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Collector profile “Cowboy”

Donald Cerrone

Cerrone's cardboard starts in the WEC, not the UFC: Topps slipped WEC fighters into 2010 Topps UFC Main Event and his #147 is captioned as a WEC Fighter card, which is why eBay's catalogue sells it as the (RC) while SportsCardsPro's data field still says no. Everything a Cerrone collector actually chases comes from 2011, the year he moved to the UFC — Title Shot gave him his first base card as a UFC fighter plus his first certified autographs, and Finest added a #76 refractor run and an A-DCE exchange autograph. After that the trail goes quiet until Panini's 2021 Prizm UFC and his 2023 Hall of Fame induction, which Topps answered with a Chrome Hall of Fame autograph.

2010Rookie year
#147Rookie card
10Key cards
  • UFC debutFebruary 5, 2011 · UFC 126
  • DivisionsLightweight · Welterweight
  • FromDenver, Colorado
Rookie card#147
01

The rookie case

#147
Rookie card · working pick Rookie disputed

2010 Topps UFC Main Event #147

His first card in a licensed Zuffa product, issued while he was still a WEC fighter and a year before he ever walked to a UFC cage. Topps carried WEC fighters in this 150-card base set, and the eBay catalogue title keeps the 'WEC Fighter' designation, which is how you tell it apart from his later UFC-era base cards.

Where sources disagree

eBay's catalogue calls Main Event #147 an (RC); SportsCardsPro's data field for the same card says it is not a rookie card. No reachable source states that the card carries a printed RC logo, and TCDB — which is where an RC flag would normally be confirmed — is not reachable.

Probable×1View sources & research
Rookie card case Card record
02

Key Cerrone cards

10 cards chosen for significance, not completeness; autographs and numbered cards follow below.

2010 Leaf MMA #36
2011 Topps UFC Title Shot #73
2011 Finest UFC #76
2021 Panini Prizm UFC #12
03

Card history

Cerrone's cardboard starts in the WEC rather than the UFC. Topps carried WEC fighters in its 150-card 2010 Topps UFC Main Event set, released on 23 February 2010, and #147 is his first card in a licensed Zuffa product — issued a year before he ever walked to a UFC cage, with the 'WEC Fighter' designation in the catalogue title that distinguishes it from his later base cards. The same year brought 2010 Leaf MMA #36, which carries no UFC or WEC marks at all and sits outside the licensed run; no release date for Leaf is documented, so which of the two actually reached shelves first is unresolved.

The rookie question is decided by convention rather than by print. eBay's catalogue sells Main Event #147 as the (RC), while SportsCardsPro's data panel on the same card reads 'Is Rookie Card: No', and nothing confirms a printed RC logo on it. Leaf #36 is flagged 'not a rookie card' on the strength of being unlicensed. Most sellers instead treat 2011 Topps UFC Title Shot #73 as his 'real' UFC card, but that came out in May 2011, more than a year after Main Event, so the earliest licensed card and the card the market calls the rookie are the same thing only if you accept the marketplace flag.

2011 is the year everything a Cerrone collector chases arrives. He beat Paul Kelly at UFC 126 in February, and Topps' 4 May Title Shot release — a crossover set of UFC veterans, legends, debutants and WEC fighters — gave him base #73 plus his first two certified autographs: Fighter Autographs #FA-DCE, from a 50-fighter subset, and Fighter Autograph Relics #FAR-DCE, a signed swatch from a 35-contender subset and the harder of the two to run down. No print run is published for either subset. Title Shot's parallel names are also reported two ways, one source giving Gold, Onyx /88, Red /8 and Diamond 1/1 where another gives Silver /188 and Bronze /88.

Finest, later the same year, gave him his first chrome card and his first proper serial-numbered chase: base #76 with Refractor, X-Fractor /388, Gold Refractor /88, Octa-Fractor /8 and Red Refractor 1/1. The Finest Fighters autograph #A-DCE carries the deepest parallel run of any Cerrone signature from the Topps years — X-Fractor /88, Gold Refractor /25, Octa-Fractor /8, Red Refractor 1/1 — but the checklist tags it as an exchange card, so packs held a redemption rather than the signed card, which is one reason live copies are thinner than the print runs suggest. The same product produced an Iron Sharpens Iron dual autograph with Clay Guida numbered to 25. After that the trail goes quiet for a decade.

Panini's first Prizm UFC brought him back at base #12, behind the widest colour ladder he ever had — Silver and Green through Red /275, Neon Green /75, Mojo /25, Gold /10, Lucky Envelopes /8, Octagon /8 and Black 1/1 — and gave him Prizm Signatures #1, literally the first card of a tight 20-subject autograph checklist and his first Panini-era signature, with Gold /10 and Black 1/1 at the top. He went into the UFC Hall of Fame's Modern Wing in July 2023 with more Zuffa wins and more post-fight bonuses than anyone, and Topps answered the following March with the 13-subject Hall of Fame Autographs subset of Chrome UFC, #HFA-DCE, running Refractor /150, Gold /50, Orange /25, Black /10, Red /5 and SuperFractor 1/1. The checklist starts that ladder at /150, so whether an unnumbered version exists is unclear.

Sources for every paragraph

04

Autographs

5 certified autographs in the archive.

2011Topps UFC Title Shot Fighter Autographs #FA-DCE Auto
2011Topps UFC Title Shot Fighter Autograph Relics #FAR-DCE AutoRelic
2011Finest UFC Autographs #A-DCE Auto
2021Panini Prizm UFC Signatures #1 Auto
2024Topps Chrome UFC Hall of Fame Autographs #HFA-DCE Auto/150 (Refractor; base version print run not separately documented)
05

Card eras

2010
WEC fighter on a UFC card

Topps UFC Main Event (released 23 Feb 2010 per TCDB) carried WEC fighters, and #147 is Cerrone's first licensed card. Leaf's unlicensed 2010 Leaf MMA also gave him a #36 the same year.

2011
UFC debut and first autographs

He beat Paul Kelly at UFC 126 in February, and Topps put him in the May release of Title Shot at #73 with a Fighter Autographs #FA-DCE and a Fighter Autograph Relics #FAR-DCE. Finest UFC followed with base #76 through the full refractor ladder and the #A-DCE Finest Fighters Autographs exchange card.

2021
Panini takes over

Panini's first Prizm UFC used him at base #12 and, more importantly, gave him Prizm Signatures #1 — the first card of the Signatures subset and his first Panini-era certified autograph.

2024
Hall of Fame autograph

A year after his July 2023 induction into the UFC Hall of Fame's Modern Wing, Topps Chrome UFC put him in the 13-card Hall of Fame Autographs subset at #HFA-DCE, Refractor /150 down to a SuperFractor 1/1.

06

Rookie parallels

Base
—
Unnumbered
Gold
—
Probable
07

Sets

Where Cerrone's key cards come from.

08

Buying & wanted

Wanted by FightCardboard
  • 012010 Topps UFC Main Event #147 (WEC Fighter) — the rookie, and its Gold parallel
  • 022011 Finest UFC Finest Fighters Autographs #A-DCE Octa-Fractor /8 or Red Refractor 1/1
  • 032011 Finest UFC Iron Sharpens Iron Dual Autographs #ISI-JC (Clay Guida / Donald Cerrone) /25
  • 042024 Topps Chrome UFC Hall of Fame Autographs #HFA-DCE Refractor /150 or better

Offer one

Available here

Nothing from this archive in the vault right now. Selling one?

Sources & research High confidence×10Probable×6

Every factual claim on this page, the evidence behind it, and an honest confidence level. Where sources disagree the disagreement is kept, not quietly resolved.

Probable

Donald Cerrone's rookie card: 2010 Topps UFC Main Event #147 — Donald Cerrone.

2010 Topps UFC Main Event #147 is his first card in a licensed Zuffa product. Topps included WEC fighters in the set (Cardboard Connection's Title Shot write-up confirms Topps was still carrying WEC fighters into 2011), and Cerrone's card is catalogued on eBay as '2010 Topps UFC Main Event - WEC Fighter Donald Cerrone #147 (RC)'. SportsCardsPro lists the same card at #147 but its data panel reads 'Is Rookie Card: No', so the RC designation is a marketplace convention rather than a printed RC logo. Main Event released 23 Feb 2010 (TCDB, via the archive's existing set record), which puts it ahead of everything else he has.

High confidence

Cerrone's cardboard starts in the WEC rather than the UFC. Topps carried WEC fighters in its 150-card 2010 Topps UFC Main Event set, released on 23 February 2010, and #147 is his first card in a licensed Zuffa product — issued a year before he ever walked to a UFC cage, with the 'WEC Fighter' designation in the catalogue title that distinguishes it from his later base cards. The same year brought 2010 Leaf MMA #36, which carries no UFC or WEC marks at all and sits outside the licensed run; no release date for Leaf is documented, so which of the two actually reached shelves first is unresolved.

High confidence

The rookie question is decided by convention rather than by print. eBay's catalogue sells Main Event #147 as the (RC), while SportsCardsPro's data panel on the same card reads 'Is Rookie Card: No', and nothing confirms a printed RC logo on it. Leaf #36 is flagged 'not a rookie card' on the strength of being unlicensed. Most sellers instead treat 2011 Topps UFC Title Shot #73 as his 'real' UFC card, but that came out in May 2011, more than a year after Main Event, so the earliest licensed card and the card the market calls the rookie are the same thing only if you accept the marketplace flag.

High confidence

2011 is the year everything a Cerrone collector chases arrives. He beat Paul Kelly at UFC 126 in February, and Topps' 4 May Title Shot release — a crossover set of UFC veterans, legends, debutants and WEC fighters — gave him base #73 plus his first two certified autographs: Fighter Autographs #FA-DCE, from a 50-fighter subset, and Fighter Autograph Relics #FAR-DCE, a signed swatch from a 35-contender subset and the harder of the two to run down. No print run is published for either subset. Title Shot's parallel names are also reported two ways, one source giving Gold, Onyx /88, Red /8 and Diamond 1/1 where another gives Silver /188 and Bronze /88.

High confidence

Finest, later the same year, gave him his first chrome card and his first proper serial-numbered chase: base #76 with Refractor, X-Fractor /388, Gold Refractor /88, Octa-Fractor /8 and Red Refractor 1/1. The Finest Fighters autograph #A-DCE carries the deepest parallel run of any Cerrone signature from the Topps years — X-Fractor /88, Gold Refractor /25, Octa-Fractor /8, Red Refractor 1/1 — but the checklist tags it as an exchange card, so packs held a redemption rather than the signed card, which is one reason live copies are thinner than the print runs suggest. The same product produced an Iron Sharpens Iron dual autograph with Clay Guida numbered to 25. After that the trail goes quiet for a decade.

High confidence

Panini's first Prizm UFC brought him back at base #12, behind the widest colour ladder he ever had — Silver and Green through Red /275, Neon Green /75, Mojo /25, Gold /10, Lucky Envelopes /8, Octagon /8 and Black 1/1 — and gave him Prizm Signatures #1, literally the first card of a tight 20-subject autograph checklist and his first Panini-era signature, with Gold /10 and Black 1/1 at the top. He went into the UFC Hall of Fame's Modern Wing in July 2023 with more Zuffa wins and more post-fight bonuses than anyone, and Topps answered the following March with the 13-subject Hall of Fame Autographs subset of Chrome UFC, #HFA-DCE, running Refractor /150, Gold /50, Orange /25, Black /10, Red /5 and SuperFractor 1/1. The checklist starts that ladder at /150, so whether an unnumbered version exists is unclear.

High confidence

2010 Topps UFC Main Event #147 — Donald Cerrone.

High confidence

2010 Leaf MMA #36 — Donald Cerrone.

High confidence

2011 Topps UFC Title Shot #73 — Donald Cerrone.

Probable

2011 Topps UFC Title Shot Fighter Autographs #FA-DCE — Donald Cerrone.

High confidence

2011 Topps UFC Title Shot Fighter Autograph Relics #FAR-DCE — Donald Cerrone.

Probable

2011 Finest UFC #76 — Donald Cerrone.

Probable

2011 Finest UFC Autographs #A-DCE — Donald Cerrone.

Probable

2021 Panini Prizm UFC #12 — Donald Cerrone.

Probable

2021 Panini Prizm UFC Signatures #1 — Donald Cerrone.

High confidence

2024 Topps Chrome UFC Hall of Fame Autographs #HFA-DCE — Donald Cerrone.