Ilia Topuria 2022 Panini Instant UFC #23: the Jai Herbert KO, the base card and its parallels
Card #23 of 2022 Panini Instant UFC is the card of Ilia Topuria's KO of Jai Herbert in London, printed to order in the days after the fight, in his rookie year. We have catalogued 4 versions, from the 394-copy base to the Black 1/1; 4 have a photo of the actual copy.
The fight behind #23: the Jai Herbert KO in London
Card #23 tells of Ilia Topuria's win over Jai Herbert on 19 March 2022 at The O2 in London: a KO in the second round, at 1:07, on the UFC Fight Night headlined by Alexander Volkov vs Tom Aspinall, per the official UFC event page.
Front, landscape: Ilia Topuria shouting by the fence, an official beside him and the ESPN+ banner behind; the title “Topuria KOs Herbert in the Second Round” running vertically, “Saturday, March 19”, the UFC Fight Night logo and the RC logo. Per the photo of our copy.
Back: “No. 23”, the date “3/19/22”, another photo of the same moment, “Featherweight”, the UFC Fight Night logo and the line “1 of 394”. There is no text.
What Panini Instant is and where the 394 comes from
Panini Instant is printed to order: the card goes on sale on Panini's website days after the event, usually for a week, and whatever is ordered in that window is made; that figure is the print run on the back, per Beckett (a secondary source, archived copy). Each card cost $9.99.
394 copies of the base, the figure on our copy and the one Beckett gives. From the same night, Muhammad Mokaev's card reached 1,109, Paddy Pimblett's 661, the Pimblett and Molly McCann dual 605, Tom Aspinall's, the main-event winner, 246 and McCann's 229, per the same source.
The parallels were not made to order: Versicolor /5 and Black 1/1 were sold separately until they sold out, per Beckett, which does not mention the Bronze; we have that one catalogued from the copies we have seen.
The #23 ladder
Base: the 394 print run, printed on the back.
Bronze /50: a bronze-coloured frame; our copy reads “1 of 50”.
Versicolor /5: a multicolour shattered-glass frame; our copy reads “1 of 5”.
Black 1/1: the back reads “One of One”.
The print runs add up to 450 copies of the #23 across its four versions.
What gets mixed up
The same format says two things: on the base, “1 of 394” is the print run Panini prints on the back, not that copy's number; on the parallels it numbers the copy, and the Bronze of the #147 we have photographed reads “50 of 50”.
The back says “Featherweight”, but the fight was at lightweight: that is how the official event page lists it.
There is another 2022 #23: the Select UFC Concourse base, with its own page, Select Concourse #23. The Instant card never came in packs: it was sold only on Panini's website.
It carries the RC logo and is from 2022, his rookie year, but the classic definition leaves out print-to-order cards; that is why his rookie card is the Prizm #115, whose Hobby release came on 25 March 2022 per Panini. Ilia Topuria rookie cards explains it.