Josh Allen proudly wore the NFL’s gold shield patch on his jersey throughout the 2025 season to commemorate winning the 2024 NFL MVP award. But once the season ended, the Buffalo Bills‘ QB probably had no idea that the same gold shield patch would end up changing the lives of Arizona native Robbin Stowers and her three grandsons. Earlier this month, Stowers bought her grandsons a box of 2025 Topps Chrome Football cards.

And somehow, they landed one of the biggest pulls in the entire set: the redemption card for Allen’s one-of-one autographed Gold NFL Shield patch card. Fast forward to now, and the card has officially sold for $1.35 million after an auction that wrapped up early Friday morning through Fanatics Collect.

The story actually began on April 15 while Stowers’ grandsons were in class. That morning, she headed to Hot Corner Sports Cards in Mesa, Arizona, hoping to buy 2025 Topps Chrome Football boxes for Dylan, Harrison, and Stephen. Even after waiting an hour outside the store, Stowers wanted to make sure she was first in line. She eventually bought the first Hobby box sold that day, along with a few smaller Value boxes for the boys.

“Take a deep breath and go slow because there are only a few packs,” Stowers told her grandsons when they returned home.

Once the boys started opening the packs, they realized they had pulled “a really cool Josh Allen ticket” and discovered it was actually the one-of-one Josh Allen NFL Honors Gold Shield autographed card.

Not long after the discovery, Stowers and her grandsons returned to Hot Corner owner Phil Rinella to better understand what exactly they had just pulled.

“Before we went to Phil, the first thing (the boys) thought they were going to get to either meet Josh Allen or go to a Bills game and meet him or whatever. I said, ‘No, honey, I don’t think it works that way.’ And so when we went to the store, Phil kind of explained what the ticket was and what he thought maybe it was worth,” Stowers told, per The Athletic.

That was when the true value of the card became clear and was later scheduled for auction on Fanatics Collect beginning May 21. Now, just days later, the final sale price has reached $1.35 million.

With those figures, the card has already made history in multiple ways. According to The Athletic, the $1.35 million Allen card shattered the previous record for any Allen card by more than $1 million. The prior record was a Panini National Treasures rookie patch autograph numbered 1-of-10 that sold for $288,000 in 2022.

At the same time, this also became the first NFL trading card of any player to sell for seven figures since an autographed Tom Brady rookie card sold for $1.2 million in June 2023. It is also now the most expensive NFL card produced within the last five years.

So what started as a grandmother simply trying to surprise her grandsons with football cards somehow turned into a record-setting moment, with Stowers previously telling The Athletic that the money from the sale would eventually be divided among her grandsons. As for Allen, the Bills’ quarterback has now joined an elite $1 million card club.

Josh Allen joins the million-dollar card club

As Josh Allen’s one-of-one Gold Shield card sold for $1.35 million at auction, it was not the only trading card recently to cross the million-dollar mark. In fact, LeBron James’ one-of-one 2026 Topps Chrome Superfractor, featuring his new crown-style autograph, sold for $1.25 million. On top of that, the company also announced the private sale of a Cristiano Ronaldo card for $1.35 million, setting a new record for any Ronaldo card and becoming the second-highest known sale for a soccer card ever.

And while those cards made history within their respective sports, Allen’s one-of-one card carries major significance both for the quarterback himself and for the NFL trading card market overall. After all, the Bills star has now officially become just the fifth football player to enter the million-dollar card club.

That exclusive list already includes quarterbacks Joe Burrow, Justin Herbert, Patrick Mahomes, and Tom Brady. Here’s a closer look:

• Joe Burrow: His 1-of-1 2020 National Treasures Platinum NFL Shield RPA sold for $1.7 million, which still sits above Allen’s latest record sale.
• Justin Herbert: The Los Angeles Chargers quarterback actually has two separate sales around the million-dollar range. The first was a 2020 Panini Prizm RC Black Finite 1-of-1 graded BGS 9 that sold for $1.1 million in September 2022. The second was his 1-of-1 2020 National Treasures Platinum NFL Shield RPA.
• Patrick Mahomes: Mahomes also owns two seven-figure card sales. One was a 2017 National Treasures Gold RPA /10 that sold for $1.08 million in 2021. The other was a BGS 8.5 graded 1-of-1 Platinum NFL Shield RPA that reached an incredible $4.3 million in 2021.
• Tom Brady: And naturally, just like he is widely viewed as the NFL GOAT, Brady also dominates the trading card world. He owns 21 separate million-dollar card sales, all tied to his iconic 2000 Playoff Contenders Championship Ticket Autograph /100.