Random Blaster Box: 2013 Topps Baseball

I picked up a couple of blaster boxes of 2013 Topps baseball to open, originally I had planned on just getting one blaster for a hands on review but after I bought my first blaster I decided to grab two more for fun.

 

I never seem to have much luck when it comes to Mariners and Diamondbacks; the two teams I collect just are not usually represented very well due to the lack of collectability besides a handful of players. I ended up pulling only 3 Mariners and 5 Diamondbacks counting base cards and Blue parallels and 6 of the players are pitchers.

 

A Cy Young winner and NL MVP winner

 

A couple of young guys who may define the future of their teams for the next decade

 

Each retail pack contains 2 parallels, Wal-Mart’s parallels are blue, Target’s parallels are red and Toys R Us’ parallels are purple. I pulled one Mariner and one D-Back along with a couple of decent rookies and stars.

 

I pulled 5 Emerald parallels, 1:6 packs. Along with these three I also pulled Javier Lopez and Colby Lewis.

 

I pulled these 2 Gold parallel, they are #/2013

 

The 72 Topps release sure was an ugly ass set, and that is coming from someone who is building the 1972 Topps set (my birth year). I pulled 3 per blaster box, so 9 minis total.

 

The Chasing History inserts cover players (past and present) who have hit a significant accomplishment, with Babe Ruth leading the way. Along with these 3 cards I pulled a McCovy 500 Home Runs, Spahn Wins By Left-Hander cards and Ian Kinsler 6-Hit Cycle cards.

 

Chasing The Dream inserts are focusing on young players who have potential. I pulled 5 total with Harper and Trout being the best, the rest are Matt Moore, Casey Kelly and Drew Pomeranz.

 

The Calling Card insert covers something special about the player, Sabathia’s card talks about how he wears two different socks when pitching, Dickey’s card is about his knuckleball and Pujols card explains why he points to the sky after home runs.

 

The Cut To The Chase die-cuts are pretty cool; they use a Finest technology with a refractor coating and die-cut. Even though the cards appear to have a texture they are actually smooth.

 

Topps includes a manufactured patch in each blaster box. I pulled two silk patch cards and a Cespedes commemorative patch. I cannot complain, I really like all three cards.

Topps Cuts To The Chase With 2013 Topps Baseball

First, sorry about the pun in the title, I had to go there.

Topps got a jump on next year when they began releasing some images and pack out information for the 2013 Topps Baseball set which is set to hit shelves on January 25, 2013. First, there is no mention of the set being a “Game Changer” but sadly they were still able to work in a hook to draw groans from collectors. The 2013 Baseball release is all about “the Chase”. Inserts have names like Chasing History, Chasing the Dream, Cut to the Chase and The Ultimate Chase.

 

The base set is pretty nice, a decent design and there is focus on the player and they even worked a baseball field in to the design (Home Plate and the infield are above the player’s name on the bottom left corner with the border being the outfield). The base set has a 330-card checklist and each card will have a handful of parallels. Emerald Parallels, Gold Parallels (#/2013), Black Parallels (#/62), Pink Parallels- Breast Cancer Awareness (#/50), Camo- Military Support (#/99), Platinum (1/1), Printing Plates (1/1) and 100 cards will also have a silk parallel (#/50).

Autographs will be a mix of cut signatures, sticker autographs and on-card autographs. Topps is able to offer up an awesome autograph checklist which will include current players as well as retired/HOF players: Ken Griffey Jr., Willie Mays, Reggie Jackson, Stan Musial, Nolan Ryan, Rickey Henderson, Don Mattingly, Gary Carter, Frank Thomas, Cal Ripken Jr. and Mike Schmidt.

The 1972 minis will probably be a hit with collectors. The base set will be a 50-card set and there will also be autograph and relic versions. The autograph checklist will contain only 10 signers and each card will be limited to 10 from each signer. I am not certain how many 1972 mini relic cards there will be but the cards will be limited to 25 of each.

 

One thing that I noticed reading about the release is that many collectors are not big on the Pink and Camo parallels. Sadly it seems like some collectors are lost on the significance of the parallels.

Here are a couple of comments that can be found:

“The pepto-bismal pink card gotta go!”

“The pastel color scheme is not good”
“I like the design of the Harper care, but the pink cards and the camo cards are ugly”

“Is the pink representative of anything?”

“Pink. Seriously?”

Obviously a pink ribbon or a military branch logo on the card and it becomes obvious what they represent. This is something that they have done in their base football sets but the colors were brighter and seemed more obvious to what they supported where these parallels just do not seem to fit in with the set. I appreciate that the leagues and sports card companies are showing support but the cards should be marked as BCA or military support. Add a pink ribbon or “Support Our Troops” on the card, let people know the importance of the card. With 5 months before release date this may change.

I am digging the die-cut Cut to the Chase cards and I believe there are 25 players on the checklist but there will be only 5 players in the autograph parallels and they are limited to 10 autos from each signer and there will be a relic version that will be limited to 25 of each player. I guess I can forget about “chasing” down the Griffey autograph and relic versions.

Some additional cards from the higher end of hits possible. The Nolan Ryan Ultimate Chase at the bottom reminds me of something we would expect out of Upper Deck design-wise and has Topps now gotten in to the dime sized player image market? I thought they were better than that when representing players, especially players of this caliber.