Welcome back, loyal listeners of the stacking slabs podcast to season three episode two of the WNBA card podcast. My name is Caitlin. I go by at cold bunch cards, and I'm your host today.

I'm joined by my cohost, Brett at Stack and Slabs, and we're excited to continue to deliver collector driven and community focused content to your headphones, to your car speakers, to wherever you're listening to us today.

We appreciate you being here and sticking around. It's three seasons in. Brett, how are you feeling today? I am excited. It's cold here in the Midwest, which I'm I'm all for, I'm all about.

I got the heat on in my house. I it's interesting. Right? We're not we don't have any WNBA to watch. There's other sports to entertain us, but we now have new WNBA cards to talk about.

So that's what we're gonna do today, and we it's it's crazy the time. We've we've gone seasons without a new release, and we've got a new release, which is done with us and excited to spend some time talking about a brand new product.

I'll just say, let everyone know, I have not ripped it. I've I have looked at, you know, all the same information as probably most of you. By the time this goes live, I would imagine, there will be people with their hands on this stuff.

There'll be breaks happening. So just make this statement upfront. If you hit something cool, doesn't matter if it's high dollar, whatever. If you hit something cool, tag WNBA card pod.

We would love to see it. Absolutely. I'm excited to see where these things go. I'm loving the first sneak peeks that we saw, and then, you know, as they start to get broke, I saw some great parallels and cards.

So I'm super excited to finally have product on the shelves. I'm excited to get into this conversation as well, Brett, all about Don Russ 2025 WNBA product.

But before we get into that, why don't we talk about our sponsors today? Per usual, we have Great Lakes Trading Cards Co, sponsoring the pod, a local card shop to me in Saint Paul, Minnesota located off Randolph Ad Ave.

A little plug for them that we're gonna continue to do is that they have a women's sports card show happening at Dual Citizen Brewery on Sunday, November 2 from twelve to five. Enjoy a cold brew, something of that sort.

Get some women's sports cards and talk to folks that also collect women's sports cards. Should be a fun event, and I hope to see a lot of you there. Should be good. Brett, why don't you tell us about our other sponsor?

Yes. Shout out to our good friends at Card Ladder for coming on board. Season three, Card Ladder is the official data provider of the w NBA WNBA card podcast. Wouldn't imagine couldn't imagine life without Card Ladder.

I Caitlin, this isn't on the script, but as I'm thinking about this Donner's product to kick it off, I kinda I know we're gonna like it in the weeds a little bit, but you you mentioned the images we've seen.

Obviously, Panini's pushing those downtowns. Yeah. Yes. I know. You're in this last lap of kinda this era where there's, you know, downtowns in every type of sports.

The downtowns are really popular. Did did you see the size of those, rabbits on the Asia Wilson downtown? Did I heard one is bigger than her, I think. Yes. I did hear that one of those. They're kind of weird looking rabbits as well.

They look kinda guilty. I don't know. Would that be a jackrabbit thing? Well, I'm not a rabbit expert, Brett, but, I am an Asia Wilson expert, and she should be bigger than the rabbits on the cards.

So that's a bit disappointing, but maybe maybe somebody you know, for the one person out there that has a rabbit and also collects agent Wilson cards, this is gonna be the chase of a lifetime.

I'll tell you that. So one more because you are a Links fan in I am. You do live in, Minnesota. The question I have and I caught this, and I was scrolling fast. Was was was that a Juicy Lucy burger in in fees downtown?

Hell, yes. For once in my lifetime, one of the downtowns actually resembles something that represents the city or state, and I was excited to see the Juicy Lucy represented on the Nifissi Nifissi Collier downtown.

For folks that don't know, a Juicy Lucy is a type of burger that was, I suppose invented in Minnesota, but popularized in Minnesota. Many bars around here fight over who actually created it first, and I've been to all of them.

And I have no opinion on who created them. I'll go Matt's, maybe. Maybe. Anyway, so there's a Juicy Lucy, which is a burger that has cheese in it so that when you bite it, it squirts out and burns you in the face.

And it's just a very special experience, and, you know, it made me happy that it's not just a generic something. Somebody somebody at Panini knows what a juicy lunacy is and decided to put it on the cart, and I like that. I like that.

I I I watched some food channel way too long, like, several years ago, and it was you teed it up perfectly because it I had never heard of juicy Lucy as a term, but they the the whole episode and I gotta go back and figure what it did what it was, but they were exploring these different bars that claim that they were the creator of the Juicy Lucy.

I now this makes me wish that the Caitlin Clark had a breaded tenderloin. The which is there's a debate always from, P us Hoosiers in Indiana and the great people of Iowa who invented the, breaded tenderloin.

Now Caitlin Clark represents both of those states, so it's like, where is the breaded tenderloin if we're putting a Juicy Lucy on fees downtown?

You know what I'm saying? I never thought I would hear those words, put together in the same sentence of Caitlin Clark breaded tenderloin in downtown from.

But here we are. Oh, this is what happens when new products get released. We get fired up. The question just to kick this off is a lot of us are getting excited, new product.

When a new product hits the market for you, Caitlin, what is your first instinct as a collector? Are you trying to get your hands on this stuff to rip it? Are you trying to research it?

Are you trying to just kinda relax and let everything settle? Like, what's your mindset as Don Russ has returned to the scene? My mindset is to sit back and enjoy other people spending their money on the product for a bit.

And that might involve research, quote, unquote research of sitting in break rooms and watching folks hit massive cards and I get a little bit of FOMO. That might happen. It does happen.

It will happen. But, no, I'm not going out and ripping boxes. I'm not a box breaker. I never was. The extent of my, quote, unquote, box ripping came as a child when I, you know, ripped cello packs of shitty 2,007 tops paper products.

Like, it was not something that I, had a lot of experience in growing up, and then it never really translated for me because when I joined back into the hobby, box prices were super inflated.

And we'll get into that with this product in particular because I know that price point is something we wanna touch on.

But, yeah, I will not be ripping at least for the foreseeable future, but I will be trying to relax and hopefully doing some research.

What about you? I'm gonna be sitting back and researching, letting the initial hype kind of, I'm just gonna watch it play out.

Honestly, I I don't even know what I want from this product yet if I want something from this product. I'm having this, like, debate in my mind right now with my WNBA collection, which maybe we can talk about for another episode.

But I'm I'm beginning because I'm widespread, I'm beginning to feel like I should be more focused in me to get these parts as collectors.

And, I'm seeing some opportunities in some areas, so, maybe we'll dig into that this episode, but that leads me to maybe being a little restrictive on being impulsive on participating in this.

But I'm gonna watch like you're gonna watch. And for anyone who hasn't been following along with Don Russ, we've talked about Don Russ Russ a lot.

This is its first release since 2019. This six year gap is a fun one, I think, to explore, and I hope through content on the WNBA card podcast, if you want to learn more about 2019, you can tune into older episodes.

But I can't help, Caitlin, but think about the price point of this product, which is $500 a box, and think about this new product that's $500 a box, and then continuing to have this burn in my brain of a conversation I had at the national conversation you had at the national of in 2019, they couldn't give this stuff away, and people were literally, like, probably spending, like, $500 for an entire case of the debut product.

So I think that's a signal for just the momentum and where we're at right now with the market. But just have you price points, have you thought about that at all as we kinda get into this episode? The price point is disappointing to me.

I don't want to say that it's not worth $500 because I'm sure some of the chases will far outpace that sticker price. But $500, man, that's you can get a nice WNBA single for your collection for $500, or you can chase and gamble it.

And to me, 500 is just a price point that's a little bit outside of my comfort zone. I would have felt much better, about opening and ripping boxes if it was, you know, just south of 300. Maybe that's being too optimistic.

But on the bright side, it is a good signal of that momentum that you were talking about. So we we can be happy about that while still critiquing the fact that it may be a little out of reach for most, at least casual collectors.

We can all agree on that. I think the fun part about WNBA product and new WNBA product is that there's not a ton of it. So for people like us, we can actually spend some time digging in and exploring what it means.

What do you what does Donneras, as it kind of reemerges, mean for the WNBA collecting community, and then also for just you generally as a collector?

Yeah. So I'll start with this. I can't recall across any of the collecting lanes that I've personally collected in a gap so wide for such a, quote, unquote, foundational set.

So Brent mentioned this. It's been six years since Donris appeared for the WNBA line. To have that gap is very interesting. It it shows that, you know, collectors are demanding this kind of stuff.

You know, the the manufacturer understands that there is a demand, and they wanna fill that that demand. But at the same time, why why wasn't this a consistent product that was coming out, between 2019 and 2025?

So that was my first thing I wanna hit on. But what it means to me, and, yeah, I think this applies to the greater ecosystem, is kind of the market dynamics at play once these are getting pulled in their singles.

I think we all can recognize that there's not gonna be a ton of rookie hype relative, relatively.

Because we already know who outperformed or who underperformed expectations. We know who won rookie of the year. We knew know who, kind of, like, shouldered the load on their respective teams or somebody that kinda just rode the bench.

That mystery, that that question, that speculation is gone. We already have our answers. So there's no urgency from the collector side to be like, I need my favorite rookie before they blow up and just become like this sensation.

But there's also no urgency from the investor, the quote, unquote flipper, who's looking to make a quick quick dime because the timing is off. There's no okay. Before they get to the all star game, I think I think I can buy something.

They'll get to the all star game, and their prices will go up. Oh, I think this person will play a big role on a playoff team and make a push, so I think their prices will go up. All of those things have already happened.

So collectors, you know, aren't really chasing anything of what's next. And when we talk about that, it leads me to my final point, which is, you know, collecting is inherently about what's coming next, about chasing the next thing.

And as we know now, we are past this season and we're moving into the next. We're already looking ahead. People are already like, when is unrivaled? When is the next season happening?

And that overlap can fog collector's priorities and their intention. And I think, you know, it definitely hurts this class because they didn't have that natural momentum of a season carrying their rookie cards through.

Instead they're going to have to compete for collector's attention, with the next class that's coming up or with NCAA or with unrivaled or all the other leagues that are happening.

And we didn't even mention the non women's basketball leagues, like if you're an NBA fan, well, we're no longer in the WNBA season.

I've shifted now to another league, you know. These types of conflicting priorities are definitely impacting the ecosystem in my collecting.

So that was my big takeaway from kinda, like, the timing and the market dynamics I expect to see at play. I think that's a very interesting perspective.

And I also just I'll I'll note this. I think it'll be interesting to see the Paige Beckers sales and the direction that they're going in relation to the Caitlin Clark sales or general market and the direction that's going.

And I think you're gonna probably see one going up really fast, and you're probably gonna see another one retract really fast.

And I think it's a timing thing too. It's like we don't or it's gonna be a long time until Caitlin Clark steps back on the basketball floor.

But a lot of us just got done watching Paige Becker's play, and we've been waiting for her card. So that's like a a storyline within the story of this product that I'm certainly interested in examining.

Exactly. And and I don't wanna be too, I suppose, critical here. I wanna end on a positive note for this particular question, which is that I think the cards look great, and I think filling this gap, the six year gap is great.

And I think by supplying cards after the season, there are some positives that we can tease out that build momentum, like you said, with the page cards.

I think, you know, something is better than nothing, and sooner is better than never. Okay. Let's jump into it. We we this was, like, forever ago when the news dropped that this was gonna come out.

And there was a time where we, like, initial renderings, we'd spoke about doneris, but we're here, and maybe we'll revisit the Donnerus of it all and how you felt when you heard about it.

So what was your first reaction, and this was a long time ago, when you saw that Donnerus was coming back into the fold?

I think my first reaction was more nostalgia driven. Because, for those that don't remember, 2019 had a stacked rookie class, including some of my favorite players.

You have Nafissa Collier, Jackie Young, Enrique Ogdenwale, just to name three. Those are three of my favorite players in the league, all with the same iconic rookie base cards.

So I was immediately drawn to the design, to the product, just because of the credibility that those players, gave the product. It also reminded me of a time of pre Caitlin Clark.

You know, things have shifted so much that pre Caitlin Clark era is not talked about a lot both in the media nor in the hobby, but it should be. So this kind of drove me to look back, at 2019 and appreciate more pre appreciate it more.

And then the second thing that I thought when it came out was, man, I hope they don't f this up because this is a great product that came out, and I do not want it to be, stained by an overproduction or a lazy design team or an overextended checklist or something like that.

And I think the main pull for 2019 Donruss was those Chase cards were so desirable because the fact that they were rare and scarce, they were nice looking cards.

Not only were they hard to get in 2019, but they're hard to get in 2025. And I just hope that they preserve that going into this 2025 set.

So that was kinda my initial reaction. Did you have similar thoughts, or were you thinking along a different trend? Yeah. No. I think I think, generally, similar thoughts.

I do think that the base card look and feel and design is nice. Like, I think they are really nice looking cards. You know, my and maybe getting a little further into the comparison side of 2019 versus, 2025.

I think the the optic you mentioned the Chase cards. Like, the the fact that that that optic brand is not integrated in this set is, it doesn't I wish it was. And if it's not, I'm hopeful that maybe this means stand alone optics set.

But I think that being a shiny card fan, knowing that maybe optical vinyl one of ones were in this product would probably get get me to have responded a lot differently upfront about what I was going to do on the first week of this product release.

Right. I I think it's important to note here that we're talking about our initial reactions. Because I I do think there are hollows coming in, Brett. I'm just not sure about the optic brand itself.

Okay. What I guess, just have you thought about the comparing and contrasting kind of 2019? What worked, what didn't with maybe anything that you're seeing with in this in the early look of the this product?

Yeah. So like I said, I think the main point that worked in 2019 was the exclusivity. And the thing Wayne thing that didn't was the accessibility, which is impossible to get that balance right.

I think that, you know, Donner's 2019 Donner's did a good job. And I I made a little table here, so I could contrast some of the numbers that I'm seeing in the set.

So this is just preliminary. Things may change. This is based on the information that I have. But in 2019, the base set was a 100 cards with 88 bets and 12 rookies. In 2025, that number stayed the same at a 100, which I love.

But the number of rookies actually went up by three. So it's 85 vets and 15 rookies. Let me just say I'm very excited about that. One of the main things that I was, like, really hoping they did not mess up was that the checklist length.

I think that's gives you a lot of depth to have players, you know, that are fan favorites but not necessarily see the court a lot.

But it also incorporates the stars that we're chasing. In 2019, there were about three to four parallels for each type of card depending on what it was.

In 2025, I went through the checklist spread, that number surged to 28. That is a red flag for me. 28 parallels is a lot, especially for a product that prided itself on keeping it quite, strict and and and stringent.

I was, I go right to the bottom of the list, and I was looking at the bottom of the list and then started to scroll up.

And, my that I felt like we're on a little we're a little little parallel overload. I do think it's okay to recognize that the way these boxes are being broken in 2025 likely looks a lot different.

And so we're trying to appease the breaker culture, and we don't want just a bunch of base cards in one parallel every box. So I understand that, but I also think it is a word of caution for everyone out there.

Like, there are going to be people trying to make money off of this product, and they're gonna be gassing up stuff that might look rare, but it's not really rare.

And I just think my feedback on this is don't not be excited about this. We should be excited, but always look at this product in relation to the 2019 debut.

And all you have to do is just look at values and pricing and know that the 2019 release is going to be a lot more rare across the board than the new product.

And that's not to scare anybody, but that's just I think we should that's the mindset we should have is we're spending a lot of money maybe participating in breaks or maybe buying boxes for our own for our own.

Absolutely. I wish I heard that when I first joined the hobby, especially You too. Yeah. For sure. The last thing that I wanted to hit on here when comparing the two numbers wise is the number of insert sets, across products.

So in 2019, there were seven base insert sets. In 2025, we see 18. So once again, proliferation here more than doubled, the number of base insert sets.

And then we move on to autos. There were two autosets in 2019, and there's six. So it's tripling between these two products. And then finally, memorabilia sets or patches or relics.

There were none in 2019, and now there are two. So we're just seeing across the board an increase in the, volume of cards that are being supplied, with the checklist remaining the same.

So I think, like Brett said, that disclaimer about, you know, put put the lens on of understanding that, you know, things have changed, the landscape has changed, demand has changed, and that maybe, your collector preferences have changed.

So, just an interesting differences between 2019 and '25.

For the most part, I wanna highlight the positive, which is that we don't see a ton of players in the checklist and that the rookies are limited, and I'm excited about that. So we're recording this on a Thursday.

So there hasn't been a lot of this, showed on the Internet yet, and may that that leads me to a question, I guess, for you, Caitlin, if you've seen this anywhere, and I know it's always impossible to find.

Do do we know, like, from an auto perspective, do are the are there any on card? Have you discovered that? And then from a memorabilia perspective, do you know if there's any game worn?

I'm assuming no to both, but what Yeah. I haven't I haven't seen any confirmation to contradict your assumptions. I'll say that. Okay. Alright. Let's talk about the brand. So Donneris, I think, is or I know is a very recognizable brand.

It's been a brand forever. Obviously, has it played an instrumental role in WNBA cards. Maybe talk about nostalgia and the nostalgia with the brand and how that influences maybe a new release like this. Yeah.

I think if you put it in the context of WNBA card collecting, it brings you back to a time when you were able to affordably rent cards because of the love of the game and the love of the hobby, not because a bunch of people wanted to make a quick buck, which, you know, there's there's still people back then that were doing that, and there's still people now that are doing it for collecting.

But I think the cards themselves market kind of transition period for w collectors away from, you know, Rittenhouse controlling the market for so many years.

Transitioning over to Panini, really gave a lot of credibility to WMBA collectors and said, we see you, and we're gonna give you a flagship product that is exciting and new.

To that end, you know, it only appeared once, and now it's coming back. It's boomeranging back, but, I think that's kind of the nostalgia and the recognizable part of the brand, that I see.

I also see, similarities across sports and categories, which we talk a lot about, which is, you know, adding more visibility. It makes it an easier entry point for collectors that are looking to buy into WNBA.

If you like Don Russ in NFL or NBA, you know, now it's an easy place place to to slide into the WNBA community. In terms of so, again, this seems like forever ago.

We we made it known that the last release, which was a Panini instant release, which was Rookie Royalty, we set on this podcast based on what we were seeing, how it was being released, the price points that this product wasn't for us.

This is like, we weren't going to be spending the money. That product, very investment focused, very flip oriented.

How do you break down maybe the different types of, like, collectors, investors, just casuals, like, with a product like Don Ross? How are you thinking about its place with those groups?

I think it has a place with all of them, which is a good thing. I think for collectors, you know, just to put it into my own perspective, because I don't wanna speak for other people. For myself, like, I know I want a page card.

I absolutely know I want a page card from Don Ross. It has to be done. We've been waiting so long. I'm getting impatient. It's exactly what the manufacturer wants, and I will have my hands on it.

And I you know, we talked about the Juicy Lucy and a piece of collier. I was, like, bracing for some mediocre AI slop on the back of it that looked like some every other city Like the Clark?

Yeah. Exactly. And for once, they delivered with something, like, just an ounce of creativity, that spoke to me as a Minnesotan.

So, you know, like, those things definitely draw on my heartstrings as a collector, and they're definitely things that I wanna add to my collection.

But I think a lot you know, on similar lines, for investors or flippers or however they wanna identify, they already know who's working out versus not, so a lot of that, mystery is gone.

So it's a bit of a, quote, unquote, safer investment at least over the off season because not many players are gonna be playing.

Page already has rookie of the year, so there's no speculation there. It provides a good opportunity for some profit.

And then the case hits and the synergies across lanes, like I was talking about the NFL and NBA, definitely, lower that that barrier of entry for for investors because of the liquidity of those cards that have been proven in the past couple of years or so.

And then to round it out with casual fans, you know, I don't necessarily think a $500 box is accessible for casual fans, but I would find it hard to imagine if there was not a retail, drop of this.

And I think that retail, definitely could be good retail therapy for some casual fans looking to add, you know, just some of those base cards or fun inserts of their favorite players to a binder or something like that.

So I think there's a place for all three, Brett. I I wanna dig into just new product, new release since it's been forever and what, like, back to the collector focus of that.

And it's like, my mindset on this, Caitlin, is, like, even if I'm not going out and buying into breaks or running and buying boxes, to me, this is a win because I feel like because I have cards in the community or I collect in this community, I want more people and more interest in it, and that usually comes in the way of more product.

And so whether you like it or not and you're collecting WNBA cards, I think it's a really good thing that we're have a new release to talk about in doing this episode.

So maybe talk about just, like, what a new release can do just in terms of, like, providing visibility to a category like w NBA for more collectors.

Yeah. I I think it's, undoubtable that, we need some product to show for our community. We've been sitting here, like you said, for three seasons of the WNBA card pod without a new release except for rookie royalty that nobody wanted.

So, you know, this is a healthy volume, that needs to be sustained for market for the market and for collectors. And I think that Don Ross is kind of that mid tier.

I mean, $500 isn't really mid tier to me. But, you know, it'd be considered mid tier to Panini, but a very foundational set. So I wrote in my notes. It it reminds me of, like, comfort food, Rhett. Like, it's not the most exciting thing.

It's not the most boring thing, but you always come back to it, and it never disappoints. And that's how I feel about Don Ross, and I think it'll have a role to play, for collectors, not only in 2025, but onward.

I think that's the hardest part for me, I think, with the price point and then just, like, knowing what a Donner's card stock feels like.

It's just really hard to justify. And that's no disrespect. We need these low to mid tier products. And I guess that's where I I wanna maybe take this next is, like, does, like, we're all busy doing our things collecting.

You know, we have our projects, but then we haven't had in a while, but then a new, like, mid tier set enters. Do you think that maybe helps or hurts overall collector focus?

I think the net good definitely outweighs the net, quote, unquote, bad. I think it helps because of that accessibility factor. A lot more people can afford this than rookie royalty.

That's for sure. It's not $30,000. There's a nostalgia factor that obviously drives prices and drives emotional collecting. It's a relatively low cost, like I said, recognizable format and more inclusive.

It has a good checklist. It's not just 15 rookies from one class. But at the same time, it can hurt collectors because, I think that, you know, the delayed schedule signals, you know, a lack of attention to the community.

It dilutes the excitement for some of those rookies or even vets, and then it also distracts away from the sets that maybe we've been working on, like you said, like the prisms.

So that have existed for the past five years. They have that lineage, that legacy, that consistency.

So I think there's there's aspects in the pros and cons, but the WNBA card collecting space in total, the catalog is still small enough that any release, matters, and it it matters a lot.

But collector bandwidth and the attention that we can give to all those sets, the more we widen that, the less attention can go to each.

So I definitely think it it can both help and hurt the focus of collectors. I I wanted to talk about, like, first time appearances for players that have missed in past sets, and, that's, like, an interesting thread we can pull on.

But, like, as I was thinking about that, what triggered in my mind, and I wish I could remember the collector, apologies in advance, but it was a Valkyries fan. The sign period cards, I think.

It could have been. I saw it on the story. But I learned through that update that none of the Valkyries cards players are in Valkyries jerseys. That stinks if you've been waiting this whole time. Right? I agree. That's so disappointing.

Like, could we not at least photoshop them or airbrush them in at the very The one thing I literally struggle, and it's like my OCD in terms of, like, collecting, like, it gives me anxiety to look at a card of a player in a another team's jersey with the logo of the a different team on there.

Like, it just it it, like I can't even, like, look at the cards.

It's like, this this shouldn't be happening. So, like, I feel bad. Maybe not terrible because the Valkyries had a pretty fun year, but for the collectors who just been salivating waiting for it.

And my expectation would be if I were a Valkyrie fan that this product, since we've waited so damn long for it, that these cards will be in, you know, they'll be in Valkyrie's jerseys, but, damn, that that hurts.

Right? That's a shot. Yeah. For sure. That's disappointing. You can only hope that the next one, I get I guess it's just the next one. Hopefully, they'll put them in Belk's uniforms, but, yeah, super disappointing.

I'd be pissed. So Let's maybe move forward and just talking like, let's spend some time focusing around, like, the rookie class, and I just think it's really important.

Great rookie class. In in my prep, I didn't even, like, mention Malonga, which after I got done with this sheet, I was like, Caitlin's gonna wanna mention Malonga, and I didn't even put her in this.

So I just was like but I was like, we've got three all stars already, Paige Becker, Sonia Citron, and KiKi Irvin. People have been waiting for these cards for a while.

Like, maybe talk about everything's driven off of rookie hype for the most part in new releases, but, like, maybe talk about this class. Obviously, I'm seeing clips of freaking Paige Beckers gunning the football at Dallas Cowboys game.

Oh, gross. I cannot believe that, Brad. They made her a freaking Cowboys fan. Yeah. She's staying relevant. On the flip side, I'm, like, seeing edits of Sonia Citron and, like, being goofy and silly and just being a weirdo.

And, like, the more I I've been a fan of her, but, like, the more I, like, learn about, like, her personality type, I'm like, she my kind of player.

But, yeah, these players aren't go like, they're still in front of us. So but they're not playing, but they're in front of us, and we've got the this new release coming out.

So, like, maybe talk about just, like, this class and them appearing in a product that you can rip packs and see them for the first time.

I think it's so exciting. I think, personally, this rookie class is one of the strongest we've ever seen. You mentioned some of the names that I wanted to bring up, but let's start with Paige.

I think Paige is you know, she's been on, at least my mind, since she was in, like, fifth grade as a Midwest sensation. People have been calling her greatness since she was, like, 10.

And, to live up to those expectations is insane. And to live up to them in the card community is even harder, I think. People are tough critics. So, I think that she's kind of this catalyst for, collecting, for attention, for media.

The biggest one since Clark, easily, and then, you know, Sabrina, I would put up there as well. Those are kinda like the top three catalyst attentions attention getters.

And she's like a bridge. I think I think something that's interesting that I wanted to hit on is this, like, transition from, Bowman first to rookie cards because all these players appeared in a set, but not in their pro uniforms.

And I think that by having a a rookie class that, you know, people watched kind of grow up in their college careers and then transition over to the w.

It builds a stronger collector base, and it also, helps translate, like, translate fandom.

And so I think that that visibility really helps with the card market. And it's interesting because, you know, we've been waiting so long for a true Paige rookie card, a non instant card.

But at the same time, we've already we have a bunch of Yukon cards with Paige that are considered her, like, first prospect card. So balancing that is interesting with these rookies.

I I'm interested to see how that market plays out. So that's my kinda, like, take on Paige. My take on the rest of the rookies is that, you know, we've seen in the Clark class and previous classes how the hierarchy ends up stacking out.

You have your, you know, poster girl, which is Caitlin or Sabrina or Paige, who are going to drive up the price of boxes, are going to be the main chase, undoubtedly, for all collectors, even if you're not a fan.

And then you have those, like, second a tier players who are amazing. You know, you you hit on it.

Sonia and Kiki both won all star accolades in their rookie season on the Washington Mystics. Like, that is massive. Then you have a player like Dominic Malanga, who put up all rookie records and was just amazing.

So I think it's important that we have this hierarchy of kind of tiers of players, at least in the hobby world, so that it can sustain that growth. You know, you don't know what's gonna happen to Paige.

You don't know what's gonna happen to Sonya or Kiki, but there's these players also underneath them, that are building that foundation of both prices and attention. Because if you only have one chase, things get, sour quickly, I think.

And we saw that a little bit with Clark where, you know, Clark gets injured, and then we see prices kind of go down a bit. I think that's not the best example because the Clark class was also incredibly strong.

But it was just interesting to see somebody put on such a high pedestal compared to their peers, and I think we'll see a similar but a little bit less accentuated, gap between Paige and kind of the rest of the rookies.

I think those are good thoughts. I'm excited to see some of these sales out of the gates, some of these cards pulled. Like I mentioned upfront, definitely tag us at w m b a card pod.

If you pull something or see something cool, we'll definitely repost it. Before we move on to the other segments, and I know we've got we're we're trying to run this episode as efficient as possible based on our schedules.

Anything on just, like, new releases, collector psychology front you wanna touch on, anything you're thinking about as this, becomes a product that we can all participate in?

I think the one thing that I wanna hit on is kind of, like, this pressure to participate. We hit on it a little bit with, like, what we're going to do, but I just think that, you know, FOMO drives a lot of collecting.

Emotional connections is what makes us buy certain cards of certain players. And I think that, know, it's important to set your priorities straight before you go into the marketplace and start to buy or rip or something like that.

It's just kind of a disclaimer I wanted to put out there. There's no need to get ahead of yourselves. These cards will be available, next month. They'll be available next year.

They'll probably be available the year after that. And there's no need to get ahead of yourself. And I think that's just really important to remember with all releases, but especially in such a hyped up, long runway release like Donros.

Awesome. Let's get into the one card or trend that sold this week. A card that I wanna feature is from the debut set of Donruss.

And I chose this very intentionally because this card just sold October 17, and this card is the 2019 Donneris debut Kelsey Plum press proof gold laser out of 10 PSA nine. And this card sold for $267. Now this card just sold.

Kelsey Plum is a very well known and recognizable player. The gold laser is one of the rarest but also most successful, coolest looking parallels and donerous. To me, the lasers are donerous. Like, they're so specific to the brand.

And so if I'm a collector and I'm wanting to get a Caitlin Clark or a Leah Boston, my my my thought process is, well, it'd be great to land any one of ones, but a card that I'm actually probably gonna be able to get is maybe a gold laser.

So I say all that to say, this is the first year of this product. This is a perennial all star, and this card was had via best offer for under under $300.

Caitlin, I'll tell you this. If I bought a box of Donneris, WNBA twenty twenty five, and I didn't pull one gold laser of an all star caliber player, I I would feel like I've lit my money on fire.

I just wanna present that context for everyone because right now, new product, things are gonna be gassed up.

To me, and this is just me, the 2019 set, no matter who the rookie class is in comparison to the 2025 set, will always mean more based on it being a first year set.

So I say all that, cool card, under $300. Hooray. What's your reaction to that in this context? I think that you said it all, Brad.

I think this is half the price of one twenty twenty five box. Give me two Kelsey Plum gold Graded. Graded too. Graded. Yeah. You could get 20% of the population of this card for the price of one twenty twenty five Don Roose HobbyBox.

To me, this is more value. Alright. Be be be careful out there. Watch what you're doing. Let's talk about, pickups. Like I mentioned, I'm in a, holding pattern. I do I am getting some cards back.

Hopefully, says by October 30, my PSA order will be done. So I'll have some stuff to talk about. And I'm also, like, thinking about how I wanna move forward with my w collecting, which is a whole another story.

But Caitlin, have you picked up anything this week? I am sad to report I have not. I made two strong what I consider strong offers on a Angel Reese card and a Jack Young card.

On one, I was ghosted, and another, I was denied. But my pursuit will not be stopped. If you have a cool angel research, Jackie Young card, I'm on the lookout.

I love this, like, continual Jackie Young. I know. It's just permeating my collection right now. I just did a team follow back on your collector of the week that you picked. Yes. Let's get into it.

Let's talk about her. So our collector of the week is at rachel manz underscore. Rachel Mansfield is an awesome collector based in Northeast Ohio, and we'll we'll forgive her for that for today. A lot of Ohio State here.

I know. It's too much. Just ignore ignore the Buckeye stuff, and let's get into the other stuff. I wanna talk first about her bio because it's just a great bio. Sometimes you see good bios and you're like, yeah.

Shout this out. It says, collect what you love, love who you love, forget the rest. Period, Rachel. I love the positivity. I love that outlook on, collecting and on life. She's a self proclaimed women's sports ambassador.

I would cosign on that. Obviously, we touch on this Buckeye focused, but lots of other cool WNBA and NCAA women's college basketball cards. You'll see a lot of Keke Rice and upcoming collegiate stars like, Sarah Strong among others.

But if you don't follow Rachel, you're missing out on one of the most positive voices in the women's sports card hobby and on some awesome story sales that she has.

So, if you don't follow Rachel, give her a follow. Definitely worth it. Incredible. Mailbag. What are we doing here?

Mailbag. Let's let's do it, Brett. I've got three questions for you that I drafted for this week. We can ask them back to each other, but I'm excited about this. I tried to tie it into some of the themes we talked about this week.

So the first one is, Brett, what's an example of an emotional buy that you made in WMEA card collecting, but you you didn't end up regretting? I've used this as an example, and it was very emotional.

And it it's a card I still have in my collection, which is the '24 Caitlin Clark select gold concourse PSA 10. I'm seeing I haven't talked about this in a while, and I'll just, like, hit it really quick.

The this this year was very tough with Caitlyn not playing. What Caitlin does to my city is unlike anything I've ever seen before, and I've seen a lot of great athletes.

It's it's all it's very interesting to me to hear all the voices in the hobby about Clark and people shitting on Clark and her cards in her market and all this stuff.

Like, I try to tune it all out and focus in on her as a player and what she means to my community, and it's a lot.

Like, it's like, I would if Caitlin Clark never played again, God forbid, like, the the moment of her being here and what I saw from my people in my community has been insane.

It's been another level. And so I needed a card, and it was gonna be expensive. And I knew it was only gonna get more expensive.

And so that was that was a very emotional decision because I, like, I got rid of a lot of cards to get that one card. And it's the centerpiece of my WNBA collecting, and I and I absolutely love it.

So, I say all that and express that emotion to, like, maybe tease to the audience of, like, how I'm thinking about, during this time, reorganizing my collection a little bit.

But how about you? Mine, funny enough, is also a Caitlin Clark card.

I put down the 2024 Bowman You Now Caitlin Clark SP number 74. It's a rainbow foil paper based card with the hand to the ear celebration. I remember been smashing that on eBay for about $70, and I just remember seeing it.

It was one of those that SPs that was inserted in the Bowman in the Bowman you now packs that you could buy straight from tops. And it's one of the few Caitlin Clark cards that have survived the different iterations of my PC.

And when I look at it, it just reminds me of, you know, discovering Caitlin Clark per se, before the big wave. And the card has not only appreciated in value, but I've decided I think it's worth the card is worth more than the money.

And, yeah, just to have that one. I I it was a lot of emotion that went into that just because the fandom, but excited to have it and don't regret it at all.

I'm I'm excited, by the way, for that time down the road where we the whole we do the the Caitlin Clark, like, oh my god. We missed you so much, and you're coming from your campus.

It's I'm excited for that. Absolutely. Okay. Second question. This is an interesting one, Brett. What kind of collector archetype do you see pull towards Don Russ versus pull towards Prism? Yeah.

I think Don Russ is probably going to pull in more of the collector's collector who recognize that brand, who I I don't wanna say, like, tries to buy in value based on $500, but I just imagine the more, like, hardcore base of WNBA collector, being involved with Donrus where Prism, you know, is a magnet for all different types of hobby participants.

So I don't think and I could be wrong because Paige is a rookie, and I'm sure they'll craft some narrative to elevate these in a way that is beyond crazy, but I just I can't I can't see, like, this like, the the hype machine, like, taking we we know what Donnerus is.

It's like, hey. Quit fooling us. We know what it is. So I'm interested to see it play out. How about you?

I think the way that I put it was that similar to you, which is that, like, the classic pure collectors, like, purist collectors are drawn towards the Don Ross mid tier foundational vibe, whereas, like, the shiny enthusiasts, the people that value that legacy, the building sets of, you know, across years, like, through prism, are are drawn more towards prism.

So, yeah, I definitely think it's two different types of collectors.

There's definitely people that overlap. That's not what I'm trying to say. But I thought it was interesting to think about the type of collector that collects Don Ross versus prism.

Mhmm. Okay. My third question, Brett, and you've alluded to this, so maybe this will expand into, a bigger episode in a larger discussion, but we talk a lot about PC builds.

Do you think that most collectors recognize that they're curating and building a story or just accumulating a stack of cards? And my follow-up question to you is, when you look at your WMEA PC today, what story is it telling?

And does that story align with what you hope it's telling? I think this takes time. I think we all eventually get there. We are accumulators, and then we refine.

I, mine I have a lot of different players that I like, but I'm asking myself the question, do I need a one card of all of these players, or would it be better served to have another card of a player that is at, like, the top of my list?

And so that's that's what I'm going through now. And I it's funny.

It's like, I didn't think I was gonna get here with the WNBA collecting, but that's where I'm at. And it's it's lagged how I think about my football card collecting, but I haven't been collecting WNBA as long as football.

So it's like I'm in, like, this other the season I've been in before with a whole new category in sport, and the thought of change excites me.

So and I I don't know what I'm going to do, but, yeah, I think we all experience this at some level.

And if you're out there and you're like, I've experienced it all, and I'm really excited, and I'm I know the direction I'm at I'm at, that's how I feel in football right now.

Like, congrats to you. Like, that's the best place to be in. Yeah. That's what we're trying to go towards.

Right? And, like, having conversations like this should hopefully spark some of that inspiration. And so for me personally, I I agree with your, diagnosis that most people get there eventually, but takes some time and some help.

When I look at my PC, the themes that I see are, you know, we went over this in a previous episode, are team fandom and player specific appreciation.

And while I really like that, something that I'm trying to build out more is the storytelling so that when I present to my friends or, my future kids, you know, I think about that a lot in ten years.

I wanted to paint a fuller picture of the w as a whole, to show, like, trailblazers and change makers and the history.

And so that's something that I've been kind of, like, focusing on for an angle for my PC, and I'm excited to see where it takes me.

So, my story that I tell today is not the story that I think I'm going to be chasing and working on, but we're in progress.

It's always a continuous pursuit of that. So this would be exciting, Brett. I hope those three questions sparked some imagination as you think about your PC, for both Brett and for collectors that are listening.

Appreciate all of you listening. Go share your Donruss hits with us at WNBA Card Pod. Thanks for tuning in. Thanks, everyone. See you next week.