Lacrosse Cards in the NIL Era

Two weeks ago I wrote about how Deemer Class and the Leaf Trading Cards created the first high school lacrosse cards of the NIL era. They are nice cards, but there is no immediate plan to continue the line.

Onit Athlete is a newly founded trading card company that is working with colleges and athletes in the NIL space and producing team sets in a new and really cool way.

Onit Athlete was founded by Sheridan Hodson and Chad McCloud with funds they derived from selling a previous business. Both men had prior trading card experience and were passionate collectors themselves. They saw the combination of NIL and trading cards as a way to celebrate college athletes while getting money into the hands of not only the stars, but all members of a team and in sports not well-represented in the hobby such as softball, lacrosse, track & field, volleyball, soccer and gymnastics. 

Boise State was the first school they approached with their idea for selling team sets in the fall of 2022. The school bought in and Onit sold 10,000 packs of Boise State trading cards. That access only strengthened their resolve, and they soon reached out to Oregon, Washington and the University of California-Berkeley, which all became part of Onit’s next wave of cards. 

Progress has been steady since those early days and their dedication to producing a quality product has never wavered. Onit’s cards are fully licensed and recognized by the hobby’s most important third-party authenticators and graders, which is a major success in itself.

“Several universities across the country have signed trading card deals with Fanatics [Topps],” said Sheridan Hodson. “But we have been able to negotiate a carve out of the exclusivity for team sets, which is the basis of our business model.”

Hodson believes that the exclusivity deals are based on the idea that Fanatics did not want competitors for its Bowman Chrome line. But as that product focuses on only a handful of star players for specific teams, they were willing to grant the ability for Onit’s officially licensed team sets. 

Still, licensing is a challenge. After taking their own assessment of a particular college or university, Onit has to work with the school to obtain a trading card license. Then they work with individual teams and finally, the athletes. The goal is to build team sets that include every individual on a roster, but there are situations where individual athletes already have exclusive trading card agreements with Fanatics/Topps.

SET REVIEW

“Right now the majority of the buyers of our lacrosse sets are fans of the team and not necessarily members of the hobby in general,” said Hodson. “They are individuals who support the team or have connections to the athletes. They are the ones buying the product right now, and that is what we expected for many of the sports. But it was also part of our strategy to help grow interest in the hobby. We think we can help grow the market for lacrosse cards.” 

Onit sent three packs each of their Ohio State Men’s and Women’s lacrosse cards for me to review. The 14-card packs retail for $12.99 while boxes containing six packs are listed for $64.95 on the Onit website. The cards are packaged very attractively. The foil packs come in a cardboard housing that is attractive but also goes a long way to ensure your cards arrive in top condition.

I opened the men’s team packs first. Each pack includes a title card-type insert with a QR code for placing future orders. The cards have an attractive design with large player images on the front and basic biographical information on the reverse. The checklist for each set is available as a downloadable pdf.file on each product page. It took a minute to locate near the bottom of the page, but it proved to be helpful as the set was more complex than I expected. The addition of serial number information to the checklist would be very helpful.

The Ohio State Men’s Lacrosse set is complete at 53 base cards, and is supplemented by an additional 17 insert sets consisting of three-to-10 cards each. A base set with all possible inserts totals 131 cards. It is obvious that a lot of thought went into the creation of these cards. While there is no serial number info on the checklist, the various inserts definitely hit at different rates.

Granted it was a small sample size, but the collation was excellent with my three packs and I only got one duplicate card. The best card I pulled appears to be a Signature Parallel of Caleb Fyock, the freshman goalie who at 6’ 2” and 297 lbs. is affectionately known as “Big Tasty.” The card is labeled 6 of 36, but without information on the checklist I don’t know if the three Signature Parallels were printed in the same quantities or if they are the only serial-numbered cards. The on-card auto, a rarity these days, was a very nice touch.

I moved onto the three women’s team packs next. Admittedly, my knowledge of the team is limited, but I had my 16-year-old daughter Sydney help me. The women’s checklist has the same parallel and insert structure as the men’s, though the base set is complete at 39 cards and there are a total of 117 with all parallels and inserts.

The second pack we opened is where the magic happened and we were given a first-hand example of the joy the Onit products can deliver. Midway through the pack my daughter stopped me and said, “Stella Wineman is on a card? She played for my club team and has come back to coach us a couple of times. This is so cool!”

It turns out that Stella Wineman is a junior defender from San Diego’s La Jolla High School and she played for the Coast Lacrosse Club in her prep days. Pulling her base card from a pack was a fun experience for my daughter and gave us an instant connection to these cards. The dopamine hit was real and caused us to view these cards from a more personal perspective.

It is hard to imagine that many of these cards will have any long-term value. Some individuals will certainly play professionally, which will be reflected in their card values, but the vast majority will finish their careers at the collegiate level. But trading cards were popular for a long time before anyone associated them with high-dollar sales. These cards will be attractive to fans and collectors simply because they feature teams and players we enjoy, and in some cases know personally. Onit offers the opportunity to collect for pure enjoyment, which is rare in the hobby these days.

Onit is relatively new to the card game and there are still opportunities for improvement. A more detailed checklist would be really helpful. I also spoke with a handful of collectors who ordered the lacrosse products and were unable to complete base sets with their purchases. As these single cards are not on eBay in any quantities, at least for the non-traditional sports like lacrosse, these people are unsure how to complete their sets other than just purchasing more packs and hoping for the best. If Onit built an online forum or trading center that collectors could access to exchange cards, I think it would help build an online community of collectors of their products.

But those are relatively minor issues that can be addressed rather easily. From my perspective, Onit has already conquered the most challenging part of their journey.

1. They introduced a unique product to the hobby;
2. They found a profitable way to produce trading cards while compensating college athletes in many different sports; and
3. They have designed and produced very attractive trading cards.

My hope is that they dive deeper into the lacrosse world and present the hobby with an expanded lacrosse card lineup in the spring of 2025. And lucky for us, it appears they have every intention of doing just that.