The FBI arranges to release three criminals from jail (Alphonse Royo, Charlie O'Bannon, and Ice Gregory) in order to use their unique skills to catch criminals.
On their first case in Los Angeles, the Players hire on to expose a crooked lawyer, Marcus Flint. They are initially supposed to use his client Jay Bagley to get close to him, to which end Ice has himself arrested. Unfortunately, Bagley ends up dead, the victim of an apparent suicide. The Players take one more stab at getting Flint, and with the help of an old friend of Ice's, they finally get him. Agent Kowalski isn't happy with the men initially, but begins warming up to them by the show's end.
To catch CD bootleggers, Ice goes under cover as a country singer (Cool McCall), who invents a new form of music called 'rap redneck', with Charlie playing his manager. Their target is Del Cavanaugh, who seems to gain most of his income from the late great Jesse Dalton, whom Del killed to collect his fortune. And now he plans to kill another up-and-comer, Sarah Grace. With the help of Alfonse (who is able to play both a Greek waiter and an Australian photographer in one episode), the Players prove that Dalton is still alive, and take down Del before he can take down Sarah.
Ice poses as an art thief to catch a crooked gallery owner. Alphonse disguises himself as the gallery owner's new Columbian client. Nothing goes quite according to plan and Chrissy has the trio dragged back to the office in handcuffs as a Van Gogh has gone missing. The boys set up an even more elaborate trap with Chrissy in the role of gangster's moll, something that Alphonse attempts to take full advantage of. Once again the boys land on their feet.
Assigned to crack a counterfeiting ring, the trio takes a curcuitous route involving car hijacking, basketball-game betting and high stakes golf matches with Ice as a duffer.
When the Players are assigned to bust arms dealer Simon Lott, Ice is shocked to run into his former partner / lover Laura and her new partner, Burke. Laura not only stabs Ice in the back by taking the deal for herself, but she infuriates Ice by playing it up with Alphonse. Laura's act seems to be working, because Alphonse agrees to leave the team and take the FBI's money and run along with her once this is all over. While Ice poses as the buyer, Alphonse as a rival seller from the IRA, and Charlie as the middle man, Lott's goose is cooked. After Lott is arrested, Laura heads over to pick up the money that Alphonse had left in a bag for them. She's shocked to learn that she was conned herself...the bag is empty, and Alphonse is back with the team.
Alphone, Charlie, and Ice are all arrested after an armored truck heist gone wrong, and while in the interrogation room with Lt. Harper, each one gives a different story to him. Harper is left to sift through all these stories, with the only common thread being Veronica Salt, a beautiful woman who acted as a go-between for criminal mastermind Alex Duchek.
Quentin Belkey was recently released from a minimum security prison, and now he runs a high stakes poker game where the funds are seemingly unlimited. The Players are brought in to infiltrate the game, and take town Belkey. Stuart Finch controls the scene, and sets Ice up as a restaurant, Charlie as a waiter, and Alphone as a hotel security guard. A slight mishap has Charlie assuming the role of the owner, and the con almost goes awry when there are a number of unplanned distractions.
The trio engineers a scam involving a baseball trading-card valued at $200,000 in order to catch a mobster and his henchman. Meanwhile, Charlie has to deal with his father, an even bigger con man.
The boys take on a New Age guru with a murderous agenda. They set themselves up as marks to get close to him, and then exploit his cons to the full. Enter Corky Simmons, a grifter friend of theirs who helps with the scam.
The trio attempt to set up an arms dealer, but it all goes horribly wrong (again). A crooked cop is involved, and he kidnaps Chrissy to force Ice out into the open, because he knows Ice can identify him.
The trio (Ice-T, Costas Mandylor, Frank John Hughes) tries to get the goods on brother-and sister fashion designers who give drugs to models and are involved with illegal garment workers. Chris helps out with the con, and Ice falls for the sister.
A killer (John Saint Ryan) murders two guards while escaping, then the judge who sentenced him is found dead, so the trio tries to protect the woman (Michelle Stafford) whose testimony had sent him to prison.
The trio attempts to catch two kidnappers who have taken the son of a man who's estranged from his mobster father; and Alphonse (Costas Mandylor) agrees to deliver the ransom.
While investigating a ""billion-dollar"" racket involving bootlegged gasoline, the trio discovers that there's a leak at the FBI and tries to find the agent who's working with the mob.
Charlie receives birthday wishes from a terrorist named Jericho who is threatening to kill the entire city of Los Angeles with a sarin bomb. Turns out Jericho is a man from his past. While deciding what to do, Charlie faces his demons since leaving prison.
After college student Barry Decker is shot and killed in a parking lot, the team goes undercover, and realise his death is connected to a computer program he was developing. Charlie goes undercover as Barry's partner, and forms a tentative relationship with Barry's former girlfriend, Sarah.
The paroled trio returns to New York where Ice tries to reform a young thief; Alphonse fights with his son Adam's drug supplier; and Charlie tries to stop an insurance scam while fighting his feelings for the beautiful conwoman.