TOPPS Heritage 2011 (Baseball): 8 Pack Break

I love baseball but do not collect baseball cards to the same volume as I do hockey cards. When I was a kid I collected nothing but baseball cards and for some reason that is not the case anymore. This week I picked up 8 packs of Topps Heritage 2011 Baseball cards. I did the same for the 2010 Heritage product and was fairly satisfied with the product and thought I'd do the same again this year -try out a few packs.

The 2011 Heritage product has a design that mimics the 1962 Topps card series. It is a nice looking set with faux wood borders and a staged, often portrait shot of a baseball player. The bottom right corner of the photos are slightly rolled so that the player's name and team name can be shown. The color and sharpness of the photos are also skewed so that they are reminiscent of older photographs. The skewing is nice because it makes an otherwise boring portrait shot instead dynamic and interesting. The back of the cards are also nice because they include a tasty paragraph of trivia on each player, their combined career stats, and a bit of trivia that is associated with a comic-style drawing of the player in action. Overall, this set is really nice looking and worth picking up!

Each pack contains 9 cards with the chance of subset, memorabilia, and autograph cards. From the base cards I picked up 5 rookies and two high-numbered cards. The high-numbered cards are base cards numbered between 461 and 500 (I believe), and they are short printed. High-numbered cards fall 1 in every 3 packs. In addition, I picked up one News Flash Backs and Baseball Flash Backs cards. I like the baseball flash backs as it highlights the major events of the year this product pays homage to, but the News cards can be weak. I picked up the 'Dodger Stadium opens its doors' card, which is fine, but I've seen some of these cards feature news stories about the Mona Lisa and American politicians. I'm sorry, but I'm buying baseball cards and not random stuff cards. These two cards represent part of the product's subset and are perhaps the weakest part of the product. They are not numbered nor do they stand out from the base cards. I think they could have just done without these. Next, I pulled a check list. There are six checklists in this series and they are not part of the base set. I prefer checklists to be part of the base sets and there is nothing interesting about this card other than the card stock and colors are different from the base set. I don't get this as a checklist should go with the base set cards, and why does this card stand out from the base cards more than the subset cards do? Weird.

Pulls from the 8 packs: 5 rookies, 2 chrome, and 2 relic /memorabilia cards.

OK, I saved the best for last here. From the eight packs I broke, I found two chrome and two memorabilia cards. The chrome cards are the same as the 2010 series, but still look really nice. The chrome cards are numbered out of 1962 (makes sense) and there are multiple versions of them with different numbering schemes. For instance, there are green chrome cards that are numbered out of 100 something and fall 1 per case. Next, I pulled two memorabilia cards or what Topps calls clubhouse relic cards. The first was of Justin Morneau (Twins), and the other was Albert Pujols (Cardinals). The relic cards look nice with clear portrait photos of the players and a decent sized jersey, although some relic cards also feature wood instead of jerseys.

I had heard that relic (and autos) fall one per box so obviously I had lady luck on my side with these eight packs. Even if I had pulled only one relic card in these eight packs I think I would've still been happy. The base set looks good and the chrome cards and relics add a nice additional value. There are two drawbacks to this product. One is that the subset cards don't make sense and blend in with the rest of the set. Second is that I don't like there being too many parallels to a product. From what I've gathered, there is the regular chrome, green chrome, blue chrome, black border, and red something or the other parallels. I think a product should stick to one or two parallel editions. Anymore than that and it waters down the value and interest of the parallels. That being said, I still love the look of the chrome cards.


This product is pickled.

Upper Deck Game Used 2010-11: 1 Pack Break

Picked up a solitary pack of Upper Deck Game Used and am disappointed!

Game Used is an expensive product that features a hit per pack. In each pack there is one memorabilia card, and it would seem one Authentic Rookie, numbered out of at least 699. Last year's product did not seem to have a rookie per pack, so if it is true then this is a nice added value to this year's product. The un-pickling of this product is that the packs are expensive, include at most of 3 cards, and have an identical design from the previous year's.

Cards from 1 pack of Game Used 10-11.

The pack I broke had one base, one memorabilia, and one rookie card. The base cards are ugly, with an uninspired design where the player is silhouetted against an abstract background. There is nothing unique about this card design. The rookie was of Chad Kolarik, a mediocre pull. The rookie card, again, has an almost identical design to last years set. Finally, the memorabilia card was of Shane Doan and was not serial numbered. This is truly unfortunate as for a product that has a high price tag you would think they could number all their memorabilia cards. After all, the Artifacts product has all their memorabilia cards serial numbered yet their packs are a third of the price! Further, while the size of the jersey isn't too bad, it is no larger than the two-piece jerseys that Artifacts offers.

Even though I am giving this product a poor review, I may still pick up another pack. Perhaps the pack I picked up was a dud and the next will be better, however I am more inclined to pick up some more Artifacts over Game Used.

Upper Deck Artifacts 2010-11: 3 Pack Break

Picked up 3 packs of Upper-Deck Artifacts, 2011.

Never been a huge fan of this series as the design has been weak and last year's product had many defects. The primary defect is that the foil along the cards was often scratched or ripped. Nevertheless I picked up 3 packs of this year's series in the hopes of finding one of this year's great rookies.

From the three packs came 8 base cards. The base cards are not numbered and feature a similar design to the 2010 product, including the foiled accents. Unlike last year's product is that the foil is mint from the pack! The cards also have a really sharp look, with the players displayed over a stylized background that is either blue or yellow in color. The highlight of this product is that each pack contains a hit, although the hits can vary from a serial numbered 'Star', 'Legends', or 'Rookie' to a memorabilia or auto. The Star, Legends and Rookie cards are the same as last year's series, along with the hits of memorabilia and autos. The fact that the only difference from the 10-11 and 09-10 products is that the backgrounds have been changed on the base cards does not warrant a 'pickled' status. I still like how you get a hit, even if it is weak because the price of the Artifacts product is affordable and as my three packs show, it is worth it. I would just not recomend sinking too much cash into this product as there are better products out this year.

Hits from the 3 packs of Artifacts.

Getting back to the three packs I opened, the three hits were one memorabilia, one auto, and one rookie. The memorabilia card was a Frozen Artifacts Paul Stastny single color, two-piece jersey numbered out of 150. The autograph was from a less than pickled player. The auto is an unnumbered Gilbert Brule card. The auto is not a hard sign but instead on a sticker. I prefer hard signs, but am not upset over the usage of stickers either. What was nice about the auto is that it was signed in blue ink, unlike the more common black ink used for most cards; I don't get why more autos aren't done in different colors, but maybe that's just me. Lastly, the rookie was of Corey Elkins, numbered out of 999. Overall not bad pulls from three packs, but again the unimaginative design leaves me wanting a lot more. I'll probably pick up a few but not many more packs as I would rather spend the money on a different product.

Crown Royale 2010-11: Pack Break

Saw some good cards coming out of the Crown Royale packs from online posts and thought I'd try my hand. I prefer Upper Deck products to some of the new Panini products that have come out this year, but thought one pack wouldn't hurt!


Crown Royale 2011: Pickled!

A box of Crown Royale contains 3 packs, with 5 cards per pack and each pack has at least one hit: autograph or memorabilia! The packs are reasonably priced and is a nice alternative to the much pricier Upper Deck products that offer a guaranteed 'hit' per pack. Upon opening the pack I was immediately satisfied. In the pack were three base cards that were die-cut with a shiny crown at the top. Base cards are not numbered but there are parallel base cards that are. In addition to the base cards was one subset card: Royal Pains. This subset has a silver embossed area on the card that matches the base set, which is nice that the team behind Crown Royale had put some thought into making a unified set. The Royal Pains cards are also serial numbered out of 499, which is not a bad run as many subsets from other products are numbered at 999 or more. Finally, the hit of the pack was truly OUT OF THE PARK, or I guess rink might be a more appropriate word! What I pulled was a Royal Lineage patch card numbered out of 25! The card featured three pickled (!) patches, one from each: Kyle Okposo, Evander Kane, and Wayne Simmonds. A great collection of young players!

Crown Royale 2011 pack

Now, while I pulled a great pack there is one con to this product. One is that the awesome patch card is slightly curved because (I think) of the size patches. In my experience, Upper Deck patch cards do not warp from their thicknesses. Because of this I do wonder about the quality behind Panini's manufacturing. There may be more cons to this product, but as the one pack I picked up treated me so well I will definitely try my hand again!