2024 Absolute Football: A Popular Product With A Long History But Limited Potential

Absolute Football is back, releasing on December 06, 2024 at $500/box. As always, this early-season release will make great use of memorabilia and will be a top product to chase.

This release is packed with new rookies, inserts, parallels, and autographs, making it an absolute must-have for collectors and investors alike.

2024 Absoulte Football introduction

Absolute Football 2024 continues the brand’s legacy of delivering a hit-centric experience for collectors, particularly at the hobby level.

In recent years, Absolute Football has solidified its reputation for autographs and memorabilia cards and housing some of football’s most popular regular inserts, including Kaboom! and Explosive.

The 2024 release is no different, bringing back these sought-after inserts alongside a variety of autographs, memorabilia cards, and case hits.

For collectors who enjoy guaranteed hits, 2024 Absolute Football hobby boxes deliver three autographs per box, one of which is a Rookie Premiere Materials card. Each hobby box also includes two memorabilia cards, spread across just three packs.

As always, the Rookie Premiere Materials Autographs set stands out as a cornerstone of the Absolute collection, offering autographed memorabilia cards of promising new talent. Additional hits like Tools of the Trade, Ground Hoggs, and Pro Bowl Souvenirs add variety and depth to the product’s lineup.

A few red flags with Absolute Football 2024

Like every 2024 Panini football product, there are a few caveats that come with 2024 Absolute.

I will be saying this in every 2024 product review I write: many of the top 2024 draft picks are working exclusively with Fanatics on autographs.

This list of players includes Jayden Daniels, Caleb Williams, Drake Maye, AD Mitchell, Malik Nabers, Brendan Rice, Jayden Daniels, Brian Thomas Jr., Xavier Worthy, and Rome Odunze, to name a few. These athletes agreed to no more autos with Panini, but they could still have some in this set. (Rome Odunze seems to). 

And with a 15-card box that’s driven primarily with autographs, it’s a set that falls particularly flat without top rookie signers. Yes, you’ll be able to pull rookies or a nice SSP like Kabook, but they’d have to be really special rookie cards to make up for the $500 price tag.

What to expect from 2024 Absolute

For $500 per box, this year’s 242-card set includes 100 current stars, 100 rookies, and 42 exclusive Rookie Premiere Materials cards, ensuring a diverse mix of seasoned players and rising stars. Remember, you’ll get 1 RPA, 2 other autos and 2 memorabilia cards in every box, plus a rookie card. 

With a very deep checklist of 100 rookies, Absolute usually has every single rookie you could ever hope to pull. Occasionally, when an unexpected star breaks out, this can create value in its own way. But with rookies seeded only 1/box, you’d have to rip a lot of boxes to hit the rookie you’re after. 

Fan-favorite inclusions like Rookie Premiere Materials and Tools of the Trade return with updated designs and star-filled checklists. Additionally, Absolute delivers on case-hit excitement with both horizontal and vertical Kaboom! inserts, as well as the Explosive series, making it a popular chase for collectors chasing big hits.

While we don’t have a full parallel list yet, it will probably look like last years, which is below:

2024 Absolute Football parallels

The 2024 Absolute Football release includes a variety of parallel options from the more common (Black, Blue, Green) to the 1/1 Black Galaxy, Black Spectrum and Printing Plate parallels.

• Black
• Blue
• Green
• Orange
• Pink
• Purple
• Red
• Red/White/Blue Kaleidoscope
• Spectrum
• Teal
• Yellow
• Red Squares – /499
• Orange Mosaic – /299
• Red Spectrum – /100
• Blue Diamonds – /99
• Orange Spectrum – /75
• Blue Spectrum – /50
• Green Waves – /50
• Gold Stars – /25
• Green Spectrum – /25
• Splash Spectrum – /16
• Gold Spectrum – /10
• Purple Rain – /10
• Purple Spectrum – /5
• Black Galaxy – 1/1
• Black Spectrum – 1/1
• Printing Plates – 1/1 (each has Black, Cyan, Magenta and Yellow versions)

Value of 2024 Absolute Football

Let’s look at investing in Absolute as a potential investment, both sealed and singles. 

Investing in 2024 Absolute Football boxes

Let’s assume the pre-order price doesn’t budge and we have a release price of $500 for this sealed product as we try to value it as a potential investment. 

With that in mind, here’s the value of sealed Absolute boxes for the last few years (as of 11/4/2024):

• 2019: $950
• 2020: $935
• 2021: $400
• 2022: $655
• 2024: $550

These numbers look a lot better than they do for most products, honestly. Absolute has always been a pretty popular release, and that popularity (and perhaps the possibility of pulling non-rookie Kabooms!), keeps the floor pretty high. 

Still, this year’s washed-out, watered-down product doesn’t have half the rookie autograph potential that the previous year’s do (even though 2023 doesn’t include CJ Stroud autos, either.)

So if you want to make money long-term with this product as a hold, don’t buy this box anywhere near the $500 mark. 

Investing in Absolute Football 2024 singles

This is a section I always include, but with Absolute, I’ll keep it really short: there are not many singles I’d invest in long-term. The best options are if you’re a believer in Kaboom! cards and the players they feature. 

No matter how great the player is, the ceiling is only going to be high with Absolute Football. Save your individual player investments for a brand that has more potential, like Prizm, Optic, or a high-end product like National Treasures. 

Bottom line: Should you rip hold or pass 2024 Absolute Football?

While you shouldn’t buy boxes of Absolute to stash, there are still some nice cards if you decide to rip. But a 15-card box for $500 carries extreme risk, so invest only if you have the disposable income to potentially lose. 

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