World Stars Toreka Edition Is Live

2013 World Stars Toreka Edition has now been live for two weeks and we are now seeing how the cards are looking on the secondary market. Surprisingly there are not many showing up though I am guessing that with this being a Japanese release we probably will not see as much opened here. You can purchase boxes, which run $150 plus $10 for shipping, from their English web site. Each box contains 3 packs with one card in each pack.

Some of the top cards that have shown up include RG3 Autorait, a gold Carlton Fisk Autorait and a Mike Tyson Autorait. There have also been a number of Alex Morgan Deco cards that have sold pretty well (usually in the $50-75 range) but the biggest boy to show up so far is a Sylvester Stallone Autorait with a whopping $700 BIN.

 I have watched a number of case breaks and it seems like half the boxes are good and the other half are duds so you have roughly a 50-50 chance. The problem with the duds is that they are usually the boxes with buy-backs, most of these cards are pretty common like Bowman Chrome and Topps Triple Threads and the cards are no where near the value you would expect from a $150 box.

I was fortunate enough to win Koji Uehara Kogei autograph shadowbox card from Beckett last November. These cards are extremely cool, I am not sure if I would want to take a chance on a box or just pick up the singles that interest me.

Sometimes You Just Have To Say "F%&k Yeah!"

I would not consider myself a lucky collector, my wife has the lucky hand when it comes to opening packs. In the past couple of months I have won a couple of contests including the box of Panini Beach Boys a few weeks ago, but my big time luck seems to have changed last week when I received an email from Beckett’s Chris Olds telling me I had won a Beckett contest. An email that actually left me speechless, something that is quite rare.

 

Here is a link to the Box Buster video where the prize was pulled.

 

A one of a kind (Beckett exclusive), 24k gold Kogei shadowbox Koji Uehara autograph card. This card is freaking amazing and even cooler looking in hand.

 

The card is a standard shadowbox card with three levels, the bottom level is the gold card and there are two layers of acetate above that. Uehara’s face is on the gold card, the full-body shot is on the lower acetate level and the autograph is on the top layer and is hard signed. The card is in a magnetic holder with a “VOID” sticker over the end, so it will be staying in the holder.

 

The back is generic the info “2013 World Stars Toreka…” is actually a sticker across the back. The sticker also includes the word “BECKETT” marking it as an exclusive made for Beckett to do the Box Buster video. The serial number in the bottom right corner is marked as “A* Products”, when I pulled up the web site it is an art work studio so I am not sure what the serial number references, maybe the studio was involved with the gold work.

 

Brothers Inc., the company that produces the World Stars set, makes some very nice cards. The 2013 set is made up of Kogei shadowbox cards, Autorait cards (autograph portraits), Autographed sketch cards, jumbo relics and re-packed buyback mystery cards. Each box contains 2 or 3 cards and runs around $175-200 per box. The product is supposed to be released right after Christmas.

 

This is one card that will never leave my collection. It truly is a thing of beauty.