The PLL has launched their latest set of trading cards for 2024. Building off the smaller Snapshot set from 2023, the new set features 156 player cards, and includes autographs, jersey relics, and numbered parallels.
Lacrosse cards have commanded some serious value in the secondary markets. Rare rookie cards for players like Jeff Teat have pushed into five figure price tag territory. Mac O’Keefe and Lyle Thompson numbered parallels have fetched thousands. A collector received an offer over $1,000 for a rare Jack Rowlett card from the 2023 Snapshot Set, and turned it down. While lacrosse as a sport is fighting it’s way into the mainstream, the collectible world is already locking up the rare cards of young stars
Cards are available in a single pack of eight cards, or in a box which has 20 packs in it. This is important to note, because it helps us do some math and figure out the size of the print run. It also is important so we know the odds of pulling specialty cards from the set. More on this later.
For that reason, this 2024 set is particularly compelling. It will contain rookie cards for players from what the PLL dubbed “The Greatest Draft”. Brennan O’Neill, already one of the games biggest stars, will have a rookie card in this set, including autograph and jersey relic cards. The same is true for Connor Shellenberger and Pat Kavanagh. Mason Woodward and Ajax Zappitello have autograph cards. As rookies, these will likely be the biggest chase cards in the set. Rookie cards are highly sought, because they only happen once. Collectors will get new Brennan O’Neill cards every year as long as the PLL makes them, but they only get one set with an O’Neill rookie in it. For that reason, it’ll be the biggest chase card in the set. But just opening any Brennan O’Neill card doesn’t mean you hit the lotto. Let’s take a look at the cards in this set and the chances of getting them.
Numbered Parallels
So what’s a numbered parallel? Why are they special? As context, the set has 156 base cards in it. 156 players, and there is a plain old version of a card with that player's picture and name on it; their base card. Nothing particularly special about each base card, even for superstars, as they’re available in mass quantities. Each player’s base card has a series of numbered parallels. These cards look a little bit different. This is where you start seeing market value for cards. The card might have a blue border, and in the top right corner, be stamped a certain number out of 77. Blue border parallels of a card are each one of 77 of that card. That’s it. Using O’Neill as an example, there are exactly 77 total copies of the blue bordered version of his base card, each stamped and numbered. In the entire print run, only 77 of those cards exist. The rarity scales down from there. There are yellow borders for parallels numbered to 49, black borders for parallels numbered to 25, red borders for those numbered to 10, a “Player Edition” numbered to 2, and a gold border numbered to 1.
That’s right. A gold bordered 1/1 card means it is quite literally one of a kind. The only one in the entire print run. That’s where the big money price tags start to show up. Each base card has a 1/1 numbered parallel. These cards I mentioned above that went for big money were numbered parallels in the 1/1, or another low numbered card. For some collectors, the jersey number card also boosts value. For example, Jeff Teat wears number seven, a parallel that’s numbered 7/10,7/25, and so forth might command slightly more value than others.
The “Player Edition” is new and a very cool edition. There are just two each of a Player Edition parallel. One of them is put into packs for collectors to chase, the other goes directly to the player on the card. So if you open up a Player Edition card of Tom Schreiber, you have one, and he has the other. And those are the only two that exist. It’s the turtle doves from Home Alone 2, except with lacrosse cards and way fewer pigeons. This is a spectacular idea. The opportunity to share this with a favorite player make this a unique card to chase. PLL also has built an opportunity to have those who open player edition parallels connect with the player, which is special.
As you can imagine, the 1/1 cards are very rare. How rare? Well we have the odds of pulling one as provided by the PLL. They are:
Blue /77 parallel: 1 card in 7 packs
Yellow /49 parallel: 1 card per 10 packs
Black /25 parallel: 1 card per 19 packs
Red /10 parallel: 1 card per 48 packs
Player Edition /2 parallel: 1 card per 240 packs
Gold /1 parallel: 1 card per 480 packs.
So to “guarantee” yourself a gold /1 parallel, you’d have to buy/open 480 packs, or 24 boxes of cards. That’s a major investment.
Autographs
When the set is being put together, players are sent sheets of stickers, which they sign and return. Those are adhered to a run of cards for the player, and voila, an autograph set is made. Not every player in the league has an autograph card. Of the 156 players in the set, 23 of them have autograph cards. Autos are harder to come by than typical base cards. On top of that, Autographs also have their own run of numbered parallels. The same way the base set has blue border, yellow border, and so forth down to gold border, the autographs do too. So there will be a 1/1 gold bordered autograph for 22 players in the set, which will command a heavier secondary market price tag than the base card without the autograph on it.
If you’re after autos, the odds are:
Base Auto: 1 card per 11 packs
Auto /99: 1 card per 33 packs
Auto /49: 1 card per 67 packs
Auto /25: 1 card per 134 packs
Auto /10: 1 card per 327 packs
Auto /1: 1 card per 3,261 packs
Jersey Relics
These were not included in the 2023 Snapshot set, but have been added for the 2024 run. A jersey relic card is a player card that has an actual physical piece of the player's jersey embedded in the card itself. The player photo is typically different, the card layout is obviously different because there’s a piece of uniform in it. These are, at the base level, the rarest base card. Harder to find than autograph cards. Like autographs, jersey relic cards have a run of numbered parallels too. So you can find the fabled 1/1 jersey relic card. The odds for finding a relic are:
Base relic: 1 card per 20 packs
Relic /99: 1 card per 50 packs
Relic /49: 1 card per 100 packs
Relic /25: 1 card per 200 packs
Relic /10: 1 card per 500 packs
Relic 1/1: 1 card per 5,000 packs
That relic 1/1 is the rarest of the rare, the longest odds in the entire set. The person who pulls a Brennan O’Neill 1/1 relic is a lotto winner.
What should you do if you get one of these rare cards? Depending on the card, you can submit it to PSA for grading. You send them your rare cards, they evaluate it for a variety of measurables, and give it a grade, 10 being a perfect (gem mint) card. It’s returned to you with the grade, in a protective case, with the info about the card on the label.
There are different schools of thought on sending 1/1 cards for grading. For some, it’s nice to have the card in the PSA case, graded, safe and sound forever (slang for this is having the card “slabbed”). Another school of thought is that it’s a 1/1, why bother, it doesn’t matter what the grade is because the card is one of a kind anyway. Very rare relics and autos, even base parallels, can be submitted for grading. For collectors of a specific player they might want the card to be graded. Ultimately, if you open an ultra rare card, what you do with it is up to you. Just don’t toss it in the junk drawer, promise me that.
The Print Run
With all those odds, which are provided by the PLL, we can try and get a handle on just how big the print run is for the 2024 set. That is to say, how many packs did the PLL make?
Using the pack odds for pulling a gold 1/1 card, we can do a bit of math. Gold autos are 1 in 3,261 packs, gold relics are 1 in 5,000. Working backwards, we land somewhere in the ballpark of 75,000 to 80,000 packs of cards being printed. I reached out to the PLL to confirm that number but as of yet no response. That’s a sizable run of cards. PLL has enough there to have plenty available for the initial surge of orders at release day, for the holiday season coming up, to sell at the Championship Series in February, and to have on site for next summer in merch tents.
How do I know they’ll last that long? The PLL has a cap on orders this time. The max purchase in a single order is six boxes, and the max annual purchase is 24 boxes. That sounds like a lot, but in the card collectible world, the cap limits the ability of larger purchasers and collectors to secure cases of cards in a single order. It also reduces the amount of savings on those massive orders (imagine someone buying 100 boxes and using a 20% discount code on the order). Large distributors like Topps have used order caps before, but it’s surprising to see one in use for a market as small as the lacrosse card market is. I reached out to PLL for more info on the order capping, but have not heard back.
The Good, the Bad, the Ugly
The good, it’s a new set of cards and it includes a special rookie class. That’s a big deal. The PLL didn’t lean hard into the trading card game right out of the gate, so some players who are still in the league, and stars, don’t have rookie cards, or have a limited run of cards available. For big fans and collectors that’s unfortunate. The league committing to regular releases of cards means that collectors and fans have the chance to grow their collections of their favorite players. Establishing a regular cadence of new sets of cards will demonstrate a legitimacy of the league to collectors and outsiders. The set is more ambitious than before, with more cards included, the addition of jersey relics, and a larger print run. The Snapshot set sold out fast enough that the PLL didn’t have packs left to sell on site for the last few regular season weekends and into the playoffs; they call that a good problem. Aiming higher after the first set is the right thing to do.
The bad, there’s a lot of Snapshot repeats in the auto set. About half the auto set are players who also had autos in 2023. Not the end of the world, but collectors were likely hoping for some new signatures to chase. Part of a new set is new cards, but really new specialty cards. Looking back at the award season, the winners of the LSM of the Year, Defender of the Year, and SSDM of the Year don’t have autos or relics in the set. It’s hard given timing to get the set out now with autos and so forth in it, while the awards dinner was less than a month ago, but these are superstar players. Danny Logan in particular is up for SSDM of the Year every year, it would have been nice for him to have an autograph card available.
The ugly, there is one other serious hole in the auto/relic set. TJ Malone was one of the best stories of the year, a 3rd round pick who outplayed the mega stars selected at the top of the draft, and won Rookie of the Year on a Whips team that made it back to the finals. Malone’s season was spectacular. It was clear early on that Malone was an impact player and a star. He does not have an autograph card or a jersey relic card. His rookie parallels will be a major chase card for Whips fans and collectors, but his market could have been scorching hot with autos and relics. There’s just one chance for a player to have a rookie auto, and so Malone will never have one. In my eyes, it’s a major mistake to not have autos or relics for Malone in his rookie set, and it should not have happened.
I will also add, the dangerous. PLL sent a number of packs out to influencers on social media. They’re folks in and out of the lacrosse world; the usual run of barstool personalities, gambling influencers, and of course pro players. Anyone who follows the sports card breaking world knows this can be a dangerous game. There have been legitimate scandals in that industry, where people with large followings on their card opening streaming channels or on social media are sent a new card product to open on stream, and low and behold, it has a very rare chase card in their break. There are instances where this appears to have happened deliberately, with the influencer being specifically sent a pack with a chase card in it to excite their audience and push more interest in the product. I am not at all saying the PLL has done that here. But because the collector world is wary of this sort of thing, should one of the influencers the PLL used open something exceptionally rare, it could be met with skepticism and anger, not excitement. You also run the risk of the influencer you use not knowing much about lacrosse and getting player names wrong, which doesn’t exactly help things when it comes to legitimizing the sport and the product.
All told, the new product is an ambitious leap forward from the 2023 Snapshot Set. For a serious in depth understanding of lacrosse cards, and assuredly a great breakdown of this set, it’s release, and other card info, check out Todd Tobias’s work for Lacrosse Culture Daily. He authors regular articles on lacrosse cards, their history, and more, and is an invaluable resource on the lacrosse collectible market.
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