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.