It has now been exactly one month since MTG TMNT officially released, and it’s safe to say that this set has had more of an impact in Commander than in other Constructed formats. Ultimately, this isn’t too surprising for such a small Universes Beyond set with a high density of new legendary creatures.
At the same time, though, MTG TMNT still produced some archetype staples across different formats. In Modern, for example, Casey Jones, Vigilante has emerged as a powerful Jeskai Blink support element. Now, it appears that this spike in competitive appeal has also caused the creature’s price tag to rise.
MTG Casey Jones, Vigilante
By itself, Casey Jones, Vigilante isn’t the most powerful or exciting legend out there. While a three-mana 4/3 that draws three cards is incredible on rate, there’s a good chance you can’t utilize that card advantage the turn you cast this Human Berserker. This means that you’ll likely be forced to discard three cards during your next upkeep, and you don’t even get to choose what they are.
As you may imagine, this is not an issue Modern’s Jeskai Blink deck has to deal with. Thanks to Consign to Memory, Casey Jones can skip discarding cards altogether. This turns the hockey stick-wielding character into an Ancestral Recall attached to a creature.
If that weren’t enough, Jeskai Blink can reuse Casey Jones’s enter ability later in the game. Using Phelia Exuberant Shepherd and Ephemerate, you can draw cards for cheap, using your remaining mana to play them. All the while, you’re fueling your graveyard for Phlage, Titan of Fire’s Fury. These small upsides combine to make Casey Jones a worthy inclusion in small numbers in one of Modern’s best archetypes.
While Casey Jones’ best calling is certainly Modern, it does show up sometimes in Rakdos Discard shells in Standard, too. With a copy of Monument to Endurance in play, Casey Jones’ delayed trigger actually becomes quite threatening.
The Spike
It didn’t take long following MTG TMNT’s release for Casey Jones’ inflated presale price to plummet. By March 15th, Casey Jones’ near mint market value fell to $0.29, its lowest point over the last month.
Soon after, however, Magic Online user McWinSauce won a Modern Challenge on March 19th with Casey Jones, causing the card to garner a lot more attention. From there, Casey Jones continued to excel through the following weekend, proving its impact was more than just a flash in the pan. As players jumped on the hype train, Casey Jones’ demand skyrocketed, and its price tag has since followed suit. Over the last two days, Casey Jones’ traditional variant’s average sale price is $1.81, representing a 524% price spike since March 15th.
Notably, prices for this card are a bit all over the place at the moment. Foils in particular have sold for as much as $9.63 and as little as $1 in just the last 24 hours. At the time of writing, though, near mint foil and non-foil listings for Casey Jones are available for roughly $1.40. With the only other printings of Casey Jones being pricier Showcase variants, $1.40 is about the best deal you can find for the card, even accounting for worse condition.
Moving Forward
While there’s no denying that Casey Jones’ value has gone up, at the end of the day, its price tag is still rather affordable. There’s also reason to believe that this creature’s price won’t increase too much further, at least in the near future.
Despite Casey Jones’ Modern popularity, the card isn’t too interesting in Commander. This puts a hard cap on the demand that the card can experience, which will likely keep the card cheap. Even in the context of Modern, Casey Jones only appears in one deck, and as a two-of. So, barring a future breakout, it seems unlikely that Casey Jones’ price will balloon much further.
Of course, with Secrets of Strixhaven’s release on the horizon, metagame shifts could happen that make Casey Jones more appealing. It’s impossible to predict the future with any degree of certainty, so for now, we’ll just have to wait and see things play out.
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