'52 Rookie Card Short Prints

Topps sure has had an obsession with the '52 Topps design lately. Football Heritage swiped the design this year (although admittedly they used up 6 of the nicer football designs last year) and Basketball got their own '52 themed set. Now the 2006 rookie class get their own retro cards in the 2006 Topps Rookies - 1952 Edition set.



When I first heard about this set my first reaction was a stifled yawn - how many more times do they need to rehash that design? Actually seeing it for myself changed my opinion. Instead of simply fading the player photographs to make them look more retro like they did for the Football and Basketball sets, Topps airbrushed/photoshopped the pics to make them look more like the original set. The results are quite attractive, most cards I've seen do have an original '52 feel to them. Concidering a number of the subjects probably debuted in September for a late season cup of coffee, the fact they were able to turn this set around so quickly is impressive. Even more impressive is the fact that 311 players made their major league debut this year. That's a lotta rookies.



The set has 312 cards, 311 rookes plus a Mickey Mantle rookie reprint. Parallels include Chrome (numbered to 1952), refractors (numbered to 552) and Gold refractors (numbered to 52). There are two insert sets, Dynamic Duos featuring two prospects on one card (but no Braves - booooooo) and Debut Flashbacks where a veteran's Topps rookie card photo is transmogrified into the '52 design. the Flashbacks also can be found with the Chrome, Refractor and Gold parallels. Finally there's a healthy bunch of Autographs to be found and a Relic set featuring a ticket stub from a prospect's debut game. Don't count on finding one of these relics at Wal-Mart though - 16 subjects numbered to 10 each means very long odds.



Of course, since it's a heritage set that means there's short prints. SP's pack out at a 1 in 5 ratio, not bad concidering a 300+ card set is being sold in 6 card packs. Anything less would make the SP's more common than the commons. There are also 15 variation cards in the set. Ok, ok, Bowman Heritage collectors calm down... these variations aren't slight differences in the dithering algorithm used when printing the cards. No, this time they have 10 rookies with the old 1952 logo and 5 Mantle cards with different colored backgrounds. OBVIOUSLY different backgrounds that is. The short prints are also mercifully segregated to the back of the set, numbers 276-312 to be exact.

Beckett has the SP list here, but I'm gonna list 'em out anyway.

2006 Topps Rookies - 1952 Edition set Short Prints
276 Miguel Perez
277 Paul Phillips
278 Omar Quintanilla
279 Guillermo Quiroz
280 Darrell Rasner
281 Kenny Ray
282 Royce Ring
283 Brian Rogers
284 Ed Rogers
285 Danny Sandoval
286 Joe Saunders
287 Chris Schroder
288 Mike Smith
289 Travis Smith
290 Geovany Soto
291 Brian Sweeney
292 Jon Switzer
293 Joe Thurston
294 Jermaine Van Buren
295 Ryan Garko
296 Cla Meredith
297 Luke Scott
298 Andy Marte
299 Jered Weaver
300 Freddy Guzman
301 Jonathan Papelbon
302 John-Ford Griffin
303 Jon Lester
304 Shawn Hill
305 Brian Myrow
306 Anderson Garcia
307 Andre Ethier
308 Ben Hendrickson
309 Alejandro Machado
310 Justin Verlander
311 Mickey Mantle
312 Steve Stemle

2006 Topps Rookies - 1952 Edition Variations
37 Jeff Karstens Old Logo
52 Willy Aybar Old Logo
88 Matt Cain Old Logo
107 James Loney Old Logo
163 Paul Maholm Old Logo
178 Shane Komine Old Logo
216 Melky Cabrera Old Logo
217 Jonathan Broxton Old Logo
225 Cole Hamels Old Logo
233 Chris Duncan Old Logo
311 Mickey Mantle Yellow Background
311 Mickey Mantle Red Background
311 Mickey Mantle Green Background
311 Mickey Mantle Orange Background
311 Mickey Mantle Black Background

I'll never figure out the new rules and regulations on rookie cards. How exactly does Kenny Ray get an official MLB rookie logo when he played 13 games for Kansas City in 1999? Surely Bowman or somebody put out a card of him back then. Oh well, mine is not to question why, mine is but to go and buy. Speaking of buy, it might be best to pick this up sooner rather than later. I'm not seeing much of this stuff out there, and they do have a tendancy to create shortages of 'hot' products like this (Allen & Ginter, anyone?). It depresses me that I've been thoroughly trained by the marketing weasels though. Oh well, worst case scenario I eBay the Braves and save my pennies for the 2007 Topps release.