The NFL and Football Hobby Continues to be Haunted by Player Worn Material

If you havent figured out what player worn material is, I would challenge you to do some research and quickly. With the growing expense of gathering game used material from both stars and rookies, almost every company has switched to using some sort of player worn material instead of actual game used material as a substitute. In the past I have called PWM the sticker autograph equivalent of the relic card.

Basically, for the un-indoctrinated folks, PWM is a jersey that is worn at a photo shoot or signing, usually done in bulk, with the sole purpose of getting more yield to create relic cards for the given player. For almost 18 years, the card companies have used this practice for rookies, and for the first time this year, we are seeing an absolute INFLUX of PWM for everyone – not just rookies.

There is a reason for this, and its one that many will not be happy with.

On average, lets say that a product’s budget is split up into the cost of production, licensing, relics and autographs. Its more complicated than these four things, but lets keep this simple.

Over the last 10 years, every product released on the calendar has some sort of “hit” element – either an autograph or relic in every box. You can imagine, that would necessitate a lot of content to be generated in the last two buckets. Most autograph checklists have 50-100 players on it, and 90% of the products out there have some combo of autographs and relics.

Autographs continue to drive product value above and beyond any of the other categories. and also account for an increase in cost that is seen almost across the board. Although cost of production is up and the cost of licensing is up, those are standard price of doing business increases, some of which is self inflicted. As for autographs and relics, the price of doing business is dictated by the market, and that is not a friendly environment to exist in. Players are no longer dumb to the value of their participation and are demanding more money to sign.

For relics, the game used memorabilia market has exploded, especially for top NFL stars, as its clear that there arent a lot of games, and there is not a lot of opportunity to pick up stuff for your collection. To make matters worse, the value of relic content in a product is at rock bottom. Some could say that the community is wise to the fact that most material can have questionable authenticity, or the fact that PWM has diluted value across the board. Either way, pulling a game used relic in a pack that is single color or even multi color, is just not valuable any longer.

This would speak to the need to establish an alternative, especially one that can be done in bulk and with little overhead to the general product.

As for the rookies, its a completely different story. For them, the necessity of adding rookie relics to packs is ENTIRELY dependent on PWM. It has been for multiple decades, and stems from the fact that many rookies dont see the field until later in the year, and when they do, they arent always ready to just dump their game used jersey on the open market.

Even worse are the rookies that are important that dont see the field period. Look at many of the QBs or injured players who will sit out an entire year before a game will take place. Even if they did see the field, by the time the jerseys were found, authenticated, bought, processed and ready to go, its almost too late for any real yield. At most, it would be one jersey, with lots of single color relics, and very few cards. It doesnt hurt that for 20 years, collectors have shown time and time again that they either dont care or dont know its PWM in the card instead of game used.

There are two main questions that collectors ask in response, and they arent wrong in the sentiment. The first is “Why dont they just make fewer products or fewer cards?” and the second is, “why dont they wait to make the rookie stuff if the content isnt available?”

To answer the first and some of the second, its all about licensing, and guaranteed money that is due to the leagues at very specific times. They cant make fewer products because the license has specific product number requirements. Basically, they cant just scale back production to 10 products because they have 35 on the contract with the league. They could have fought back and said that 35 products wasnt a good idea, but sales numbers dont tell that story. For the manufacturers and consumers, numbers point to saying the more the merrier from just about every source I talk to.

As for timing, delays are not a good idea in Football, especially when products are dominated by rookies in almost every corner of the hobby. As much as we want Aaron Rodgers and Tom Brady autos, their cost and their availability are not what draw. Its the rookie class. The rookies are what drive people to products, and collectors want rookie patch autos as much as they can. Therefore, the companies will drive that down our fucking throats until we stop buying. If they delay a rookie class because of relics that have worked for 20 years, someone is going to lose their job and be replaced by someone who is going to do it the previous way.

Honestly, ive become numb to the whole thing. I really have decided to avoid the thought process all together, mainly because its unavoidable. Same with the argument around autographs and stickers. There is so much variety in past and present releases, I can easily pick and choose which cards I want to avoid. I dont buy PWM jersey cards unless they are autographed. I know the relics arent game used, and therefore arent appealing to me. If I pull them, I just sell them to someone who doesnt care if its GU or PWM.

I dont necessarily give the pass on the matter though when someone asks about it. I really dont like that this is the direction things are going. Im just smarter about the way card companies are thinking about it. They dont care about the venom or the vitriol online unless sales drop. They arent dropping, so the business decision is made. Pretty simple.

We always hear about people who are the way I used to be about this stuff, and that’s not a bad thing. They shout their hatred from the rooftops and try to garner support from others to join their cause. Im glad those people are still around, because I have lost the will to scream myself hoarse about something that isnt supported by any real progress.

Im also curious how this photo continues to be a reason why people are so up in arms.

Yes, that is Mark Ingram at the rookie premiere, wearing a stack of Jeremy Shockey jerseys like an overgrown christmas sweater. This calls attention to a few things that I find pretty funny. One, people dont understand that the card companies could care less what number and player are on the jersey, because they know all of them will be cut up regardless.

Two, that same bunch thinks the PWM is at least run around the stadium a few times during the event, not realizing that Ingram probably put more use into those jerseys than any other in the history of the event. Due to time constraints, for all the jerseys worn at any shoot or event, the neck-hole is put over a player’s head and then taken off and thrown into a stack. That’s all it takes to be labeled “player worn.” So, for Ingram to wear those jerseys for 10 minutes in a joking way, is probably more use than 99.999% of the rest of the jerseys ever worn during this event.

For reference, wearing jerseys are not the only thing the rookies have to take care of, as they have to sign thousands of cards, meet with all the 25+ licensees who want their shot at the big guys, and do a bunch of press. There just isnt time for the rookies to run around in the 100 jerseys they have to wear. Most of them are only present because its a requirement by the NFLPA to attend and participate. Not a good recipe for having a good enough attitude to do a fashion show with so many different pieces of material.

Bottom line, player worn material should be labeled barely worn material, because that’s what it is. The situation is pretty much a juicy sausage that no one wants to see the making of. There is a reason why there is a ton of coverage of the rookie premiere, but none of the back rooms where they do the jerseys.

Understandably, my blog is read by a very small group of people these days, and this post isnt going to be enough to inform the uneducated Joe Collector on Reddit that posts every time they find out their Saquon Barkley card isnt actually game used. A lot of these concepts are making their ways outwards as well, with more and more of the industry using PWM to make a product work.

This is the reality we face, and its going to be up to us to decide how we want to participate very quickly here. If you dont like the direction, much like I dont, its time to figure out a way to avoid it or tolerate it. That’s the only way to really make a point, as its clear that every other way hasnt yielded much in results.

7 thoughts on “The NFL and Football Hobby Continues to be Haunted by Player Worn Material

  1. The Jersey Cards are really not worth collecting anymore. They have seen their day.

  2. At this point, I’d rather get Panini rewards points than a PWM patch. We have trouble giving them away…

  3. I think it’s ridiculous that basically even veterans are all “player worn”..and how does that even work? So Panini ships jerseys to all these veterans and they put them on send them back? Game Used Jersey’s have become so worthless as it is and this is a step below THAT. And they still have the gall to call these cards “hits”, when in reality the majority of them aren’t worth more than a run of the mill numbered insert.

  4. Disagree, for alot of the younger collectors, PWM is all we know. Since many of us under 30 years old do not have “game used” memorabilia’s….PWM is just as saught afetr as stick autos.

    The market is changing, and there is nothing the community can do about it. Sticker auto cards sell just as fast as “on-card auto’s”….atleast from my experience on eBay.

  5. I can’t stand pwm if it’s not an rpa and even that should be game worn in NT/FLAWLESS I only pc 2 players 1 football 1 basketball and everything is oncard auto and game worn because in my opinion that’s what makes the cards cool and generates the real value besides the print run….. like The player wearing the jersey during a game they played in and holding the card as they autograph it is what makes it cool so that’s just my opinion…..I have pwm manning patch auto from flawless and it makes me sick it’s not game worn. Literally ruins the card

  6. Interesting, and I agree with just about all of it. The napkin era of mem cards is in full effect. Just gotta ask though … why’d you ditch the punctuation in the last half of the article?

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *