Inaugural Panini Optic NWSL

 Being a San Diegan that appreciates women's soccer, I've considered myself a San Diego Wave FC fan since their inception about five years ago. My family and I have attended a handful of games over the years and I'll catch them on TV from time to time. Obviously, I'm also a collector of sports memorabilia so the possibility of the NWSL getting a contract with Topps or Panini always intrigued me. It finally happened earlier this year, and their first ever product just dropped a couple weeks ago. I bought two First Off the Line Hobby Boxes of the product directly from Panini when it dropped. They only made an estimated 60 cases of FOTL. Each hobby box guaranteed 3 autos or memorabilia cards. Well I opened my boxes last night and got way more than that. My first box had three autographs and two memorabilia cards. The first auto I pulled was in fact a former Wave player, star forward Delphine Cascarino. This was the green autograph /5 so was a hell of a start. The second autograph I pulled was another Wave player, star midfielder Kenza Dali. Her auto was /49.

I wasn't familiar with the player from the third auto in the first box, Houston Dash defender Paige Nielsen. This auto was /125.

Getting three autographs from the box was a strong indicator that these FOTL boxes were loaded. I pulled two memorabilia cards as well, both with nice patches on them.

The second box only had two autographs, neither as good as the first two just mentioned. However, it had four memorabilia cards, one of whom was Marta, arguably the GOAT among women's soccer.

The Jordyn Bloomer auto was /25 and the Ally Brazier auto was to /75.

Additionally, I ended up with 11 numbered parallels plus one Rookie Queens Case Hit of chase rookie Kat Rader. Some of the bigger parallel hits are below.

The pink shimmers are both numbered /3, which are FOTL exclusives. Meaning, you can only pull the pink shimmers in first off the line boxes. 

I'd say this is a very affordable, nice product to rip for soccer collectors. If the end of the game is to hit a mege ceiling card, this product isn't for you as there are no five figure cards in the set. That being said, these FOTL boxes were absolutely loaded and dar surpassed the documented guaranteed hits. I would 100% recommend opening these if you're a collector or a fan of the NWSL in general. I more than made my money back easily. Final tally in two FOTL boxes listed below;

5 Autos

6 Memorabilia 

11 numbered parallels including 2x pink shimmers /3

Case hit Rookie Queens