Lacrosse Card Landscape: Topps Brings Back a Legendary Brand

Lacrosse cards really made their mark in the modern hobby between 2007 and 2012, when Panini-Donruss and Upper Deck, two well-known sports card manufacturers, first began to issue nationally distributed lacrosse cards.

Not long after that, Topps began dipping their toe into lacrosse cards. However, instead of inventing something new, they re-invented a legendary brand in the hobby.

In the late 1880s, a brand called Allen & Ginter produced two multi-sport card sets that they distributed by including a card in their cigarette packs. The 1887 (N28) & 1888 (N29) Allen & Ginter The World’s Champions sets each feature 50 of the world’s most popular athletes and are some of the most attractive sports cards of the 19th century.

After disappearing for more than a century, Topps reintroduced the Allen & Ginter name to the hobby in 2006 when they began producing their own multisport sets under the name Topps Allen & Ginter (A&G). Each annual issue included athletes and other celebrities from a variety of subjects and disciplines.

Six years later, they introduced their first lacrosse card into these sets in 2013, when Shawn Nadelen became the first lacrosse player to ever appear on a Tops card.

Nadelen had already retired as an active player and concluded his first year as head coach of the Towson University Men’s Lacrosse Team in 2012. Considering the many significant and still active players of the era, Nadelen was an interesting choice for the subject of Topps’ first lacrosse card. Still, he received a star’s treatment with multiple variations of his #45 base card including framed mini autographs, framed mini relics, serial-numbered inserts, and 1/1 printing plates.

It wasn’t until four years later that Topps again featured a lacrosse player in their Allen & Ginter issues. By this time the card company had expanded the line to include a second set called Allen & Ginter X. This set features the same basic design as A&G with the exception that A&G X cards have a black background.

Just two years removed from his collegiate career at Albany, two–time Tewaaraton Award winner Lyle Thompson was one of lacrosse’s biggest stars when the 2017 A&G sets were issued with cards bearing his likeness. The A&G line had also greatly expanded in the four years since the Nadalen cards. Multiple autographs, minis, 1/1s and online-only versions of the Thompson cards were produced. In total, 35 different 2017 Lyle Thompson Allen & Ginter cards were issued. These cards were not generally celebrated by collectors at the time, but there has been a considerable increase in secondary market prices for all A&G Thompson cards in recent years. On the rare occasions they come up for sale, the low-number parallels and autographs particularly sell for several hundred dollars each.

After Thompson, lacrosse fans had to wait five more years for one of their stars to appear on another Allen & Ginter card. But the cards proved to be worth the wait, particularly for fans of the women’s game.

Charlotte North is likely the most celebrated women’s lacrosse player of all time. Like Thompson before her, the former Boston College star is a two-time Tewaaraton Award winner and she led the BC Eagles to their first NCAA title in 2021. North left college as the NCAA’s all-time leading goals scorer following that season. 

Topps had already added Allen & Ginter Chrome (an identical design to the base set but with a chromium finish) to the A&G lineup by the time they issued a Charlotte North card in 2022. This allowed for the inclusion of a couple more popular trading card styles to North’s A&G checklist. In addition to autographs, relics, printing plates and minis, Charlotte North SuperFractors (1/1) and X-Fractors (1:216 packs) were also available for those with the desire to chase the rare cards. In all 39 different cards make up the 2022 Topps A&G Charlotte North offering, including 11 different 1/1s.

The latest A&G set was released late in 2023. It did not include a lacrosse player, but with literally any subject at Topps’ discretion (actors, desserts and a certain cranberry-juice-guzzling-skateboarder make appearances in the set) it is not surprising that back-to-back lacrosse issues have not yet occurred. In spite of the fact that far more lacrosse cards have been produced in the last five years than we’ve had in decades, collectors of America’s Oldest Game still do not have a regular trading card release schedule with which to plan their purchases.

Next week we’ll dive into the Parkside years when a new boutique trading card company issued very nice lacrosse cards during some very difficult times.