2016-17 Panini Donruss "Donruss Debuts" #224 Christian Pulisic

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The 2016-17 Donruss #224 Christian Pulisic was the first-ever pack-based product featuring a Christian Pulisic rookie card and his first Borussia Dortmund card; it was released on August 17, 2016 and featured a 17-year-old Pulisic within the short-printed Donruss Debuts rookie cards (which took the place of “Rated Rookies” in this set before Donruss reverted to the “Rated Rookies” branding for its soccer products in future years).  Throughout the various packaging offerings of this product, there are a total of nine different parallel versions of this 2016-17 Donruss #224 Christian Pulisic card, each of which are discussed below in detail.  To find all nine of these Pulisic parallel rookie cards, collectors needed to purchase nearly all the different Donruss product offers.  In total, Panini created six different ways to purchase this Donruss product, which are highlighted below.  The base version of the Pulisic card is available in all products except the retail five-card packs (which did not include the Donruss Debuts short print cards at all), but the parallel versions vary in each product.  A breakdown of these 2016-17 Donruss product offerings and the Pulisic rookie card parallels contained in each is as follows:

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Hobby Boxes – Pulisic Base, Holographic, Gold, Press Proof /149, Canvas /49 and Mosaic /15

Blaster Boxes – Pulisic Base & Purple

Fat/Jumo Pack Boxes – Pulisic Base & Swirlorama

Retail Boxes – Pulisic Base & Silver

Blister Packs – Pulisic Base & Silver

Retail 5-Card Packs (Gravity Boxes) – No Donruss Debuts cards are in this product, meaning no Pulisic cards

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Before getting into the details of each card, we would like to provide a little background on our knowledge of this product.  We believe that nobody has broken down more cases of blaster, fat packs and retail boxes than us.  We have also broken down around 20 hobby cases, which provides a solid insight into the pull rates within this offering as well.  As we explain in detail below, all the numbers provided are estimates and are not confirmed by Panini.  But with our pull rate knowledge, the population of graded cards as of January 2026 and a review of other market indicators, we believe the estimated numbers outlined here are high quality estimates of print runs for cards that are not serial numbered.

 

Base Version

We believe most collectors don’t fully appreciate the challenges of finding one of these short-printed base version Donruss Debuts cards.  We will cover the base card pull rates for all products here along with our estimates of the print run of each product offering to provide a full picture of the scarcity of this Pulisic card.

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Hobby: The hobby product contains two base Donruss Debuts cards (#201-230) per box (stated differently, there are 40 Donruss Debuts cards per case split between the 30 different Donruss Debuts short print cards).  That means there are 1.33 Pulisic base cards per hobby case.  When you compare that to each case producing approximately 2,876 of the non-short printed base cards (#1-200) you get approximately 10.8 base cards for every one Donruss Debuts card, which clearly makes this a short-printed card.  For those that should happen to collect hockey cards as well, we feel a good comparison of these Donruss Debuts cards would be the Young Guns in the Upper Deck hockey products with the only real difference being there are only 30 Donruss Debuts cards versus Upper Deck generally having 50 Young Guns.

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To estimate the entire production run of hobby cases we focused on the Press Proof cards that are numbered to 149 each.  There are 298 different cards which have Press Proof parallels, which are cards 1-230, the Picture Perfect inserts and the Accomplishments inserts.  This means there are a total of 44,402 Press Proof cards.  Based on our pull rate knowledge we estimate there are approximately 1.1 Press Proof cards per box, or 22 per case.  At this pull rate the production run would need to be approximately 40,365 boxes or 2,018 cases.  With this being a 2016 product, we think Panini may have elected to produce 2,016 hobby cases (instead of our calculated 2,018 cases) to match the year of production.  In any event, this would match our experience quite well.  Using the 2,016 case estimate, there would be 80,640 base Donruss Debuts short print cards in the offering in total across the 30 different Donruss Debuts short prints, which comes to exactly 2,688 copies of each base Donruss Debuts card in the hobby product.  The fact this comes out to a perfectly even number is additional support for why we believe 2,016 hobby cases is correct.  We also believe the hobby product accounts for approximately 73% of the total Pulisic Donruss Debuts base version production.​

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Blaster Boxes: Base Donruss Debuts cards are pulled at a rate of one per box in the blaster box product, meaning you will find a Christian Pulisic base card at a rate of 1:30 blaster boxes.  The only remaining question to determine how many base Pulisic cards are in this product is the production run of blaster boxes.  Unfortunately, there is not an easy answer here as there are no serial numbered cards in the blaster box product.  So, we have used the only unique item in this product to make our estimate: the Purple parallel cards.  The Purple Donruss Debuts cards are pulled at the same one per blaster box rate as the base versions.  If we can estimate the Purple cards, we also have an estimate for the number of base cards contained in the blaster boxes.

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To provide an estimate we reviewed GemRate.com data of graded cards, reviewed eBay for active and completed sales for the Purple parallels, and investigated how much unopened product may still exist in the hobby. 

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Per GemRate.com as of January 2026 there have been 159 total Purple cards graded, eBay showed 13 sales/available for sale of raw Purple cards over the past three years, and blaster boxes on eBay were relatively plentiful among small sellers with multiple sellers having good quantity, but there were no boxes are available at the three large wholesalers (Blowout, Dave & Adams and SteelCity).  With our knowledge of the industry/product we firmly believe there are more unopened blaster boxes than boxes of any other product, which means there are still a good number of Purple Pulisic Donruss Debuts rookies to be pulled.  We have always believed the Purple version is probably a slightly lower production run when compared to the Gold version.  So we will look at the same data for the Gold versions.  Per GemRate.com as of January 2026 there have been 341 total Gold cards graded, eBay showed 39 sales/available for sale of raw Gold cards over the past three years, and hobby boxes on eBay were available but not plentiful.  Additionally, there was one case and a few boxes available at the three large wholesalers (Blowout, Dave & Adams and SteelCity).  This means there is likely a very small number of Gold Pulisic Donruss Debuts rookies to find in unopened hobby boxes.

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What does this information tell us?  Considering this product is nine years old and the card grading has exploded over that time frame, we firmly believe there are fewer Purple versions when compared to the Gold versions.  Looking at ratios between the two cards, there are more than 2x the number of Golds graded when compared to Purple and 3x the number of sales of raw Gold cards when compared to raw Purple.  We do not believe the production is one-half or one-third of Gold as these numbers suggest, however, because of the unopened product that is still available.  For blaster boxes, we make our best estimate based on our knowledge and experience of watching the available market of this product since inception and we believe the blaster box production run to be no higher than 900 cases.  This means we believe the production run to be no higher than 600 total copies of the 2016-17 Donruss #224 Purple parallel Christian Pulisic since that Purple parallel is only available in the blaster boxes, which is approximately 75% of the production run of the Gold version, rather than 50% or 33% as the ratio of graded and raw sales of Gold to Purple would suggest, respectively.  This also means there are no more than 600 Pulisic Donruss Debuts base versions in the blaster box product, which accounts for approximately 16% of the total production run of base Pulisic Donruss Debuts cards.  Of course, our use of a “no more than” outer limit may mean we are assuming even more Pulisic base and Purple Donruss Debuts cards exist than actually do, as the ratio of Gold to Purple graded cards and raw sales would imply, but we have used what we consider a conservative, maximum estimate.  If anything, the Pulisic Donruss Debuts base and Purple cards are likely even rarer than we estimate.

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Fat/Jumbo Pack Boxes: Base Donruss Debuts cards are pulled at a one-per-box rate in the fat/jumbo pack product, meaning you will find one Pulisic Donruss Debuts base card in every 30 boxes of the fat pack/jumbo product.  Considering these are twelve-box cases, you need 2.5 of these cases to find one base Pulisic Donruss Debuts card, which is a very tough pull.  Based on the scarcity of the Swirlorama cards (see below) along with the tough unnumbered pulls in products like Aficionado and Revolution, we believe the case production of this product to be around 270 cases.  This means there are 3,240 boxes and only 108 base Pulisic base rookies in this product, which accounts for only 3% of the base Pulisic Donruss Debuts cards. 

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Retail Boxes: Base Donruss Debuts cards are pulled at a rate of three per box in this product, which equates to 60 total Donruss Debuts cards across all players per 20-box case.  Given there are 30 different Donruss Debuts cards, this means two Pulisic Donruss Debuts base cards per 20-box retail case.  This product is similar to the blaster boxes in that there are no serial numbered cards.  This product contains the Silver (not Holographic) parallel cards, which are discussed in significant detail below.  Based on our assessment of the Silver versions, we estimate the production run of this product to be 150 cases.  This means we estimate the number of base Pulisic Donruss Debuts rookies to be 300 copies from this product, which accounts for 8% of the total Pulisic base Donruss Debuts cards.

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Blister Packs: Blister packs contain two packs of retail product mentioned above and also contain two Silver parallels inserted between the two unopened packs (as noted in the discussion of the Pulisic Donruss Debuts Silver card below, however, Silver versions of the Donruss Debuts cards are extremely short printed relative to the base Silver cards).  The odds of pulling a base Pulisic in this product is 1:180 blister packs.  We have no estimate on the number of blister packs created and assume instead the estimate of 150 retail cases above will include this way of packaging the retail product.

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5-Card Packs (Gravity Boxes): These are the boxes that you typically find at a dollar store for $0.99 per pack.  We purchased several boxes of these years ago and can report there are no Donruss Debuts cards in this product.

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Base Version Conclusion

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To summarize, we believe the total print run of the Christian Pulisic Donruss Debuts #224 card to be approximately 3,696 cards, drawing from the hobby (2,688), blaster (600), Fat/Jumbo pack (108) and retail (300) products.  When compared to an estimated 44,000 copies of the base version cards 1-200, we have very clearly proven the short-printed nature of the Christian Pulisic Donruss Debuts #224 card and the other Donruss Debuts cards. 

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In the discussion of hobby boxes above, we compared these Donruss Debuts to the Upper Deck Young Guns hockey line, and here we take that comparison one step further.  We think comparing the Pulisic Donruss Debuts short print card to a very desirable hockey product – which of course tends to have smaller print runs than baseball, football and basketball products – will provide an interesting perspective on the rarity of the Pulisic Donruss Debut short print card.  With this Pulisic card being from 2016, let’s compare it to the 2015 Upper Deck Young Guns card of Connon McDavid.  Per GemRate.com, as of January 2026 there were a total of 1,045 Pulisic base Donruss Debuts cards graded and a total of 18,453 McDavid Young Guns cards graded.  That means for every one base Pulisic that has been graded, there were 18 Connor McDavid Young Guns graded.  Another way to look at this is that there have been 5x the number of McDavid cards graded than the entire print run of the Pulisic base Donruss Debuts short print.  As noted on our homepage, numbers from the other major sports are even higher.  The point of these comparisons is to illustrate how the production of these Pulisic cards is far below what is produced for all other major sports.

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Holographic Version

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The Holographic versions of 2016-17 Donruss Debuts cards were only available in hobby boxes.  As stated above in our discussion of the base cards, we believe only 2,016 hobby cases of 2016-17 Donruss Soccer were produced.  Our experience opening the product indicates the Holographic Donruss Debut cards are pulled at a rate of 20 per case, meaning 40,320 Holographic Donruss Debuts cards are available across all 30 Donruss Debut cards; this equates to only 1,344 copies of the Holographic version of the 2016-17 Christian Pulisic Donruss Debuts card and each other Holographic Donruss Debuts card.

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Gold Version

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The Gold versions of 2016-17 Donruss Debuts cards were only available in hobby boxes.  As stated above in our discussion of the base cards, we believe only 2,016 hobby cases of 2016-17 Donruss Soccer were produced.  Our experience opening the product indicates the Gold versions of Donruss Debut cards are pulled at a rate of 12.2 per case, meaning 24,595 Gold Donruss Debuts cards are available across all 30 Donruss Debut cards; this equates to only 820 copies of the Gold version of the 2016-17 Christian Pulisic Donruss Debuts card and each other Gold Donruss Debuts card.  As noted on GemRate.com, only 343 total copies of the Gold version of this card have been graded across all platforms as of January 2026.

 

Press Proof Version

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The Press Proof versions of 2016-17 Donruss Debuts cards were only available in hobby boxes.  As stated above in our discussion of the base cards, we believe only 2,016 hobby cases were produced.  The Press Proof version of the 2016-17 Donruss Debuts Christian Pulisic card is serial numbered out of 149, so there is no question on the print run.  Based on these numbers it would take approximately 270 boxes, or 13.5 cases, to pull one of these sought after Pulisic parallel rookie cards.

Canvas Version

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The Canvas versions of 2016-17 Donruss Debuts cards were only available in hobby boxes.  As stated above in our discussion of the base cards, we believe only 2,016 hobby cases were produced.  The Canvas version of the 2016-17 Donruss Debuts Christian Pulisic card is serial numbered out of 49, so there is no question on the print run.  Based on these numbers it would take approximately 820 boxes, or 41 cases, to pull one of these rare Pulisic parallel rookie cards.

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Mosaic Version

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The Mosaic versions of 2016-17 Donruss Debuts cards were only available in hobby boxes.  As stated above in our discussion of the base cards, we believe only 2,016 hobby cases were produced.  The Mosaic version of the 2016-17 Donruss Debuts Christian Pulisic card is serial numbered out of 15, so there is no question on the print run.  Based on these numbers it would take approximately 2,688 boxes, or 134 cases, to pull one of these incredibly rare Pulisic parallel rookie cards.

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Purple Version

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The Purple versions of 2016-17 Donruss Debuts cards were only available in blaster boxes. As stated above in our discussion of the base cards, we believe only 900 blaster cases were produced.  With one Purple Donruss Debut card per box and a 30-card Donruss Debuts subset, it would take 30 boxes, or 1.5 cases, to obtain one Purple version of the Pulisic card.  Based on these numbers we estimate the print run of the Purple version of the 2016-17 Donruss Debuts Christian Pulisic to be only approximately 600 cards.  Far fewer have been graded, however.  As of January 2026, only 159 total copies of the Purple version of this card have been graded across all platforms, as noted on GemRate.com.

 

Silver Version (Not Holographic)

 

The Silver versions of 2016-17 Donruss Debut cards were only available in retail boxes (and blister packs) and this Pulisic card is without question the most misunderstood of all the Christian Pulisic rookie cards.  The confusion surrounding the Silver version of the 2016-17 Donruss Debuts Christian Pulisic rookie card partially pertains to authentication companies incorrectly labeling Holographic cards as Silver and thus inadvertently overstating the number of this card in their population reports in a way that betrays its true rarity.

 

We have broken numerous retail cases and the pull rate of Silver Donruss Debuts cards was twelve in each case we broke, meaning you need 2.5 cases of retail to find one Pulisic Silver card on average.  With an estimated 150 retail cases produced, we believe there are only approximately 52 actual copies of the Silver version of the 2016-17 Donruss Debuts Christian Pulisic card, which makes it comparable to the Canvas version.  In addition to the scarcity of this card, we also need to call out the scarcity of unopened retail boxes.  Over the past three years, there have been no sales on eBay.  There are also no boxes available from Blowout Cards, Dave & Adam’s or SteelCity as of January 2026 and it has been years since any of those wholesalers have had this product.  We expect there is some unopened product out there, but this product is a pretty tough to find in 2026.  The other options for these cards were the blister packs that contained two retail packs.  These are available on eBay in limited quantity and Blowout Cards had 60 units as of January 2026.  Considering it takes 900 blister packs to find a single Silver Donruss Debut of Christian Pulisic, however, it is likely there is no more than one incremental Silver Pulisic available in the remaining unopened blister packs.

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To help everyone reconcile the population report for PSA, we have added a table below showing all identification errors we are aware of as of January 2026.  We can account for nearly all PSA graded copies of this card, with the exception of three PSA 9 graded copies (see table and supporting images below).  Considering the scarcity of this card and the fact it was only available in the retail product, we would be inclined to believe most of the four unidentified cards are likely Holographic versions as well, but again cannot verify these four.  We believe similar reconciliations are required for versions graded by BGS, SGC and CGC as well.