A federal judge has dismissed an antitrust lawsuit filed by five sports card collectors who claimed Fanatics and the major leagues conspired to lock up exclusive trading card licenses and drive up prices for collectors.
U.S. District Judge Laura Taylor Swain issued the ruling on Tuesday, in the case brought by Robert Scaturo, Scott Bubnick, Joseph Davidov, Steven Mardakhaev, and Jonathan Madar. In a 30-page decision, the court threw out the entire complaint because the named plaintiffs failed to show they had personally overpaid — or were about to overpay — for cards bought directly from the defendants.
The lawsuit is dismissed without prejudice. That means the collectors have until roughly mid-April to ask the court for permission to file a revised complaint if they can fix the problems identified by the judge.
The case centered on Fanatics’ sweep of exclusive, long-term trading card licenses across MLB, NFL, and NBA products. Plaintiffs alleged that starting in 2021, Fanatics cut private deals with the leagues and players’ associations — including equity stakes worth billions — that shut out competitors like Panini and led to higher prices for collectors. Fanatics had already been producing MLB cards since buying Topps in early 2022, but its NFL and NBA licenses couldn’t kick in until Panini’s earlier exclusive rights expired between September 2025 and March 2026.
The case had drawn attention in the sports card community as a consumer counterpart to separate antitrust litigation between Panini America, Inc. and Fanatics.
“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,” a Fanatics spokesman told SC Daily. “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.”
In dismissing the case, Judge Swain held that “None of the named Plaintiffs adequately allege that they have overpaid or will imminently overpay for trading cards sold by Defendants.” The opinion explained that, as of the filing date, Fanatics’ exclusive licenses with the NFL, NFLPA, NBA, and NBAPA had not yet taken effect (Panini’s prior exclusive licenses were still in place until dates ranging from September 2025 to March 2026), making it impossible for any consumer to have purchased fully licensed NFL or NBA trading cards from Fanatics at that time. Any future injury allegations were deemed too speculative and conclusory to establish standing.
For MLB cards, the collectors pointed to price charts showing steeper increases for certain Topps products compared with Panini’s, but the court said those charts weren’t enough. They didn’t prove the products were truly comparable, didn’t account for other factors that could affect pricing, and didn’t tie any overcharges directly to the specific cards the named plaintiffs actually purchased.
The plaintiffs had submitted declarations detailing their buys — mostly 2024 and 2025 Topps MLB products ordered directly from Topps.com or Fanatics.com — and each said they planned to keep buying cards in the future. Still, the judge found the allegations of harm too speculative and conclusory to meet the legal requirement for standing in federal court.
Fanatics entered the trading card space after building its business in licensed apparel, and its acquisition of Topps plus the new exclusive deals marked a major shift from the old model of shorter, often non-exclusive licenses awarded through open bidding.
This dismissal comes as Fanatics’ full exclusive windows for NFL and NBA cards are now opening or have recently opened, meaning the market landscape collectors will face in 2026 and beyond could look very different. Whether the plaintiffs refile with stronger evidence of personal harm remains to be seen.
The decision also renders moot the defendants’ separate requests to send parts of the case to arbitration.
