A New York federal judge dismissed all counts Monday in a lawsuit filed against Fanatics, the NFL, the NBA, MLB, their respective players associations and OneTeam (the commercial arm of the players associations) accusing them of conspiring to engage in a campaign to monopolize the trading card market for each of the three sports leagues to increase the price of cards for consumers.
The five plaintiffs — Robert Scaturo, Scott Bubnick, Joseph Davidov, Steven Mardakhaev, Jonathan Madar — citing numerous portions of the antitrust lawsuit filed by Panini against Fanatics as an argument in many aspects, claimed they had paid too much for the cards as a result of Fanatics’ attempt to monopolize the card market. The court ruled against the claims, saying, “None of the named plaintiffs adequately allege that they have overpaid or will imminently overpay for trading cards sold by defendants.”
The court also noted that at the time the lawsuit was filed (March 2025), it was Panini that held licenses for the NBA and NFL cards. Topps, owned by Fanatics, didn’t produce NBA-licensed trading cards until October 2025 and doesn’t take over the NFL license for cards until April 2026.
“Not only did no named plaintiff purchase such a trading card from defendants prior to the filing of the FAC (the lawsuit), but it was actually impossible for any consumer to do so,” Judge Laura Taylor Swain wrote in the ruling.
Related to Topps’ licensed MLB cards, the court ruled the plaintiffs failed to allege they purchased cards at inflated prices. The plaintiffs provided a chart comparing prices for Topps’ licensed cards and Panini’s unlicensed products, but the court said the plaintiffs didn’t “explain whether the difference in prices was traceable to extraneous factors, such as production costs or quality differences, or whether the difference was traceable to defendants’ anticompetitive conduct.”
Fanatics said in a statement to The Athletic: “We said from the start that this was a baseless and fundamentally flawed lawsuit since Fanatics was being accused of raising prices on cards we didn’t even produce. The court agreed and ruled that the plaintiffs did not even have standing to sue. We are happy the court has now ruled the complaint legally deficient and dismissed it.”
John Radice, the plaintiffs’ attorney, told The Athletic: “Plaintiffs are assessing the Court’s dismissal without prejudice and considering all options.”
In an ongoing lawsuit, rival trading card manufacturer Panini is accusing Fanatics of anticompetitive behavior and monopolization of the sports card industry after Fanatics acquired exclusive licensing rights from the NBA and NFL previously held by Panini to pair with its exclusive licenses for MLB, the Premier League, F1, WWE and others.
Fanatics has denied the claims in Panini’s suit and alleged in an ongoing countersuit Panini embarked on a “protracted, unlawful, and deceitful campaign of unfair trade practices, strong-arm tactics, and tortious misconduct” in an attempt to force Fanatics to pay an extortionate amount for Panini to terminate its licenses early in 2022.
A New York federal judge ruled March 10, 2025, that much of Panini’s case against Fanatics, including claims of anticompetitive behavior and monopolization of the sports card industry, could proceed. The case dismissed Monday was filed March 17, 2025, one week after the Panini-Fanatics case ruling.