Stream of conciousness while checking out the 2008 Donruss Threads sell sheet

You can follow along with the sell sheet here if you like. It's a pdf file so be careful with crashy browsers.

Out in October... four bucks a pack.

Looks like '08 Football Threads.

I got a pack of that by accident and haven't bothered to post it to A Pack A Day yet.

Maybe in a couple weeks.

Pete Rose... Nice.

I don't give a crap if he sold nuclear blueprints to the Chinese. Put the bastard in the Hall already.

Put the plaque in the john if it bugs you that bad.

Inside the urinal.

I don't care, he's got more hits than anyone else ever. Put the bastard in already.

Four hits a box... 10 inserts.... blah blah blah.

Ooo- Shoeless Joe relic.

HANK AARON RELIC.

Me likey.

Ok... 100 card set. Legends and... draft picks.

Well, it's kind of a Legends set at least.

Wait, draft picks... aw crap. The Braves traded theirs for a crappy Glavine Swan Song.

Rats.

50 rookie autos and... 150 regular autos? That's a lot of autos... I wonder who the non-rookie autos are.

Blah blah blah 8 billion parallels inserts and jerseys and etc. etc. etc. HOLY SWEET MERCIFUL CRAP

OH SWEET MYSTERY OF LIFE AT LAST I'VE FOUND YOU

Hank Aaron Diamond King?! Well, there's one card I have to get before I die.

Excuse me... I believe I have come down with a case of the vapors.

Hank. Aaron. Diamond King.

God Bless Donruss.

Cool, shoeless. I'm liking this set.

Wait, what? 12 different versions of the Hank Aaron Diamond King? Yikes.

Well, on the bright side, more Hanks out there. I should be able to find one of 'em.



Clear sticker rookie autos. The dames call it "Quality".

Anyone who knows what that sexist reference means is all right with me.

Every year UGA baseball plays Wofford and I saw a bunch of games against them when I was in Athens.

I think one of those games might have been a no-hitter by Brian Powell, but I'm not really sure.

I could have bought a signed baseball by Brian at one of the games once, but I passed. I regretted it afterward though. The next game I went to a game I asked about them, but they had to stop selling them because the NCAA got on their ass about student athletes making money for anyone other than the NCAA or some crap.

The NCAA sucks.

Ok, I'm sort of losing interest in this product. What next.

Oh goody. More Americana cards. Just what we need, more celebrities in baseball carOHMYGAWD

LOU!


HEY ABBOTT!

This is the best thing evar! Oh wait... they short printed them to 500 serial numbered copies? weak. Totally weak weak we-what what WHAT??

LOU COSTELLO RELIC CARDS???

*swoon*

*wakes up*

*looks at sell sheet*

*faints again*

*regains composure*

I WANT LOU COSTELLO'S PANTS!!!!!!!1

*so much for regaining composure*

Wait, what? Signatures?

They dead.

Ghosts don't sign.

It says numbered to 100 or less, I'm guessing less.

Maybe it's a cut.

Whadda I mean maybe?? They dead. it hasta be a cut.

Eh, I don't need a sig, I just want his pants. Or maybe a tie. I should probably stop talking about Lou Costello's pants.

(but I want them)

This concludes the creepy part of my sell sheet review.

Donruss Threads: releasing October 22nd, $4.00 per hobby pack, 24 packs per box, 4 autographs and memoriboblia cards per box with at least 2 autographs, 10 inserts per box, lord knows how many parallels, AND LOU COSTELLO'S PANTS MAYBE.

All information is accurate as of posting (except for the end of the creepyness bit) content is subject to change to Chick Gandil, a 48th round pick of the Cubs, some American Idol rejects and Joe Besser's undershorts without warning.

It's Baaaaaaack!

2008 Allen & Ginter Sell sheet on Wax Heaven.

Design based on the N26 "World's Beauties" set.


New stuff:

Abe Lincoln's Pubes

State Flags

World Leaders

World's Greatest Victories

Framed Cloth Cards

Historical Icons insert

Baseball Icons insert


Old Stuff:

Non-Baseball Champions

Historical Figures

Minis

Framed autos and relics

Rip cards

N43's

Normal sized baseball cards with actual baseball players on them.

Second Thoughts on 2008 Goudey

See Also: Stale Gum and Wax Heaven, who got to it first.

My first impression of this product was a bit snippy. OK, it was a lot snippy. It kinda sounded like I tried to squeeze in an entire George Carlin routine (you know which one it is, be careful when you click things) into a one-sentence review. In my defense, at least some of it was due to over medication and lack of sleep. That is not to say that Upper Deck's ballooning of the SPs, getting stingy with the minis and putting cheezy president cards into the base set didn't have a lot to do with it as well. After sleeping on it, I've got a little better view toward the product. Here's my take on the sell sheet, I'll tackle the checklist later this evening:

$4.99 per Hobby pack, 8 Cards per pack.

Obviously Upper Deck hasn't figured out yet that charging two bucks more per pack than they charge for retail packs is dumb.

18 backs per box, 12 boxes per case.

They did figure out that the $120+ price point per box was scaring away potential customers. $90 a box is still a little stiff, but more competitive with Heritage and Allen & Ginter. You still get the same number of hits per box, so the value (such as it is) has gone up a tick.

One Memorabilia card per box.

Pretty typical. According to the Checklist (.pdf file) there are 90 Goudey Memorabilia cards consisting of the usual suspects. Players range from Cal Ripken Jr. to Akinori Iwamura with everything in between. Braves memorabilia cards listed are Chipper, Frenchy, Teixeira and Smoltz. A second memorabilia set like the "Immortals" from last year aren't in the checklist, but it's early so they might sneak something else in.

One Autograph per box.

Again, this is the same as last year. There's a 60 card Goudey Graphs set that if the sell sheet, er powerpoint presentation is correct, looks like a base card with an autograph. The Goudey Graphs checklist (all this is preliminary, mind you) is all over the map. You could get a rookie like Billy Buckner or Chin-Lung Hu, a star like Griffey or Jeter, or a Legend like Mike Schmidt or Willie McCovey. Braves autos in the set are Chipper, Kelly Johnson and Yunel Escobar.

There's also a Goudy Sports Royalty Autographs set, featuring 100 cards with 100 signatures. These cards are one per case, but who knows if they are a box topper or inserted into packs. The checklist is really all over the map with this one, you could get a Tiger Woods and pay your bills for a few months, or get Fedor Emelianenko, whoever that is. Oh crap. I would pick on the mixed martial artist dude for my 'bad' auto, wouldn't I. Scratch that, you could get Tiffany Cohen. Pretty much any of these autographs are likely to be horrifically scarce though, especially the non-major sports types that don't sign often. You'll end up with a plain Goudey Graphs of David Murphy or Steve Pearce so don't worry about it.

Seven Short Prints per box.

Ok, I'll get to the upping of the number of short prints by almost 50% in due time. First I want to complain about why they decided to up the number and make them harder to get at the same time. I have no idea why the hell they didn't just insert them 1:2 packs like normal people would. What kind of stupid ratio is 7:18? Do 1:2 packs or 1:3 packs for us math deficient people trying to calculate odds in our heads, please. (7/18 equals .38888 for anyone interested)

Seven Mini Cards per box.

Upper Deck, I [Carlin] HATE you. Why do you give me a lovely set the size of original Goudey cards and then yank the rug out from me the next year? Ok, I can handle them being relegated to the parallel ghetto, poor unappreciated mini cards always end up there anyways. But at least insert them one a pack!!! No, now we got this stupid 7:18 thing again, what is this the new golden ratio?? WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE?!?!??? Ya know some of us out here can't really afford three stinking CASES of a product in order to have a shot at a set, ya know? Stupid, stupid, stupid. Put 'em one per a pack or throw 'em in the trash bin and just put in another base card. Damn, this annoys me. Surprisingly, this is the biggest gripe I have with this set.

Four Yankee Mirror Thingys per box.

Apparently Upper Deck is not satisfied that people despise mirror sets enough. They look at the A-Rod Waste of space set and think "Why, our crappy mirror set doesn't cause nearly the venomous invective that is hurled toward that Topps issue, so we must surely be doing something wrong". Look carefully at the ratios and the number of packs per box. Seven SP's + Seven minis + 4 Yankees = 18 packs per box. Now, if I'm reading this right, it looks like in any given pack you will get a short print OR a mini OR a Yankee. I may be wrong and you could possibly get all three plus bot the Auto and Relic and a '34 Napoleon LaJoie buyback all in the same pack theoretically, but since the big buzzword is "value" nowadays, I doubt it. One insert a pack is easier to collate and gives the poor slob who can't afford cases at least one good card in the one pack they rip. So now anyone pulling a Yankee is cut out of the SP and the mini, thus fostering hatred and annoyance with the useless mirror set. Once again, Upper Deck will get more verbal abuse hurled at them then Topps does, by gum!

One Sports Royalty Autograph per Case.

See above. Again, I'm not sure if these are box toppers or case toppers or what.

One Goudey Buyback per Case.

These were in a special case topper pack along with a Diamond Stars/Double Play card last year. I'm guessing they do it again to reward the case buyers. All us Charlie Buckets buying one lone pack with a fiver we found in the snow can go take a flying leap.

One Yankee Stadium Legacy Memorabilia card per case.

They might actually stick these in the packs! That's a 1:216 shot at a Dale Berra Mirror bat relic or something like that.

Chase Cards:

i.e. the ones they'll put into the boxes that go to Beckett for their Video Breaks.

Goudey Cut Signatures

Pretty much if you don't have a Cut Auto in your product, you're '88 Donruss nowadays. I hope they're not being literal and cutting up original signed Goudey cards to stick the signature into new cards. Heh, that's silly, they would never do that...
w...w-would they?

Signs of History Exchange Card

Basically SuperMegaCrazy cut autos.


Yankee Stadium Legacy Buybacks

Now this one is intriguing to me. Did Upper Deck basically take all the Yankees out of the vintage Goudeys they acquired and call them Yankee Stadium Legacy Buybacks? Or did they buy all the Yankee cards auctioned off on The Bench and re-insert them into packs? You never know nowadays....

Stealth stuff not on the Sell Sheet, but on the Checklist:

There's an insert set based on the '52 Berk-Ross "Hit Parade of Champions" set in the checklist. No clue if they are a straight insert, a reasonably collectible box topper, or short printed to hell and serial numbered to 5 or whatever.

Ok, that's the sell sheet. If Upper Deck wants to make a product that will beat Allen & Ginter they need to do these things:

1) Hobby Packs - 10 cards per pack, 1:2 SPs, 1:1 minis. Everything else stays the same, $4.99 per pack, 18 packs per box, etc. You can even make the Berk-Ross cards numbered to 15 each.

2) Retail Packs - 8 cards per pack, 1:2 SPs (you got 130 of the goddamn things so give us a break), NO minis, a Retail version of the Berk Ross cards inserted 1:4 packs or so. Be creative and give the retail Berks a different colored back. $2.99 per pack, 24 packs per retail box, 7 packs and a bonus pack in the blasters.

That's all ya gotta do Upper Deck, and you will have a better set than 2007 Allen & Ginter. I'm not making any promises you'll beat 2008 A&G, but you'll have a damn fine set.

Checklist review in minute detail this evening assuming the caffeine high doesn't peter out.

2008 Topps Opening Day

Another brand new sell sheet is out, this time Topps Opening Day. You can check it out here (warning: pdf file) and download the checklist and product information sheet here (#22 and 23 under the baseball section). If you liked last year's Opening Day, you'll probably like this one too.

Once again, it is 99 cents for 6 cards. The design is just like every other Opening Day product, a color variation on the Topps base set. The sell sheet is a bit confusing though, I can't tell if it has a red border with white piping around the photo or vice versa. I think the white border card is the serial numbered parallel though after zooming in on the pdf. These also have gold instead of silver foil. I would have thought the world had enough bright red borders for at least a century after 1990 Donruss, but what do I know. The design flaws that are causing the most gnashing of teeth are still evident in this sell sheet. The borders are still much wider than they need to be, and the Topps logo not only eats a chunk out of the photo, but the Opening Day logo does as well. I like the Topps base design, but the red borders here seem to be a bit much.

Once again there is a serial numbered parallel card in the Hobby packs. Each card in the set is numbered out of 2008 and has the date of opening day stamped on it. Last year's hobby packs had them one per pack if I remember correctly. Last year's puzzle insert set returns with a 28 card set dropping at 12 per box. There's also a brand new insert set called 'flappers'. According to the sheet they are "Individual cards that "transform" into multiple cards". I have absolutely no idea what these could possibly be, and they look like your run of the mill insert card by the picture on the sheet. The only card I ever know that could transform into multiple cards was the '80-81 Topps basketball set, and I was told they weren't worth anything if you ripped them apart at the perforations. There are 18 of them, two per box, so buy a box and have one to transform and one to keep pristine. There are also autograph cards and press plates. before you scoff at the idea of finding press plates in a dollar pack, the only press plate I've ever pulled was from a box of Topps Total, so it can be done. Granted, Total had 4 times as many cards in the set, but that's not the point. The autograph set features 9 rookies and has a red border that fades into a blue border on the bottom, making them by far the nicest looking cards in the entire set. Here's the auto checklist for you prospectors out there:

Jeff Baker
Jason Bartlett
John Buck
Kevin Gregg
Anthony Lerew (hooray, a Brave!)
Glen Perkins
John Rheinecker
Nate Schierholtz
Jason Botts

The checklist is fairly typical. 195 veteran cards that are loaded with stars and 25 of the rookies they are allowed to put in a set before the season starts. 65 of the veteran cards are previews of series two, including a Mark Teixeira card that I absolutely have to have. Topps put Tex in a hideously ugly sweatshirt in his first card as a Brave in Updates & Highlights and I'm despondent that crappy looking card is the only one I have of him in a Brave uni. Sadly, Mascot cards are no longer on the checklist, which is a damn shame. I'd much rather have a Phillie Phanatic than another useless Jose Vidro card. At six cards a pack, even with a small set size you'll still have to bust two boxes for a chance at a complete set. The set quite frankly probably isn't worth anyone's time, but it will probably be very tempting since it's release date of March 10th will be smack in the middle of spring training games. I've got a box of old Opening Day cards in the basement as testament of how hard that temptation is to resist.

You see anything flapping on this thing?

Bowman Heritage Lives!!! (sort of)

While scrounging around the net for info on Allen & Ginter, I stumbled across Magazine Exchange, which has a link to new product info for various gaming and sports cards. My go-to site for sell sheets has always been Georgetown Card Exchange, who offers scans of the various sell sheets offered to dealers. Recently Upper Deck had apparently not been giving them anything to scan, but I don't really care for their products so it hasn't really concerned me that much. The sell sheet link at Magazine Exchange provided an answer to what happened to their scans: UD's sell sheets are now in PowerPoint format for some ungodly reason. Seriously, it's like they are daring us to hate them. But would I dedicate an entire post to complaining about Upper Deck's annoyingly corporate ways? Well, yeah, actually I would. I'm kinda surprised I don't do it all the time to be honest. But that's not the point of this post! While looking though their list of upcoming products I found out that Bowman Heritage will return!

Now, I am an unabashed fanboy of pretty much any vintage ripoff product out there. Topps Archives, Fleer Goudey, Topps Heritage, UD Vintage, T206, T205, Cracker Jack, UD Playball, Topps Fan Favorites, Turkey Red, Bowman Heritage, Allen & Ginter, I love it all. The only vintagy type set I have not liked is Upper Deck Origins, and the best way I can explain my reaction to that set is to compare it to Tim Burton's Mars Attacks. I was so looking foward to it that when it came out and it wasn't good I was crushed by disappointment. Horrible shiny green borders, all the good cards short printed, eighty dollar pack prices... Ug. Just painful. That was the set that officially turned me sour on Upper Deck.

I loved last years Bowman Heritage, and even I have to admit that set was a bit of a trainwreck. They tried way too hard to make the set look low-tech to match the original '49 set (I really need to scan my Kenny Rogers mini card with the big green booger hanging out his nose), The skip numbered short prints smacked of an intern sending the wrong order to the printers, and the complete fiasco with the 'white' parallels is inexplicable. To my dying day I will never understand why they just didn't go with the Name on Front variation for their parallel set. Even so, I liked the set overall. The mini cards are awesome, and unlike many, I like the little forced printer errors and blotches that try to mimic printing presses from long ago. Besides, Bowman Heritage has been an excellent value product for the past few years for collectors. A (usually) nice design, a completable set, tons of rookies, three hits a box and it's dirt cheap because everyone else hates it.

Even though I liked it, I'm weird and I am pretty sure no one else liked it that much. I was convinced the awfulness of the set killed the brand and there would be no 2007 Bowman Heritage. I was wrong! (warning - pdf file) '07 Bowman Heritage returns with the 1952 design and is set up much the same as last year's set. 300 card base set with 50 short prints, 5 of which are Mickey Mantle in various Bowman designs. Sadly the mini cards are gone, but they kept the anti-pack-searching 'rainbow' parallel. The prospects insert set is back, this time using the '54 Red Heart design. A good choice, it's a clean, classic look that was previously appropriated for an Upper Deck Vintage set if I'm not mistaken. The usual relics, autos and printing plates are there and you get two box toppers this time - a two card pack of ARod Home Run continuity cards (bleargh) and an oversized card copying the 50's Red Man Chewing Tobacco design (w00t!). The sheet gives a release date of October 2007, so we can expect it to hit shelves just before Thanksgiving.

Unfortunately the sell sheet concludes with this ominous statement:

Bowman Heritage baseball retires in style by honoring the popular 1952 Bowman design and promising 1 autograph and 2 relics per box!

Retires in style? I guess that's it then, the cutback to 17 sets for 2008 means BH gets the chop. That is assuming Topps isn't taking it for granted that they will be part of UpperFleerDeckCo by this time next year. Of course this begs the question: How in the name of Cthulhu can you have a Bowman Heritage tribute series and never get around to doing a 1953 set?? Seriously, isn't that supposed to be the most beautiful set of all time or something? They greenlit the '48 design which is painfully boring, the '49 design which is quaint yet fugly, the '54 design which is kind of meh (pastels just ain't my thing), and the '56 'what coulda been' design where the rookies looked nice and the vets were just OK. Topps chose these 4 designs over 1953 Bowman. Ouch. Maybe Topps has that design stashed in their back pocket for some reason. Maybe they figured the 1989 Bowman regular set copied it already so what's the point. Maybe, just maybe, Topps decided they are sick of the Bowman 'Black borders with Red/Green/Blue accents' motif and are going to have all future Bowman sets using the '53 design. Maybe I'll assume the latter and just enjoy the final edition of Bowman Heritage.