NFL star Blake Martinez retires after selling Pokémon card for $670,000

As second acts for former pro football players go, it’s hard to beat collecting — and flipping — Pokémon cards worth six figure sums.

It’s certainly better than getting jerked around by lousy teams, which is where Blake Martinez found himself for a second straight year. At the end of October, the seventh-year linebacker out of Stanford sold a rare Pokémon card at auction for $672,000.

Martinez (28), a former starter signed with the Las Vegas Raiders and retired from football ten days later.

Did pocketing $600 grand for a Pokémon card really sway a pro football player into early retirement? We’ve reached out to Martinez to ask him that directly, but frankly, it seems plausible! Considering Martinez’ specific circumstances, anyway.

This is the timeline

Back at the beginning of August, Martinez hosted a mystery bag unpacking of his Pokémon trading cards, which he began collecting as a kid. “Look what I found in my basement!!” he said on Instagram, brandishing the “Swirllustrator,” an extremely rare, Japan-only holographic card starring Pikachu; professional graders say fewer than 40 are known to exist. In February, the same card was sold at $900,000.

At the time Martinez revealed the card — we’ve asked when he actually acquired it, and for how much — he was still a member of the New York Giants. Martinez broke his knee ligaments just three games into 2021’s season. He then went into training camp as part of the third year on a contract worth $30.7 million. But, $19 million was not guaranteed and the Giants had already paid that, so they were free to let Martinez go. It was as though he was still a rookie trying his luck on the Giants. The Giants did so.

What was Martinez’s actual date for receiving this card?

In an Instagram video posted Oct. 25, Martinez said he began collecting Pokémon cards when he was 6 years old, got away from the hobby sometime during his childhood, then got back into it, like many people did, during the COVID-19 pandemic.

At first he went to find his childhood collection but discovered that his mom — in a story so common it’s almost cliché — had given them away or thrown them out. He got serious enough about collecting Pokémon that he started a “breaks” business (a dealer solicits buyers for a box of unopened cards, then opens them, and the buyers are awarded the contents. It is often done online.

This led him to a dealer in rare goods. “He presented me a bunch of different trophy cards, and the Swirllustrator was one of them,” Martinez said. He didn’t say how much he paid for it. (Martinez calls it the “Swirllustrator” because of two small swirls in the artwork that distinguish the card.)

Does it actually have a greater value than an NFL starter?

Martinez was acquired by the Raiders on Oct. 4 for $1.12million, a deal that is not guaranteed. Around this time, Martinez’s Pokémon Illustrator came back graded a 9.5, “Gem Mint” in card collectors’ parlance. In February, the Illustrator sold for $900,000. It was then graded as a 7. Martinez believed that he owned a card more valuable than the Raiders deal.

Martinez in an interview at Pawn Stars’ Gold & Silver Pawn on Oct. 27, speculated that it could fetch $1.5 million at auction. (Austin “Chumlee” Russell, a Pokémon collector himself, said only it was “Out of my league.”) By then Martinez had listed it with Goldin, a nationwide auctioneer of high-value collectibles. The winner bid claimed Martinez’s card for $672,000 — a nice payday, but somewhat disappointing in light of the Feb. 28 sale. Then again, Pokémon trading cards have been an extremely volatile market since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, especially when celebrities get involved.

More importantly, if Martinez actually started a business to nurture his interest in Pokémon card collecting, that could have been the tipping point to calling it a career — especially given his injury history, the potential for more (and worse), and the lack of guaranteed money.

Blake Martinez did he really quit after selling his card?

Yes. But it is not immediate. The card sold Oct. 29; Martinez started the Raiders’ next game, a 24-0 loss at New Orleans, then came in off the bench Nov. 6 to rack up 11 tackles, playing all but seven of his team’s snaps on defense.

Martinez seemed to have been getting more playing time with the injured starter. This was unknown if it was a pro- or con for Martinez. On Nov. 10, he retired, a day after missing practice “due to personal reasons.”

Although not common, it’s also not rare for NFL players to retire in their prime — particularly at high-impact positions. After an eight-year career, which included five All-Pro selections and five first-team All Pros, Luke Kuechly of the Carolina Panthers was 28 years old when he retired.

San Francisco linebacker Chris Borland retired in 2015 after just one year in the league, concluding the risks to his long-term health weren’t worth it. Patrick Willis, a linebacker partner at San Francisco’s Linebacker League, soon followed suit at the age of 30.