How a Group of NBC Collectors Landed Sports Cards on Sunday Night Football

Collectors are seeing sports cards everywhere in 2022. Record-breaking sales are appearing in the news more often than ever, stores like Target and Walmart have shelves packed with retail products, and sites like Panini, Topps and Fanatics regularly have sets available directly from the manufacturer.

But while hobbyists may have seen a massive shift in coverage and availability, average sports fans may not have noticed cards at all recently — until Sunday Night Football.

For a few minutes on Sunday night in Week 1, the sports card hobby sat in front of millions of viewers as Tom Brady and the Buccaneers clashed with Dak Prescott and the Cowboys.

Centered around Prescott and his status as the top QB from that 2016 NFL Draft class, cards of the Cowboys star and other draftees flipped across the screen. Similar to the reality on the field, Prescott and his custom card stood out from the rest.

According to NBC Sports Associate Producer Matt Salvatore, the concept for the card-focused segment was born from the parallel of opening a pack hoping for that one good card and Prescott being the one good QB remaining from that class.

“We looked at the overall story — the longevity of his career, how he was not highly regarded coming out of college and was picked among this shuffle of 15 QBs — and then figured out a way to tell that story,” Salvatore said in a statement. “Along with my colleagues Phil Cohn and Jake Somerville — after a day of going back and forth — we thought the idea of picking up a pack of cards and getting that one good one out of the bunch could resonate with the audience, as the Cowboys got that one very good QB in the 2016 NFL Draft. Once we finalize an idea like that, Dave Barton and his team of extremely talented artists are the ones that make our idea on paper come to life with what viewers see at home.”

Some of the most popular cards in the hobby are often visually striking with incredible eye appeal, so the handoff between Salvatore’s team and the design team could have been tricky.

Luckily for the hobby, Sunday Night Football’s team of designers just happens to be filled with card collectors. According to Barton, NBC Sports’ Senior Art Director, the design team leaned on that collecting experience to create something hobbyists would view as authentic. From the chrome finish to PSA-inspired graded slabs and the visual difference between Prescott’s card and other QBs, the selection of cards were something collectors could realistically see coming out of a pack from Panini America.

“The cards were inspired by classic and modern Panini and Topps cards,” Barton said. “Almost every member of the small in-house SNF design team ironically are card collectors in some capacity. So, we know very well how cards are reviewed and maintained in the industry — PSA graded slabs are the quintessential way of depicting the value of a sports card, and we wanted to have a little fun with the animation at the end, with a nod to them.”

“In terms of designing the cards, two of the lead artists on our team collaborated on the design and animation sequencing of the cards – Masa Wakabayashi and Alex Suarez,” Barton added. “Masa has been collecting sports cards for years, and knows very well the look and feel of sports cards, particularly the special hologram and foiled ones that hold value. Alex is a collector as well, who put the cards into motion, trying to capture that exciting feeling of flipping over those 1-of-1 cards in a pack. 

“The animated sequence was created in roughly two full days, but during those creative sessions, the project garnered a lot of fun conversations with other fellow teammates on the design team — it was surprising to learn how many people on the team have collected cards. Alex, Masa and I ended up texting each other past midnight, sending pictures of the rookie cards we had in our stash. We heard similar conversations were taking place in the SNF truck as well.  I think most people that work on a big sports broadcast have some sort of experience in collecting cards — if you are a fan of sports, there is a strong chance that you are a fan of collecting cards as well.”

Only good for the hobby to normalize collecting and getting more exposure for it, especially the grading aspect.

Nat Turner – Collectors CEO

Barton is certainly right that many sports fans could be a fan of collecting cards as well, though the current challenge the hobby faces is that many sports fans might not know they are fans of collecting yet.

Current collectors are more than aware of the pandemic-fueled transformation the hobby has undergone over the last several years, but even record-breaking sales hitting headlines might not be enough to get average sports fans into cards.

The reality is that average sports fans are much less involved in cards than most current collectors think, and the next step for the hobby is to normalize seeing cards on a regular basis.

Nat Turner, CEO of PSA’s parent company Collectors, says cards popping up even for a few minutes on Sunday Night Football can only be positive — especially when graded cards are part of the highlight.

“Loved seeing that,” Turner said. “Only good for the hobby to normalize collecting and getting more exposure for it, especially the grading aspect.”

A major key in the future of the hobby, and that normalization, could be Fanatics’ grand entrance into the space. Many have viewed the retailer’s acquisition of exclusive rights to licensed MLB, NBA and NFL trading cards as bad for collectors, but the reality is the company can leverage cards to its reported 80 million users on a regular basis.

Fanatics’ ability to advertise to those non-collectors will be important, and ideally opportunities like Sunday Night Football will become more common — NBC confirmed that segments like the Prescott feature are something they’ll consider exploring again in the future.

According to Goldin Auctions executive chairman and founder Ken Goldin, places like Sunday Night Football are exactly where card companies should be focusing their money.

“Well you don’t want to target your advertising dollars to the traditional hobby collectors,” Goldin said. “They are already in the hobby. They are going to join our platform. What you want to do is reach the casual fan to spark their interest. We in the hobby don’t know who goes to Walmart and Target and buys a pack or a hanger. They may never enter our ecosystem. Anytime you get trading cards in the mainstream media and talk about prices and how things affect the prices it just brings awareness.”

Sports cards, especially modern sports, are really a stock market of athletes where you can go out and buy your favorite player and root for them.

Ken Goldin – Goldin Auctions Founder and Executive Chairman

Currently slated to star in a Netflix series that will follow the buying and selling at Goldin Auctions, Goldin believes finding easy ways for regular fans to connect with and root for their favorite players through cards is the best way to fully integrate the hobby into the traditional sports space.

“If I was going to do it, I’d take someone like Jalen Hurts or Tua Tagovailoa and do a football segment where you look at what this card was worth a week before the season started and show the activity on the card now,” Goldin said. “Sports cards, especially modern sports, are really a stock market of athletes where you can go out and buy your favorite player and root for them. Look what’s happening with [Aaron] Judge during the home run chase and [Albert] Pujols during the revival of his career and his chase for 700.

“These are the types of things where you can be a sports fan and not even love cards, but be a sports fan and participate in the success of your favorite athlete. That to me would probably catch on more than someone opening cards and pulling a huge card or someone inheriting a collection that has vintage Babe Ruth cards. Anyone can relate to this and buy a card.”

And what’s next for the sports card hobby if it catches on with average fans? Some collectors are hoping the hobby could see explosive growth similar to what Fantasy Football has seen over the last decade.

An entire network dedicated to sports cards and memorabilia coverage seems far off, but you can count Goldin among those who think there’s a space for more card analysis on major networks.

“I definitely wouldn’t rule it out,” he said.

With the Sports Card Investor app, you can profit from the hobby you love by keeping up with trending cards, tracking real-time prices with Market Movers and buying items on eBay. Download the industry-leading app here for Apple or Android

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