In fact, Fanatics seems to be leaning quite heavily into the category themselves, launching their own breaking platform, and offering five figure bounties when big cards are pulled in their rooms. Michael Rubin, CEO of Fanatics, has infamously claimed that he wants to “10x the hobby.” Well, they seem to believe that catering to the gambler tendencies many collectors have displayed is the way to do it.

I actually dont disagree there. We all are gamblers at heart, especially if it comes to wax and opening packs. Ive said on this site before, there is no better legal rush in life than pulling a huge card from a pack. The dopamine release from that card being revealed in your hand is enough to have people chasing dragons for life.

The main issue that I see here is just a lack of oversight and a lack of trust. Allowing people to police their own money making schemes is a power no one should have, especially given the amount of money being traded here. Because the rooms run all day and all night, its impossible to keep track of what is going on, and because the packs are built by the breakers with no transparency, the collectors just have to trust that these packs deliver. Word of mouth around quality of content doesnt really impact much either, because all it takes is one big hit to get people back on board.

If that isnt enough to turn your stomach, most casinos are required to have some level of mental health staff on hand to monitor abuse and mitigate potential disaster. In all seriousness, it likely only helps to a minor degree, but its there. Entering into a platform like this, with no support for the tragic tendencies that tend to accompany a gambling addition may even be illegal at this point.

Although the card casino operates in a gray area between true gambling and goods/service, its without a doubt something that deserves more operational criticism than it gets. More importantly, the big rooms operate on a level I refuse to participate in, only because its not my realm of collecting. I absolutely participate in the lower levels of the platform with Wrestling Cards becoming a staple of the small niche I do operate within. The difference there is that most of the rooms at my level seem to operate very closely to the way things used to be – for now.

That being said, its hard to avoid the snazzy animated graphics and in your face marketing of the big rooms that fund the platform. I would even venture a guess that the embedded relationship between breakers like Backyard, We The Hobby, and others is noticeably light in regulation for a reason. They realize that right now, all parties involved should continue to expect golden eggs from their golden goose until things get too far down the wrong path.

If and when newly interested parties like the government and other regulatory bodies do get involved, either through a class action lawsuit or just general interest given the money changing hands, Im curious if the card casino will need to change. Right now, trusting my thousands of dollars to a bunch of college kids who are breaking to make ends meet seems a bit of a stretch. But for hundreds and hundreds of people out there, it isnt.

This is the hobby now, and though there are still major breakers out there still grinding away the old fashioned way, its becoming more and more difficult to ignore the way this platform has changed the face of the collecting mindset.

Before we dive into this subject let me walk through a few things. First – I understand that NFTs and Digital Cards are a controversial topic among physical card collectors for obvious reasons. I also understand there have been challenges with solvency and rug pulls on NFTs over the last few years, and the risk is understood. If you dont care about digital cards, this article wont pertain to your interests. If you are curious about this subject, or a fan of the platform, I welcome your input as a complete and utter noob.

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If you were following this site or my other blog Digital Card Central back in 2015-2018, you know how much I used to do with the Topps Digital apps for MLB, NFL, Star Wars, and of course WWE. Now that NFTs have replaced the original style of digital cards, the Topps apps seem dated and hard to engage with. It seems that only a few of them are still up and running anyways, especially with all the license moving that has taken place and will take place over the next few years.

Yesterday, Panini released the first batch of NFTs for WWE that has ever been released in digital card format. After some deliberation, I decided it was worth a shot to dip my toes into this pool, even though I hadnt really done anything with digital cards in years. The platform was completely foreign to me, the marketplace is much more real time and transparent, and I was a newbie all over again. Lucky for me, the new landscape was easy to navigate, and there are a lot of people who are more than willing to help.

Here is a video I made to commemorate the launch:

Differences Between Topps Digital and Panini NFTs

For people who are expecting the Panini NFTs to be similar to the original apps they loved on the Topps side, things are different in about every single way. First, there is a desktop site to match the mobile app, and that is a gamechanger. You can access all your stuff from your computer, instead of burning the battery on your phone wheeling and dealing.

Secondly, most of the market is completely different because the way the cards are made available to collectors is entirely different. Topps basically had everything housed inside the application, and the only options for acquiring new cards were trading or buying packs. On this site, there is no trading available, but buying and selling with real money (not in game currency), makes things really easy to gauge how much you are spending.

More importantly, because everything is synced to the Panini Blockchain, all sales are public, all sales history is available, and you have a clear market trend to base your transactions off of without much of an effort. In the Topps apps, this was always a mystery, and many new collectors found themselves taken advantage of by experienced collectors who knew what they were doing.

Lack of trading and in app messaging is a huge drawback for this platform though, as its clear that a fraction of the transactions that are done could be exploded by the trading abilities that made the Topps apps a fun game. Honestly, the lack of in app community is really lonely, something that made apps like Slam and Bunt so much fun. There are discords available for the Panini NFTs, but its just not the same.

This NFT experience really is market based, but still has the feeling of a game, which is something I think most collectors of physical cards really dont get. Digital cards have always been about the gaming aspect of the cards, and less about physical ownership, something that has created a ton of people with visceral negative reactions to NFTs.

Lastly, Topps kept people engaged with daily releases of content and lots of fun set collecting challenges, where this is more akin to sister products being released along side physical hobby boxes. I think Panini has a huge gap there, and I doubt there are plans to shift given licensing concerns.

Understanding what an NFT is can be a challenge in its own right, as most collectors lived through the NFT explosion in 2020-2021, but never really found it interesting enough to learn more. Basically, you buy packs on the platform, open them to reveal contents of serially numbered digital cards, and then collect, buy and sell them on the platform. You can also keep the packs sealed and buy/sell those as well.

Each NFT card is displayed in your digital wallet, and can be viewed by the public as part of your collection. The sales of the NFTs are tracked real time, and ownership history of a single card is displayed in app. You can find out how much each individual serial number was bought and sold for, as well as who the buyers and sellers were.

Payment can be tied to your crypto wallet, credit card, PayPal account or any number of other options. This means you dont necessarily have to incrementally add cash to your account if you have cryptocurrency available to spend.

Collectors also have a spotlight, where they can show off their goods, something I really like. If you have an offer on a card, you can go into the person’s account and see what they are all about. It gives a level of personality to every deal.

Understanding the Marketplace

To put this simply, its easy to buy and easy to sell. Once you open a pack, you can list the card for sale within minutes. Its not a long process to list cards, just a few clicks, and that is a really big advantage of this platform. If you buy a card, you pay instantly. If you sell a card, you get paid instantly. There is nothing else to it.

You can list a card for sale in one of two ways, third if you include the crypto market, which requires crypto wallets to participate. The first is listing a card in the public gallery, which is basically a display that shows any number of cards for sale at a given time. You can add a price if you want, or just leave it open for offers.

The second way is an auction, which is pretty self explanatory. Post a card, include a starting bid, and let it run for a day or multiple days. If someone bids, and they win, they pay instantly, and money is delivered instantly.

Ive come to understand a few things over the last couple of days, and I am still VERY new to the whole value spectrum that exists across different aspects of the gallery and auction block. Basically, buying and selling on this platform has been gamified to a degree – as all offers, sales, and transactions are publicly visible, including the historical ones. Most cards display on their page what the sales history looks like, and that is awesome.

Right now, there are a number of people still trying to feel out the different aspects of WWE value, as its a brand new expansion of the Panini NFT app. For that reasons, values can be all over the place, especially for the most rare cards available. Similarly, base cards and cards of lower tier subects tend to sell very inexpensively, with most base selling for the minimum $1 cost.

Selling on the platform does come with fees from both Panini’s back end programming and any fees from Paypal, so its important to keep that in mind as you go. Luckily buyers dont really have to worry about it, and if you sell with your digital wallet, the fees can be much lower.

Navigating the Available NFT Cards

As we have seen in Panini’s previous NFT releases, there are a ton of cards available. Somewhere in upwards of 2200 WWE ones for Elite, with varying levels of rarity. They start at base level with uncommon rarity /243 copies and go all the way to Legendary rarity which are all 1/1s.

The FOTL Elite packs which were the first release under the WWE banner had lots of rarer cards available, with one red /20 card per pack featuring an XFractor like pattern. These included the different base, inserts and autographs across the platform.

Similarly there are challenges that will take place, which require people to collect certain types of cards, and in return, get very rare and desirable rewards for their efforts. We already know that Roman Reigns and Becky Lynch will be among the first two subjects.

As for what determines the value other than rarity and subject, there are a lot of nuances to the platform that I have yet to figure out. As the base set and more cards are released, I have a feeling the legacy Panini sets like Prizm, Select, Immaculate, etc are all going to carry significant value upon release. I hope they continue to release stuff regularly.

Understood Risk of Diving In

As with any money driven collectible, there is always risk to the investment you make into acquiring the different pieces of your collection. What is different here, is that because the collectibles are not physical and are vulnerable for that reason. Given the history of NFTs, there is inherent risk of what is known as a rug pull, where a coin, token, or collectible can be closed out without notice.

Because Panini has established their blockchain years ago, and will continue to make improvements, I think the risk of a rug pull at this point is pretty low. I also think their larger user base makes the markets volatile, which is also something that is risky of buying NFTs early on in the release before things settle in a bit.

There is also licensing risk, because post 2026, Panini will no longer have the ability to produce NEW content for NFL, NBA, UFC, WWE, MLB and other licenses that were acquired by Fanatics in the grand takeover scheme that has been playing out. I dont think this will impact the currently available NFTs, but there could be risk as people get bored and leave with no new content.

Panini also uses what is referred to as a private blockchain, which means that the NFTs are held in a walled off way from more publicly available NFTs that have become commonplace over the last 3-4 years. There is still hope of opening these walls up, but nothing has been communicated that I am aware of. We have already seen major issues with Topps Digital pushing apps to their archive and basically giving up on their NFT platform, but I dont think its an apples to apples comparison.

My Experience Ripping Packs and Making Moves on the Marketplace

Here is where things get fun. I ripped a number of packs as soon as they were released, and immediately found myself addicted to the fun animations and sound effects of the experience. After going back for more a few additional times, I ended up with a number of rare cards, including 2 legendary 1/1s – a Roxanne Perez Pen Pals auto black 1/1, and a Santos Escobar Pen Pals auto black 1/1.

If you didnt already guess, I immediately started chasing all the available Becky Lynch cards, and found that they were popping out of the packs pretty quickly. I was able to get most of them for very inexpensive prices comparable to my expectations of seeing what had transpired for other sports, including the awesome acquisition of the 1/1 autograph Pen Pals black.

I also was able to move some of my bigger pulls as well, selling the Roxanne Perez 1/1 auto and a few others to more than make up for what I spent on the packs earlier. As values began to settle, I was able to start to make more progress on my personal collection, picking up some nice Rhea Ripley, LA Knight and Roman Reigns cards.

Funny enough, many of the WWE purchases were among the higher dollar transactions on the platform for the day, which was really cool to see. I have a feeling that as the base packs are released, and the challenges start, we will start to see a lot more movement than we have now. Cryptoslam is already showing a number of active sellers and buyers, which is good news for WWE on the NFT launch, but seeing that Elite is not one of the main sets that drives value on the platform (Prizm AHEM), I hope this isnt the last set either.

Overall, much like my experience learning the Topps Digital apps, this was a journey, and Im not even close to being up to speed. I had to figure out discord to get on the healthy server they have there with close to 10k participants, and that’s just the start of it. Cant wait to see how this goes, its always fun to get some experience in a new market.

Yesterday I started talking about the legacy that Panini has left behind during their short tenure in wrestling cards. If this is truly the end of the road for them, pending the outcome of the pile of lawsuits currently in progress, that inevitably means that Fanatics will be back in charge. As of last year, Fanatics has acquired Topps to be their flagship provider in trading cards, putting in motion one of the largest consolidation plans in hobby history.

The good thing is, we have had lots of experience with Topps at the helm, and collectors have a TON of expectations if/when they come back. We already knew that come 2026, Fanatics would be back in charge of wrestling cards – that was announced the week of Prizm’s launch in 2022. This means, regardless of the outcome of the litigation, Topps will be back in the fold in the near future.

With that notion in focus, I wanted to take some time to talk about some of the things that I believe need to happen to continue the success that Panini has cultivated over the last 18 months. Coming into the Panini era of WWE cards, I had VERY low expectations given their history in NFL, NBA, UFC, and other sports. I think my expectations were blown out of the water, and Panini did a tremendous job bringing new attention to the niche area of wrestling. Now that the bell has been rung, what are the next steps to keep that attention in place?

Part 1 – Avoiding the Fanatics Way

Let me start by saying Fanatics has a horrible reputation in many areas of their business for producing lower quality goods than meet the expectations of their customers. They have recently received a ton of criticism for clothing and other goods being produced with low standards of quality, including a national story about a fan who ordered a Philadelphia Eagles shirt. Here is why those things happen.

Fanatics is a multinational conglomerate whose business depends on high margins to be successful. This means producing goods at the lowest possible cost and selling them for a price that consumers still find acceptable. If you have ordered a shirt from Fanatics WWE Shop recently, you can already tell the quality of the shirts has diminished significantly. I still have shirts from the late 1990s bought during WWE events, and I can tell you that they used to have higher quality in their production. Even recent shirts I bought are much higher quality.

If Topps comes back with this mindset in tow, we are going to have major, major issues. I haven’t ripped baseball since Fanatics took the reigns, so I cant comment on any changes in quality there. But recent problems with duplicate superfractors, errors in production, and horrible collation issues seem to signal a greater issue.

I see this issue being exacerbated in WWE, being that it will end up being a license that should be 6 or 7 rungs from the top of the ladder in the grand scheme of things. In the past with Topps WWE, the amount of care delivered to the license was representative of its place within the corporate structure. Smaller budgets, lower amounts of attention, and as a result, some ongoing issues around products, timing and content were frequent.

It would make me exceptionally happy if WWE got more equal treatment within the corporate structure at Topps, even though I know that NFL, NBA, Star Wars, UFC, and of course MLB will continue to get the bulk of the attention. If there is an expectation of more gimmicks and higher margin to increase consumer demand, I have major concerns about the quality that will result from these choices.

Part 2 – Better Autograph Checklists Need to be a Focus

There was one thing that Topps did exceptionally well during their run, and it was refreshing. Most of their products by the end of things featured a majority of on card autographs. Stickers were used in some circumstances, but for the most part, autographs were hard signed.

That being said, outside of Transcendent, autograph checklists were severely lacking and incredibly repetitive. There is a finite universe of people that can sign for products, but Topps seemed to focus ONLY on the easiest to obtain. When Panini came to WWE, there was a tour de force of new signers that were featured across a ton of brands. They even got people like Batista and Scott Steiner back to the fold after long hiatuses from the card business. Other signers like John Cena, Hulk Hogan, Steve Austin, and the Undertaker were regularly featured and very accessible.

Because Topps was more cost and risk averse in their previous run, signers like this rarely made it into sets, if ever. Sometimes they wouldn’t even be put on the base checklist. That all needs to change, especially if there is now going to be more budget available. Even if it means more redemptions need to be issued, I fully support Topps assuming this risk, as I was supportive of Panini taking similar risks. Collectors may bitch and moan about having to wait, but those redemptions still carry exceptional value on the secondary market. Despite all the complaints, people still want autographs of the biggest names in the sport. From last count, Panini had a pretty high success rate of return as well, so many of their redemptions were worth it. Although some bigger names are still outstanding, their track record suggested that they would be fulfilled with more time to execute the signings needed. For a set like Immaculate that had a lot of redemptions, my tracking was showing more than 3/4ths of the outstanding ones had been fulfilled.

Now that we know what is possible with Panini in this space, its impossible to put that toothpaste back in the tube. They found ways to make autograph checklists a strength for their products, even when they were issuing sets with 100% hard signed cards.

Part 3 – Photo Choice Has to be a Huge Focus

If you look back over what Topps produced during 2013 to 2022, there were major struggles in one specific area, and that’s photography. Too many times Topps relied on the WWE render database to build their cards, over the iconic photos that were available from the historic moments in WWE history. For those unfamiliar, a render is the posed shot that WWE uses in their match graphics on TV. For many wrestlers, they reused the same renders quite a bit, and it made products hard to digest.

When not using renders, Topps didnt really have success in finding action photos from events that encapsulated the best of what wrestling fans were looking for. Championships, big TV moments, entrances, and finishers are the four buckets I align to great photo choices in sets like Select and Prizm. Topps tended to go the opposite direction. Wrestlers were rarely shown with titles, and action shots were from forgettable TV spots.

I hope that the experience with Panini and the collector response to the photos will spur action upon Topps’ return. This is an area that was arguably the strongest that Panini products displayed, and it will be hard to go back to the previous approach if not remedied.

Part 4 – Relics Need to Be More Interesting

From 2019 through the end of the license, Topps relied almost exclusively on mat relics or furniture relics to fund their memorabilia sets. Collectors CONSTANTLY complained about this, and were bored with relic content to a point that those cards became relatively worthless. When they offered unique relics in fully loaded in 2020 and 2021, there wasnt much of a response because of a small checklist, and pre-conceived understandings about the value of Topps relics.

Starting in Select 2022 and going through Select 2023, Panini opened the door to show us what is possible. Although the relics were player worn instead of match used, the visual appeal of the cards were undeniable, and collectors didnt seem to care that they werent from items worn during a TV taping. Immaculate had some of the most incredible looking relic cards in any sport in any year, and values reflected this with huge secondary market performance.

When Topps comes back, I hope we get to continue this approach, because it just didnt work the last time around. Relic cards lacked appeal, and with a lack of appeal comes a lack of value. Sets like Undisputed and Transcendent would greatly benefit from these new relics, and I would love to see what doors are opened if Topps continues what Panini started.

Part 5 – Build a Chase in Every Product

Back in 2016, Topps started focusing a lot of energy on autograph content in products. They signed a deal with the Undertaker, dedicated resources to include more autograph content in every box, and as their deal moved on, brought back Steve Austin. They also accomplished something that Panini was unable to – Vince McMahon had his first ever pack available autographs. In a way, the autographs became the chase.

When Panini came to WWE in 2022, they took that ball and ran through a wall. They added high value chases to every single product they put out. WWE logos made their debut in 2022 Select, and rare case hits in Prizm, Select, and Revolution became a favorite of collectors. Instead of autographs being the chase, Panini used their brand notoriety to create value in base parallels and rainbow hunts to add value to products without adding more cost to the box. As a result, values went up across the board for these cards, and products were more widely opened by mainstream breakers and resellers.

Although secondary market demand often put box cost well above MSRP, the chase made those box prices more easy to stomach for people like me who collect the super premium cards. Panini even put some of these chases in the more affordable products like Revolution and NXT, to ensure collectors had something to hunt for in every release.

When Topps comes back, this might be one of the more important elements they can focus on, and it cant just be for ultra premium releases like Transcendent. It needs to be more prominent, and it needs to be cool. Panini set the bar REALLY high here, and collectors will notice if Topps decides to avoid this part of the planning.

Thankfully, Topps has things like Superfractors, which have become hobby benchmarks for collecting, and they also should have access to go to the same well that Panini went to with more logos and awesome relics. Without this element, products will feel more boring and flat, and less attractive to breakers who give collectors more options and access to the experience of collecting.

Part 6 – Create More Product Variety and Crossover

When you look back over Topps Wrestling from 2005 onwards, there is an extreme focus on affordability and mid range products. Flagship, Heritage, NXT and Women’s Division were calendar staples, and Undisputed was one of the only premium releases on the calendar. Although the creation of Transcendent WWE in 2019, brought the most expensive wrestling card product in history, it wasnt enough to satisfy the demand for high end collectors that have joined WWE since 2015. Sets like Chrome and Finest can deliver premium cards, but that isnt the target delivery of those product checklists.

When Panini took over in 2022, they had more focus on a variety in their calendar, and focused all but one product on a previously successful brand name that collectors could identify with. They also had a number of premium releases that were readily accessible to collectors, with plans for more as their license went on. They played the hits for WWE, and sets like Chronicles filled in the gaps where there needed to be more affordability in play.

As much as I loved Undisputed, its maybe the only unique to WWE product that carries any real weight or value with collectors. Although there are prominent members of the previous WWE collecting community that loved Women’s Division, NXT and other ‘WWE only’ sets, the value outside that small (but vocal) group of people was small. None of them really brought new people and new eyes.

If Topps were to come back with sets that were incredibly popular in MLB and other brands, the entire scope of their calendar could change. Sets like Dynasty, Museum Collection, or Masterworks could add huge value to their portfolio when paired with favorites from the previous era like Chrome, Finest, and Undisputed.

Part 7 – Find Opportunities to Maximize the Shiny

Topps is the innovator of Chrome style sets in the modern sense that most products are built upon. Not only that, but Topps has EXTREME brand equity in this space, even though the cards arent as valuable as we have seen Prizm and Select become over the boom period. It took a risk in 2020 for Topps to even consider bringing back Chrome and Finest after being gone for multiple years. Both sets were insanely successful on the secondary market, and were some of the only cards in Topps’ run to be in demand through the Panini era.

The introduction of Prizm and Select in 2022 changed the game for WWE cards going forward. The most expensive wrestling card ever sold comes from Prizm. Maximizing this continued focus that started in 2020 needs to be a top priority. More configurations like Sapphire or Bowman could be a huge addition to the portfolio, or even shiny elements to other products like we saw with 2021 Transcendent Superfractors.

As the boom has transpired in the mainstream hobby, shiny cards became a gigantic element of what drives a successful product in all niches and licenses. Topps has the methods and IP in place for Baseball that could be similarly successful in WWE.

Part 8 – Make it a Focus to Engage the Community

One thing I think that no company has been successful with in the hobby is engagement around the community aspect of collecting. I proposed to Topps, late in their WWE run, that more community spotlight opportunities would be great to drive the competitive tendencies in their collecting base. We all know how competitive each person can be when they have a desire to curate a top notch collection, and I think Topps needs to put a focus on this aspect for their return to WWE.

Unfortunately, I think this is one area Panini completely fumbled during the last few years. Their entry into WWE caused a huge divide amongst the existing collector base, and there was little effort spent to highlight any area of the community to repair the damage. Honestly, it might not have helped even if they had tried.

Fanatics is quickly gaining a negative reputation across the entire world of sports, and finding ways to showcase their success with the community could be a huge olive branch for collectors in a small space.

Overall, I have been an avid Topps and Panini collector now for 6 years, and I have high hopes for the future of wrestling cards. Im sad the litigation strategy has thrown a wrench in the vastly successful period we are in right now. Cards are more valuable, more people are engaged, and products are selling well enough for card manufacturers to invest more in their creation. Its unfortunate this has been ground to a halt. If Topps can come back to the fold and give more due to this smaller license, things will go great. If they dedicate the same resources as before, we could see gigantic issues arise. Values will drop, fewer collectors will stick around, and investments in the future will diminish. If you just want cheaper cards, its a stupid and narrow thought process about the future of wrestling cards. I hope we dont have to go that direction.