Panini America just added considerably more firepower to its baseball-card lineup.
Panini and MLB Players, Inc. announced a non-exclusive, multi-year agreement on September 28 covering every active Minor League Baseball player, giving the company significantly broader access to prospects for future trading-card products.
The first release under the agreement will be 2026 Three and Two Baseball, scheduled for November.
And this is not expected to be a one-product experiment.
Panini said it could release as many as 12 products per year featuring Minor League players alongside collegiate and retired players, with Prizm Baseball and Donruss Elite Extra Edition specifically mentioned among the brands expected to benefit.
“Having Minor League players within the scope of this agreement creates significant depth across Panini’s baseball portfolio,” Panini America CEO Mark Warsop said in the company’s September 28 announcement.
We look forward to bringing more future stars and prospects to collectors! Read more details here:
Panini’s Baseball Card Deal Opens Door to More Prospects
Panini was already making prospect-heavy baseball products before Monday’s announcement.
The difference is the size of the player pool it can now access through a group licensing agreement.
MLB Players, Inc. serves as the licensing arm for active Major and Minor League players, and Panini’s new agreement covers every active MiLB player.
That potentially gives products such as Prizm Baseball far more flexibility when Panini constructs its checklists.
The impact becomes clearer when compared to last year’s Three and Two release.
Beckett noted that 2025 Three and Two was expected to lean primarily on prospects and retired players because Panini lacked an MLBPA license. Its checklist still featured names such as Konnor Griffin, Leo De Vries, Bryce Eldridge and Colt Emerson, but Panini did not possess blanket group rights to the entire active Minor League player pool.
Now it does.
“The agreement provides Panini America with the flexibility to build prospect-focused checklists across multiple brands and product formats throughout the year,” Panini said.
That could become particularly important for collectors chasing prospects before they reach the Majors.
Does Panini Have an MLB License Again?
There is an important distinction.
Monday’s announcement does not say Panini has acquired Major League Baseball’s league license, nor does it announce rights to MLB team names, logos and uniforms.
Fanatics Collectibles and Topps remain the major fully licensed players in baseball cards. Fanatics describes its arrangements with MLB and the MLB Players Association as comprehensive partnerships, and fully licensed Topps products can use MLB team branding along with player rights.
That means this should not be confused with Panini suddenly returning to the traditional fully licensed MLB-card market.
Instead, Panini has acquired something particularly valuable for the niche it already occupies: much broader access to the players collectors are trying to identify before they become MLB stars.
And Panini plans to use it aggressively.
Panini Three and Two Baseball Will Be First Test
Collectors will not have to wait long to see what the new arrangement looks like.
Panini says Three and Two Baseball will become the first product released under the deal when it arrives in November 2026. Additional product configurations and availability details will be announced closer to release.
Three and Two has traditionally been a premium-style product built around a small number of cards and multiple hits. The 2025 edition included one autograph and one memorabilia card per hobby box along with three additional base, parallel or insert cards.
Adding the full active MiLB player pool gives Panini considerably more freedom to determine which prospects fill those premium autograph, memorabilia and parallel checklists.
Prizm Baseball may ultimately be an even bigger test.
Prizm’s enormous parallel rainbow and prospect-friendly format give Panini plenty of room to capitalize on a deeper group of young players across future releases.
For a company competing against the prospect power of Topps and Bowman without the same MLB licensing package, access to every active Minor Leaguer is a meaningful new weapon.
Panini still doesn’t have everything.
It just has a lot more players to work with.
Panini Strikes Major Baseball Card Deal With MLB Players