How an extremely valuable One Piece promotion created chaos at Dodger Stadium

How an extremely valuable One Piece promotion created chaos at Dodger Stadium

Economy World


LOS ANGELES — At 10 a.m. on Thursday, Ozzy Baldwin parked at Dodger Stadium, fresh off a 24-hour drive from Arkansas. When the game ended, he said, he’d make the very long trip home. A pit stop in New Mexico each way would serve as his only reprieve.

“I really like One Piece, and I really love the One Piece cards,” Baldwin said of the popular Japanese manga and anime. “It’s a promo, so you can only get it here. It’s the Dodgers.”

The Dodgers hosted the San Diego Padres in a regular season game, but the first place, back-to-back World Series champions were the backdrop, a secondary spectacle in their own ballpark, to a small piece of cardboard.

There were lines snaking for what seemed like miles, with ticket holders arriving as early as 7 a.m. The Dodgers beefed up security, causing significant traffic congestion around the ballpark long before first pitch. Fans packed food, chairs, and sprinted to the front gate as soon as they were allowed to.

The trading card, portraying the protagonist Monkey D. Luffy in a batting stance, was projected to carry significant financial value. The get-in price for the 56,000-seat stadium hovered around $300. A StubHub spokesperson said it was “the most in-demand Dodgers home game this year, after Opening Day.”

“Demand didn’t build gradually — it exploded,” the spokesperson said in an email. “Roughly half of every ticket sold for the game moved in the days after the Dodgers … announced the return of One Piece Night in late May. The trading card reveal helped sustain that elevated demand in the weeks since.”

Over the last two years, products from One Piece’s card game have skyrocketed in value, following the resurgence of Pokémon cards before it. As the latter climbed to historic values, collectors targeted One Piece as the next hot entertainment trading card property.

This sudden rise in popularity and value for One Piece cards has coincided with a shift in collector sentiment around promotional freebies — items used to cross-promote everything and anything from sports teams to restaurants and museums — that was also largely driven by the Pokémon frenzy.

And the scene at Dodger Stadium was a frenzy, with hundreds of ticket holders entering the park, collecting their cards, and immediately looking to purchase more. Initial offers were in the range of $100 to $150. Within minutes, those same buyers were offering upward of $600.

Still, almost no one was willing to bite.

“We have six cards between us,” said Amy Valle, who sold hers at the game for $600. She carefully inspected the hundred dollar bills to verify their authenticity. More a Dodgers fan than an anime fan, she was well prepared.

“I think it’s worth it to sell one. … We can get some graded, save some,” she said. “And then sell some right after that, in case it gets flooded, and it isn’t worth what we think it’s gonna be worth.”

In the minutes before the gates opened, Los Angeles Police Department officers and stadium security huddled. One security official said the craziness from the promotion topped even some of the most popular bobblehead and Hello Kitty giveaways that have created viral crazes outside the ballpark in recent years.

One police officer tried with futility to quell the in-person secondary market. “No buying cards,” he yelled to no one in particular, as haggling continued in every direction.

It was at this stadium where One Piece promo cards initially took off in popularity. Last year, the Dodgers’ giveaway followed the German soccer club Borussia Dortmund’s offering earlier that year.

In peak condition, last year’s Dodgers promo card has sold for as much as $19,000.

With that precedent, when One Piece promo cards were given out at college basketball games across the country this past season, the response overwhelmed schools to the point where St. John’s canceled its final promo night, reportedly because of security concerns.

Last week, a One Piece collaboration with Musée Grévin, a wax museum in Paris, in which 50,000 cards were set to be given away, had to be suspended because of surging crowds. The ones that did make it into the hands of attendees are now selling for around $900 on eBay.

Once seen as less desirable for being free giveaways printed in large quantities, global demand around Pokémon and One Piece cards has outgrown supply, reshaping the view of promo card rarity and cultural significance, largely fueled by online hype.

The Dodgers, possibly driven by similar security concerns, opted not to limit the inventory — upping it from the first 40,000 fans to the first 52,000 fans, ensuring that nearly every ticket holder would receive one.

The team declined to comment when asked about the giveaway, stadium security and its decision to increase inventory.

In the line were parents who brought babies in covered strollers, shielding them from the punishing sun. One fan was taken away on a stretcher for an unknown medical issue. Some were there because they cared about the anime. Others, because they knew it could lead to a quick buck.

At least one ticket holder passed out cards to those waiting in line. They weren’t trading cards — these carried information about how to sell the One Piece card once it was in their possession.

Still, the promise of 52,000 didn’t quell the long pregame lines.

A One Piece fan, who flew in from Vancouver, British Columbia, with three friends, suggested that Toei Animation, the animation studio behind One Piece and handler behind last year’s giveway, ran out of inventory early. They weren’t willing to risk it.

“There are tons of fans that will buy and sell the card, but I think that’s fine,” said Ben Painter, who had traveled from north of the border. “If you can pay for your ticket, you can sell your card.”

The most expensive trading card of all time, sports or non-sports, is a Pokémon card YouTube star Logan Paul sold for nearly $16.5 million at auction in February. And while the Dodgers-themed One Piece cards might be quite financially valuable, this particular promotion might not reach that level.

Fans were selling the card on eBay before gates opened at around $600, but the price continued climbing later in the night to more than $700. On Mercari Japan, a secondary market akin to eBay, the cards were selling for more than $1,000, and the accompanying commemorative straw hats for more than $100. The true market is impossible to know right now, with supply and demand yet to take full effect.

But it did create a full day of chaos at a stadium where baseball, at least for one night, was secondary.



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