Lacrosse Card Landscape: NIL in High School?

The landscape for student-athletes has changed significantly in recent years. After decades of struggle and debate, student-athletes gained the ability to monetize their name, image and likeness (NIL) in 2021. College athletes are most often the subjects of NIL discussions, but these rulings can apply to younger athletes as well. Surprisingly, the lacrosse card hobby may have a place in this new system.

Editors note: The NIL landscape changed again this week, and schools will now be able to directly pay their players, in addition to athletes getting NIL money. Read more here.

High School NIL

NIL eligibility at the prep level differs between states and is determined by individual high school sports governing bodies. Currently, 29 states allow NIL participation, and several other states are considering it.

Trading cards are an area ripe for NIL participation. ONIT Athlete is a new card company that is focusing on college-level trading cards. They currently have lacrosse card options for three programs: Ohio State Men’s and Women’s, and Florida Women’s.

But the cards are now appearing at the high school level as well. Deemer Class, former PLL midfielder and Director of First Class Lacrosse (FCL), got a jump on things when FCL partnered with Leaf Trading Cards to issue a lacrosse card for Marleigh O’Day and Peter Buonanno, two high school players in the Class’s program. 

Class himself is no stranger to trading cards. He grew up as a collector and still has binders of cards from his childhood. He also has a card of his own (#84) and accompanying parallels in the 2022 Topps PLL Flagship set. But the cards of O’Day and Buonanno are the first High School cards of the NIL era. They will hold special value in the hobby going forward.

When asked how these two young athletes were selected for cardboard recognition, Class said that his company had already come to an agreement with Leaf Trading Cards to produce cards of the top athlete in the boys and girls divisions in one of their recent “Best In Class” events. In essence, O’Day and Buonanno earned their trading card appearances as top performers at the showcase.

It comes as no surprise that Leaf is the maker of these cards. The company has made a mark in the hobby not only for producing trading cards that do not require stringent licensing deals, but they have also done much to represent non-traditional sports in trading cards. Bowling, pickleball, wrestling, soccer and multi-sport issues are all part of their 2023 lineup. 

Print-on-demand cards of individual athletes are also a Leaf stample. In fact, in 2023 Leaf issued the first autographed card of former UNC and current PLL star Chris Gray as an on-demand product.

Future Value?

The O’Day and Buonanno cards followed the on-demand format and were available for a limited time at $19.99 on the Leaf website. Sales were not overwhelming; the O’Day card ended with a print run of 60, while Buonanno cards are /35. But the print run is not the most important part of this story. At least not until these young players begin to shine at the collegiate level and beyond as O’Day (Class of 2025) is committed to Clemson and Buonanno (Class of 2024) further his lacrosse education at Princeton.

The fact is that by recognizing high school athletes in this process, Class and Leaf have introduced us to a new layer of trading card complexity. Maybe high school cards will catch on, and maybe they won’t. But their introduction is noteworthy regardless of their ultimate level of hobby popularity.

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