Collector Nation - Is Whatnot Gambling? The Hobby’s Biggest Debate Right

Episode Date: March 20, 2026

Ryan is joined by Collector Nation executive producer Bella Shafer to break down one of the most talked-about weeks in the hobby. They dive into the controversy surrounding Whatnot and the growing debate over whether live breaking is crossing into gambling—and what potential regulation could mean for collectors and platforms. The conversation also explores the explosive growth of the trading card market, highlighted by a $5.2 million Aaron Judge card sale and what that kind of jump says about long-term value. Plus, Ryan and Bella touch on March Madness, new product releases, and the evolving culture of collecting as more people enter the space. If you want a real, unfiltered take on where the hobby is headed, this episode delivers insight, perspective, and a look at what’s coming next. Topics Covered Whatnot arbitration complaints explained Is breaking gambling or part of the hobby? Regulation vs personal responsibility $5.2M Aaron Judge card sale breakdown Market growth vs traditional investments March Madness & sports card relevance New releases: Prizm Black, Topps Heritage, Bowman’s Best Collector trends & hobby culture 🤝 Connect with the Hosts Ryan Alford Instagram: @RyanAlford Website: TheCollectorNation.com App: Collector Nation (iOS & Android) Bella Shafer Executive Producer, Collector Nation

There's been some drama in the hobby this past week. Unregulated online casino rather than a normal marketplace. eBay light, like they're all doing the same thing. So I don't know if you can necessarily single out whatnot. Well, I mean, they're the biggest player. So you start with the biggest player and then it trickles down. I don't know if you watch the World Baseball Classic last night and the epic game that it was. It felt like it was going to be like this storybook ending for the U.S.

I felt bad for them. But on the other hand, like I do love a good underline. story. March Maddice is here though. Finally, Clemson Women's Basketball has a pulse. We get a newer coach last few years rocking and rolling. Proud of these guys, both number eight seeds. Welcome to the Collector Nation podcast here on the Collector Nation Network. Whether you're chasing grails or calling bluffs, you take you inside the hobby. Here are your host, Ryan Alford and Brian Lut. All right, guys, what's happening?

March Madness is here. A lot of exciting things happening in college sports all around. And what's really cool is we're not just talking about the teams. We're talking about athletes you can actually collect right now. That's why we have On It Here, Leonard Berry, digital marketing producer at On It. What's up, brother? Hey, Ryan. Good to see you again.

I had so much fun last week. I said, I got to come back. Yeah, brother. I'm ready to talk some college. It's always college town around here. We're like 20 minutes from Clemson. So, and we got USC and all the other schools around us. Got some big athletes, big time programs across gymnastics, tennis, baseball, football, wrestling.

I know we got some wrestling news today. Talk about it. Yeah, we do have some wrestling news this weekend for maybe people who are so focused on basketball. It's actually NCAA wrestling championships as well. We have some of the best teams on it, wrestling cards. So if you've never collected wrestling cards before and you're interested, in that. You can definitely check those out. But amazingly, in our Penn State set, we have six signers. All six of those guys are number one seeds in their respective weight class. So that's

Levi Haynes, Luke Lidol, Mitchell Messabrink, Shane Van Ness, Rocco Welsh, and PJ Duke. Every single one of those guys is a number one seed in their weight class. And in fact, out of the six of them, only one of them lost all year. So if you're a wrestling fan or if you're trying to get into wrestling. This is definitely the weekend, Ryan, for people to start watching wrestling. Leonard, let's talk March Madness, man. It's crazy. I don't know if you guys got a rabbit's foot or what, but all 12 men's teams and nine women's teams are in the tournament. Yeah, we got super lucky this year with the lay selection Sunday shook out. 21 of our teams in total they're making the tournament. The 12 men's teams, we had one number one seed in Michigan.

And then on the women's side, we actually have all four number one seats, which is just kind of crazy. that all of those teams work with us and we produce cards for the four best women's collegiate teams that are going to start the tournament here. You know, it's insane. And it just shows that you guys are picking the relevant programs, the programs that have the followings, but also the ones that have programs that make them super collectible because they're playing in these end of year tournaments, men's and the women's. I'll tell you this, the women's product alone, WMBA, now with on it with college cards. The women's game has really stepped it up.

I think the athletes are becoming more marketable. You've got on it, you know, promoting these players ahead of their pro careers. Whether they go pro or not, we're creating a soundboard in a platform for them. And, hey, they're all in the tournament. So before we finish, Leonard, who do you see winning these things in the men's and women's? Do you have any predictions? I saw that a lot of brackets. But in my number one, heart of heart brackets, I'm going Michigan.

I like their style on the men's side. 31 and 3. They got a pretty easy path there in the Midwest. So I like Michigan to go all the way. They've had the bumps, I think, needed to kind of know what to do in these close games. And then on the women's side, I think I'm going to take UCLA. I know Yukon is undefeated. It seems like blast for me to pick against them.

But the way UCLA ran through the Big Ten conference schedule this year, the way that they just beat down teams inside the top 10. I think that they are the only team that has a chance to challenge Yukon. And if they meet up in the final, I'm looking forward because I think it's going to be fireworks. Yay, I like it. A bold, going bold, Leonard, I like it. You can be easy to say, oh, take Yukon and Michigan. Michigan's a pretty favorite.

I like to Duke personally at first, but they got a guard that's hurt. So I think they're going to struggle a little bit missing that guard. I don't know if he's out the entire tournament or the first half. We'll see. I like Florida or Michigan in the men. and then I'm rooting for the, you know, I'm going to get some pushback beat of Clemson grab, but I am, I don't root against my own state. I am pulling for the South Carolina and Don Staley, who I love.

Again, Clemson people don't be hating me. Don Staley's a badass and you know it. So anyway, always not rooting for them, but I think Yukon's going to be cutting down the nets again. If you ask me, they just look like they got another one of those teams. Are you? What's funny is Yukon's women's program was down when they were, you know, finishing second and third, you know, in the tournament. Like, I think that machine's rolling again.

Yeah, Sarah Strong and Azi Fudd, probably two of the best players in the country right now. And there's a supporting cast that they have around. Sarah's going to be cool to follow because she will be one of those turning pro. For sure. So collect now. That's why you need to get on it, literally. because when she wins the title, which is very likely, I have that on good authority, just watching them play this year.

You get the cards now, folks. Let's do it. Leonard, where can everybody find On It cards other than Collector Station? Yeah, you can find them onitathlet.com. That's our main website. So if you want to just peruse through everything that we offer on the website, on itathlet.com. If you're into live ripping ships, we're also on TikTok and whatnot.

Pretty much daily Monday through Friday. That can be found at On It Athlete, all one word. So if you don't want to open the cards yourself or you don't want to wait for them to get delivered and you want that instant opening, you can find us there as well. Otherwise, you can find us online or you can find us a collector station if you're local to South Carolina. I love it, man. The sea of sameness is going on and a lot of things on us doing things different. supporting these athletes, supporting the school, giving you something collectible.

Whether they go pro or not, you got the best of both worlds. And Leonard, really appreciate this partnership and appreciate you for coming on today. Of course, Ryan. Glad to see you as always. And thanks so much for your time. See you guys.

What's up, guys? Welcome to Collector Nation here on March 20th, 26th. You may notice something a little different on your screen. If you're watching, it's not me and Brian. It's Ryan and Brian. It is R&B still. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, we got a deep it going. Ryan and Bella. Bella Schaefer is our executive producer who, you know, we bring in. We, you know, she's willing to, but like I'll call her out sometimes, but she finally has a camera over there. What's up Bella? I'm no longer in my hidey hole. I know. So, uh, Bella is the official diva of the hobby.

Yep. I got to add you a title already, too. Deva of the hobby. You got to add some sparkle, you know. I will admit, there needs to be more. flare in the hobby. So I like it, whatever it is. I mean, you had your green on yesterday. It was, we should have recorded this yesterday. I think that would have been actually on brand for the hobby. You know, it would have been your green, the green parallel version of, of Bella.

Okay. How about it? If, uh, if you get me to the national, I'll go like, I'll pink out. I'll wear a pink wig. It might be affordable. I could fly you there while me and the boys take the RV. Yeah, you guys can slum it in the. RV. Oh, it's not slumman, maybe. Zach's got that thing looking about halfway there. Oh, excited. I wish I saw it before. It'll be done by this, maybe by the day before we leave.

Yeah, yeah, probably. Well, I keep putting them on other things. Yeah, we got to tease what he's doing right now. Oh, let's just say, look, we're here at Collector Station. That's where we do this show in the wonderful Easley, South Carolina. and our hobby store that's open to the masses. Everybody gets to watch us here as we record.

And, you know, I have a back office that you have to admit. Some people would have done their office first. It's been the last project. Yep. By far, very last. Very last. Bottom of the checklist. Yeah, we got the studio.

We got the store rocking looking good. And then now my office, which has its. sort of just a door that goes into it. And let's just say, you don't, doors are boring. Yeah, especially when they're just white, you know. White doors are boring. When we got everything else, graffitied, gold. So let's just say, we'll tease it with this, secret passages are cool.

Yep. You know, maybe it's a product of me growing up with the Goonies movie and like other things where they were like, it was the coolest thing ever to have secret passages. Hey, my house has one back in Connecticut. We have like a little wine cellar to our laundry room. You were the cool kid then. I remember going out to kids' houses that had like a couple of kids. I was like, I can't believe you.

I'm so jealous you have a secret passage near else. I mean, it led to our laundry room. So it wasn't super exciting. It wasn't like your safe room or anything. No. Honey, you know, your friend comes over and y'all push it. And it's like, look at our secret passage. Your mom's folding clothes.

Literally, literally. Yeah, wasn't super exciting. Yeah, exactly. But, you know, it is exciting. There's been some drama in the hobby this past week. I, you know, I think we got to start off swinging with whatnot and what's happening there. It took me a while I get my head around exactly. Okay.

Following it is there a criminal charge? Is this a civil charge? No, we've got arbitration complaints. You know, our legal system, I'm a college graduate, barely, but college graduate. own multiple businesses. I think by both measures, like, I feel like I'm affluent. Yeah. And I don't understand our legal system completely, you know.

I mean, you can sue anybody over anything at this point. But multiple arbitration complaints. It's like, okay. And someone's going to inevitably DM me and call me an idiot. And I'll accept that. But it's like, and maybe I haven't had to go through enough of this, which is hopefully a good sign. Yeah. against whatnot, unregulated online casino

rather than a normal marketplace. Which I think if you make that argument, like, you know, any other streaming place, you know, eBay Live, like they're all doing the same thing. So I don't know if you can necessarily single out whatnot. Well, I mean, they're the biggest player. So you start with the biggest player and then it trickles down. I mean, the first time I see these,

And I'll get to my opinion on this. So like everybody's giving their opinion. You know, now that my feed is 80% hobby, all I do is get the opinions of everyone else. I'm going to save that for a second. And I always go to things like this and longer and like, okay, what does the person on the other side have to gain? What are they going for? And it's like, okay, is this money? Is this just getting their name out there?

They're building their brand because if they, if this were to be successful, And what is success exactly, getting them to be labeled and I guess getting all the legalese and everything that goes with it and the sort of guardrails that we have to put on our society because we're all children. And we, you know, we don't like to, we get ourselves in holes that we want the government and laws to keep us out of. And don't give me the children. Well, yeah, I know. I'm just saying, let's call a spade a spade. You want an opinion, you're going to get it. And so we need to protect ourselves from ourselves with more laws and regulations.

And yes, I know that Vegas and gambling and all that has that too. And in a way, it is gambling. But I will say you do typically end up with some sort of asset on the side, which is cards versus the all or nothing. You know, if you spend $100, you only get a $20 card. yes you were hoping you got a $5,000 card, but you at least got a $20 card. So you're really just overpaid for something.

What if you go to a mall that has everything marked up, double what really anyone else is because they've got a fancy brand name and they put money to. Are we going to start suing them to because they mark their stuff up? But here's the argument. The argument is, well, they don't have the repeat, you know, the ways they draw people in and the marketing and all that. And I don't know.

I'd also argue that doesn't necessarily make whatnot the casino. It makes the individual breakers a casino. Well, they're giving them. Yeah, this is back to the who shot someone, the gun or the person. So the platform or the per people that are using it. So it's an endless debate. And I get it. I understand in theory what this is about.

And then it's like, well, if the casinos are going to be regulated, then why isn't this? But, I mean, I will say in blackjack, you either win or you lose. You don't pay $20 gambling on blackjack and get to keep five. You lose all 20. So in whatnot, this casino where you're trying to get the best card, you always get some cards. that might not be worth as much. So there is a distinction here that you're trying to pay. And I think the bigger things is what they're trying to say is less about maybe that

and more about the fact that people get addicted to this and there's no limits and that there's not this regulation and the government in our business on every action that you take the way it is on gambling. Which I probably think it could use, you know, some regulation. I mean, if you take that logic, opening a pack of cards is literally the same thing. Even if it's, like, you know, done in different forms of randomized breaks or spinning wheels, like at the end of the day, they're still just opening packs of cards. And so if it's gambling just because it's on live breaks,

I feel like it could even when regular packs of cards should also be labeled as gambling. Yeah, but you're buying a pack of cards. to get what's in the pack. And you might get something great. You might win a prize. But you're paying for what's in the pack. You're paying for whatever's in it. You're getting what's in that pack.

There's a transaction from money to cards in that pack. And you have to assume that it's not the grand prize. That Bozo the clown isn't going to roll the grand prize bike out to you every time you open the pack. You don't get that $50 bill from Cook. The Weirdo, who helps Bozo. And, you know, if you're listening, you know what that is. You're an OG like me. The Grand Prize game, you ain't guaranteed to win every time.

But you play the game. And so, but you didn't win nothing. Vegas and most gambling, it's all or nothing. Yeah, no, I agree. This is a transaction for you get what's in the pack. You get what's in the break. You get what's in the spin. It's something.

And you're taking the risk. You're taking the risk, but you don't get nothing. there's a difference and that's my opinion do i think they could do better than what they do now to maybe curb what this guy i get you know 15 arbitration complaints uh that to get chat chpd out to understand every you know word in this thing but you know it just we can have a few more few more guardrails, but without like going overboard. Yeah. And I don't think what not should.

They're going to spend a lot of money defending this. It's going to be bad publicity. And I don't necessarily agree with it. I want my kids spending all their money and getting lured in to this dark, seated place that is breaking. Come on. But I mean, that's also like, that's the risky run. And if, you know, I'm sure they have the proper disclaimers and all of that when you sign up and join whatnot as a consumer.

You spend the money and you get some cards. Those cards might be great and they might not be. But you're paying for the cards that you get. I just don't think whatnot should necessarily pay the price for other people's addictions. You know, like they're not telling you you need to spend this money right now. No, but we're built on a society that was great. Success comes great responsibility. And it's not wrong.

I'm not saying that's completely wrong, but it's also flawed in its own way. Again, I believe in some guardrails. Yeah, yeah, sure. But I believe in guardrails and not absolutes. And every case is different. This is not the same. I'm interested to see how this kind of pans out.

I think it will be interesting. And it could also be an opportunity for other platforms like eBay Live to kind of get ahead of the curve before they get put in a similar situation. I can't wait to watch 10 seconds of disclaimer at the beginning of every whatnot stream. Yeah, yeah. Or eBay live stream. For sure. This is could be addicting.

You may or may not win. You may not get what you want. And over and over again, it will lead to bad consequences. Okay. Here we go. And now we're in for the break. It should just have that. You might mortgage your house over these breaks because it's so addicting.

this spinning wheel and these shiny objects, they're so attractive. I get that it's serious. I do. I need no hate mail. Oh, this is a serious topic. People are, you know, mortgages in their house or whatever. Okay, well, then they need to grow up. And, you know, there may need to be a few more guardrails.

And maybe they need to get cut off, you know, when they start using the seventh credit card. Let's just, it right there. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, I totally agree. In lighter news, though, well, I guess not for the United States. Actually, I don't think this is lighter news at all for us. But I don't know if you watched the World Baseball Classic last night and the epic game that it was.

You know, I really don't watch too much baseball, but this I did tune in for. It was a pretty interesting game. I thought Bryce Harper was awesome. I thought that I was like, yes. Like, there it is. Here comes the USA and I give it to Venezuela, you know. They scored in the ninth and it felt like, I don't know, like it was going to be like this storybook ending for the U.S.

I felt so bad watching the last guy like stand up at bat. Like I felt because you could just see the defeat in his face. You could see the defeat in the rest of the U.S. team's face. And I just like, I felt bad for them. But on the other hand, like, I do love a good underdog story. Yeah. So. Are you really that anti-American?

No, no, no, no, no, no. But I just like, you know, like, you could see how much Venezuela wanted it. And so. No, I thought, you know who won is baseball. And, like, it's, it reminds you of how much sport can kind of, I don't know, part this red seas of division and different things. And obviously Venezuela won. But, like, it reminds you. really is the great pastime and the great, I don't know,

teacher of lots of lessons and different things that don't always have to be about war and politics and everything else. Yeah, no, for sure. And so I think it was a win for baseball. I think baseball had a really good pop last year with the teams in the World Series and L.A. And, like, now I think this is just another thing that's going to resurrect. Not that they need them. Baseball's pop, it makes a ton of money. still the most popular trading card.

But as someone that's gravitated more towards other sports, having collected baseball growing up, it is rekindling a little bit of interest for me. I think they need to keep pushing the rules to speed up the games and do things that they can. No, I agree. For ADD people like me. But I do think it was cool.

No, I think baseball is fun to watch. It's fun to watch when you're there with a beer and a hot dog. Yeah, I see. And another beer. Yeah, I kind of am in a tight. spot because I both pull for the Mets and the Yankees. Oh, my God. I know I'm probably going to get blamed for that one.

How's that possible? Well, I met Erin Judge. Yeah. So maybe it's, I just pull for Aaron Judge. Yeah. But then I just think the Mets are fun to watch. I'll pull for Aaron Judge, too. I mean, who wouldn't pull that guy?

But I'm interested to see how Bryce Harper's cards prices increase or decrease based on that home run because since they did lose. If it had been a game winning, they go up. Oh, for sure. But it's kind of like, it'll kind of, and unfortunately it'll be remembered but forgotten because it was such a huge moment. Yeah. But sort of it lasted all the five minutes like a really huge moment. A blipping time.

Yeah. Kind of like hockey. Like, okay, the hockey goal, like, you know, and now it's kind of yesterday's news. Yep. March Maddice is here, though. I know. I can't believe we went this long. You know, it'd only taken a whatnot controversy and me talking about it forever.

to keep us from March Madness. The Clemson Tigers, all that matters, they're the number eight seed playing in Tampa against Iowa. Both women and men's Clemson teams are eight seed this year. Finally, Clemson Women's basketball has a pulse. We got a great newer coach last few years. Rocking and rolling, proud of these guys, both number eight seeds. And, you know, I love Furman.

I know this, the Bello's a Furman grad. It's a really great school, really, like, top-nob. I mean, I don't know how Bella ended up the way she did. I mean, usually people coming out of there. I'm kidding. She's here for a reason. It has a little to do with Furman and a lot to do with her ability. But I will say, they're usually kind of the little engine that could.

Then they get to play Yukon in the first round. Yeah, I know. It's like, well, anybody with Yukon. So I was a Furman student when we went to Marchman this last time playing Virginia. And it was probably the most school spirit I have ever had. in my entire life. Like, I felt purple running through my veins. It was, and I was giving a tour of campus.

And as the game-winning basket hit, you know, that moment, we walked into the admissions office and everyone just starts screaming. The whole campus erupted. So I'm a little sad that, one, we're playing Yukon because it's like, okay, well, you know, that's tough. And then, too, it's at, like, 10 p.m. on Friday. Yeah, you'd just stay up that late to watch probably a smashing. Yeah.

It would be the biggest upset in tournament history if it happened. I mean, there have been other 15-2 wins. South Carolina, unfortunately, was only other end of one of those losing to a number two, like 10 or 15 years ago. But I don't think that's going to happen. Let me ask you this question. I got a question about Furman. Okay. It's a, at one time, it had religious ties a little bit.

Is that still the case? No. They haven't had religious ties. since the 80s. Okay. I'm a product of the 80s. Still relatively conservative. I mean, I think like in the sense that we're in South Carolina and we're a small school.

South Carolina school that's well known for education and all that. The FU shirts. I love them. It always threw me a loop the first time I saw it. I'm like, Furman? I love it, but Furman did this? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Was there intent?

You know, I don't know. Did someone just do that and then they didn't really know what they did? And then you step back and like you made, you've printed 10,000 of them. And suddenly everybody's like, you guys know, that's. So our chant is also FU one time, FU two times, FU three times, FU all the time. And that's like what we say like. Now that was intentional. It had to.

Okay. But I mean, it's hilarious. We made it last March back. I think it was Jimmy Fallon, like, during, or, was it Jimmy Fallon? I think during one of the talk shows at night, Saturday Night Live, maybe, I don't know. They were, like, making fun of the fact that we're FU and all that stuff.

And I just think, I think it's funny. I think it's hilarious. And I saw it, I guess, a few years ago, whenever, Burma's been the little engine that could for a while. They made the tournament here and there. And I forget what it was. I saw it. That is awesome.

I can't believe Furman did that, but it's awesome. I mean, if it's right there, like, you got to. I think we should have had and still have time, even though this airs on Friday. We recorded a couple days before. We should have FU shirts to all wear purple FU shirts on Friday. Oh, perfect, yeah. I can make it happen. All right.

I don't know if that's good for customers. It's like customer walks in. I'm just a pretty firm. I'm like, not you. I mean, hopefully they know. I know. Hopefully they know. Anyway, I had to ask that.

I'd never asked you that. It was a great thing. It always flew in the face to me of what I thought of Furman, but it was like, okay, maybe I do like firman. Yeah. And we also have Duke and UNC playing in Greenville, which not against each other, but I just think it's like. We have our grand opening weekend at Collector Station, which is wonderful. We've got some friends coming in. we'll talk more about that next week.

But I'm glad that also I would have gone inside and watched every one of these games in Greenville probably if we didn't have this grand opening one. Yeah, I was honestly thinking about that because I was trying to figure out. I was like, okay, how could we get tickets to the games so that we can still make it to dinner and still. Yeah, exactly. We guess we could have taken Baker and Brian to the game. We could take off work tomorrow and go the games. Hmm. Maybe.

Yeah. It's probably not hard to get tickets, right? Last time I checked, they were like $90. For the whole weekend? No, no, for one game. Can you stay? But don't you, can you stay or do you have to leave after each game? I'm not talking about, like, what's legal.

If it's like a day pass. I've never been, honestly. I don't know. I've been in a long time. The day pat or the whole tournament, because we have games Thursday, and Saturday, it's like $400 to go to every game. At least, I'm sure it's nosebleed. Yeah, exactly.

But, you know. Not only nosebleed. At least they finally, we called it Bonscores and not the Bala Center. It took a long time to get that off. That sponsorship stayed, but you didn't know it. No, no, no. But it was the Balo Center before. It was, there's no Balo's anymore.

But I was like, this is the greatest sponsorship ever. You get to keep the name even when the new sponsor comes in. Anyway, digress. Well, in other news. New releases. Yep, we got some new releases. The 2025 Panini Football PRISM Black Drops today as we're recording this. I just sold a kidney and bought a few cases.

Two cases? I only have one kidney, so I didn't joke about that. But I can't get rid of one of mine. I sold one of yours. We're going to have surgery a couple weeks. Yeah, perfect. Black market. Not cases.

I bought a few hobby boxes of that. It wasn't on our normal release, but I got suckered in like most, and I think we could sell them. But it's a cool product. And it might be the last year with the license because Tops would probably never give it back. If I was done, I wouldn't. No, I don't think they're going to. Unless they get sued for it. Yeah.

But anyway, it looks like a cool product that's coming out. Yeah, yeah. I think they have a lot of parallels that are coming out. Yeah, I want that manga and that color blast, and I'll take the Prismania for, you know, a nightcap. Yeah, we also have some other ones, Upper Deck, Series 2 hockey, Bowman's best baseball,

and Topps Heritage Baseball coming out too. So, I mean, there's releases left, right and center. There's always something. There's always, and we've always got it here at Collector Station. Got a few that heritage coming in. The Upper Decks Series 2 hockey, we do not have that because we bought some hockey. Hockey doesn't move great in South Carolina.

Shocking. Yeah, we'll see. Inevitably, this weekend, seven people asked me. Why don't you have more hockey? Well, we got in the Monopoly Prisms. The soccer, see? Yeah. Did you see those?

Yep. The World Cup? Yeah. See? I think those are really cool. I think like this. I might have to rip one of those. I actually want to see what's...

Okay, don't do it without me filming it. I know. I've been hot lately. I pulled a downtown last night. And you keep not filming it. I know. So I run the social media. Downtown.

We had a one mega box. I got like a number. I got like $1,000 with the card that won Donner's bag of box. Don't tell me that. I'm going to make you be miced up 24-7. Ryan Thomas Jr. numbered card, like 100. And then his downtown.

Ridiculous. And then a really cool Pat Mahomes, Scada boo. Scada boy. That's what I call him. I got a pet name for everybody. I'm going to make your boys start just recording you anytime. Well, I know.

Nash and I've been ripping. that B friends. We've got some good number ones. Yeah, and he's got to have a camera out. Hey, I took a few pictures. Not the same. Not the same. Hey, those super stickers. If you're listening, we got them. We're going to have them on the website.

That's where it's at. That's a nice collectible. I mean, there's a hit in every single one of them. Like every single one. And it's like excited. Like I like that, you know, I'm getting into the cards, but the B friends, they tell you exactly what the hits are, how likely you are to get them, and it makes it so easy, especially if you're new to the game or, like, just kind of like the excitement of opening it,

but don't want to learn all the players. It makes it so easy. I think if you're into, like, the character stuff or Pokemon or anything, like, and I don't think that's they'd be a kid, but I think there's something for everybody, and they look cool. They feel very collectible. That's the biggest compliment I can give them. It's cute. It's fun.

The names. And generally positive behind them, the meaning behind them that Gary put in there. So it's different. But it has enough of what makes it collectible, like the other cars, the parallels, the numbers. But then enough that makes it different and feel fresh. I'm excited to see what they kind of do with, I mean, obviously it's a new, a new Burr brand. So I'm excited to see where they go with that. But last thing we have today, back to Aaron Judge.

he just had a Bowman's Chrome draft pick auto Super Fractor, one of one sold for $5.2 million. And these records just break every week. I mean, it sold in 2022 for $324,000. Do we have that being flown in for me to wear as a necklace for the great opening? Yeah, yeah. I'm getting a diamond and crested right now for you, so don't even worry about it. Oh, good, okay.

I appreciate that. All right. But, like, how that. That growth, I mean, you can't, even if you invested in the best damn stock in the market, you're not going to see a jump from $324,000 to $5.2 million in four years. No. No. It's placed among the top 7 to 10 most expensive sports board cards of all time.

And he's up there with the Honest Wagner's. Like, I mean, it's crazy. I don't know. I'm just glad that I got a card. store. I also think it's interesting because when I first was reading about this, I kind of just assumed like, oh, Golden probably is the one to sell it. No, fanatics collect. Yeah. They're trying to get in on the action. 5.2 mill big ones. I mean, I can't wrap my head around some of these values. Like, I think it's a cool card. I mean, I would have given at least a couple grand for it. I mean,

not. No. 324,000. That sounds right. right to me. Yeah, four or five hundred. That'd been a nice jump. No, 10x. Well, the part that's scary to me is like, you know, Aaron Judge is still playing. So what if, I mean, he seems like he's relatively healthy and a good guy and all that

great stuff. Like I said, I met him, and he was so down to earth, so sweet. But, you know, you don't know what's going to happen in the next five, ten, 20 years. No. So you're going to make a 5.2 million. Like, where does the card go? from there. Does it keep going up?

Like, I don't know. I don't know. What's it make? It more begs the question of what's it make other things worth. And there's a lot of people holding cards like in this territory going, well, what does that make this one worth? I think one day you're just going to walk out from your PC and be like, well, guys, this card's now worth $2.2 million. Yeah, well, maybe. You never know.

I might have a couple of them. but it would take more than 2.2 for me to like close down the shop. It has to be a few other zeros behind it. 2.2 doesn't go as far as it used to. You know what that's fair. Some people let's pocket change now. Yeah. So we'll see.

My tastes are bigger than that. I need like that 18.5 mil. And then I wouldn't really change anything by a bigger boat. It's 75 feet now. I need like, yeah, I need, you know, like 200. I got to cash in an invite to that houseboat. Oh, it's coming. The summer tours is happening.

We'll be on the boat working, you know, one of the days of the week. We'll figure it out. Perfect. Oh, I think that's all we got. Yep, yep, that's all I got. You order to find us, thecollectornation.com. You can download the app in the app store as well. It's got all the video content.

It's the best source to get it. the direct video content and everything that we're doing for collector nation. Of course, I'm right. Ryan offered on Instagram is my biggest platform. And we, we being Bella or myself, answer every DM. Yes, we do. Yes, one or the other. And Bella, great job today. I appreciate you.

Thank you. Yeah, I'm excited to make my first camera appearance. There she is. There she is behind the camera. All right, guys. see you next week right here on Electronation. Thanks for tuning in to the show. Be sure to follow us on your go-to podcast platform and catch the full video episode over

on YouTube. Visit us at Collectornation.com and follow Ryan on Instagram at Ryan Alford. Now get out there and collect yours.