Tag Archives: 2013 Bowman Sterling

Product Spotlight: 2013 Bowman Sterling

Posted by on 12 January 2014 Comments Off on Product Spotlight: 2013 Bowman Sterling

Getting it right the second time around

To appreciate 2013 Bowman Sterling, you need to look back at 2012 Bowman Sterling.  Which I didn’t write a review for.  That means you’ll have to get through a quick 2012 review before we get to the good stuff.  Sorry.

2012 Bowman Sterling – Underachieving to the Max

If you can’t see the autographs, try tilting your screen

It was hard to get too excited about 2012 Bowman Sterling.  Now without any memorabilia cards, this was an autograph-only release with a token base set.  You would expect some high-quality autographs from a set like this.  And there they are in that image above.  Really.  Look closely.  Trust me, just look in those big dark spots.  See those slightly darker areas?  Those are autographs.  Yeah, these are some awful cards.  Terrible design, terrible colors, and players nobody really cared about by December of 2012.  Rookie Kirk Nieuwenhuis was the default Mets Rookie Card autograph in 2012, so he only had a few dozen more interesting autographs on the market at the time.  Gavin Cecchini and Kevin Plawecki had their first autographs the month before in 2012 Bowman Draft Picks & Prospects, but those were really the only ones anyone needed.  Unless there are some sweet refractor autos in here.

Taste the rainbow. Or maybe just something yellow.

Nope, just these.  The most common refractor varieties are shown above: base refractors numbered to 199, gold refractors numbered to 50, and black refractors numbered to 25.  So much color and variety.  Bonus points if you can tell the difference between base and black refractors without looking at the serial numbers.  With autographs like this, the Matt Harvey base Rookie Card may be the most interesting card in 2012 Bowman Sterling; Harvey’s only other Topps Rookie Cards are in 2012 Topps Update.

2013 Bowman Sterling – Second Attempt

And that brings us to 2013.  On the surface, nothing had changed from 2012.  Sterling was once again a premium autograph-only release with a token base set, essentially a chromium version of Bowman Inception with a bigger autograph checklist (plus the aforementioned base set).  One look at the cards though will tell you that this is nothing like 2012 Bowman Sterling.

Autographs

This time around, the autograph cards in Sterling are a more visually pleasing portrait orientation with large design elements and a signature background that makes the ink more visible.  It’s not going to compete with Bowman Chrome for the most desirable autograph card style, but it stands well enough on its own.  On top of that, the player selection is greatly improved from 2012.  The two Mets with autographs in Bowman Draft, Dominic Smith and Andrew Church, are here as expected, plus late-season replacement Rookie Card signer Zack Wheeler (on stickers unfortunately).  That alone is a modest upgrade over 2012, but then we add the first autographs from L.J. Mazzilli (son of Mets favorite Lee Mazzilli) and the first Mets autographs from Noah Syndergaard (the other big chip in the R.A. Dickey trade along with Travis d’Arnaud, who had his first Mets autographs in 2013 Bowman Inception).  Sterling has something unique to offer instead of being filled with leftovers.

And that’s not even considering the refractor autographs.  Black refractors are out, replaced with blue refractors at the 25 level.  Gold stayed the same, only at the fifth level down instead of the second.  Base refractor numbering went down from 199 to 150 and three new levels were added: green at 125, ruby at 99, and orange at 75.  The ruby coloring wasn’t quite as distinctive as it could have been, but this was a huge improvement over 2012.

Base Cards

And we haven’t even gotten to the base cards yet.  Inserted at a rate of just one per pack (compared to three per pack for autographs), these aren’t easy to get.  The three top names from the autograph list show up here: Wheeler, Syndergaard, and Smith.

As for the refractors, the base cards don’t get the three new refractor levels and go straight from base refractors (numbered to 199) to gold refractors (numbered to 50).  The lack of common variations and poor scanning results make these the weakest cards in Sterling.

Inserts

We’re not done yet.  Next up are a pair of The Duel inserts featuring Dominic Smith and Matt Harvey.  Topping it off is a sapphire reprint of David Wright’s Bowman rookie card.  Wright joins Jose Reyes as only the second Mets player in this set, which ran throughout all of the Bowman products in 2013.  All that’s left are the autograph inserts, most of which are on stickers and all of which are numbered to 50 or less.

The Verdict

As one of the final products of the year, Bowman Sterling is an easy one to overlook.  2012 Bowman Sterling faded into the background, but 2013 Bowman Sterling proved that Topps still had something new to offer after more than two dozen products.  Let’s hope that attitude carries over into 2014.

Best Mets Cards of 2013

Posted by on 6 January 2014 Comments Off on Best Mets Cards of 2013

Pitching dominates this year’s awards

It’s 2014, which means I’m running a bit behind on my 2013 wrap-up articles. The last few posts have covered most of the interesting cards from the last year, so now it’s time to narrow things down to just the best of the best so you don’t have to dig through 5,000 words for just the few things you’re interested in. Only 1,800 words…

Best Manufactured Material

2013 Topps Series 2 Tom Seaver Proven Mettle Coin

Not much has improved in this category since last year, so this award goes to a Seaver coin again. At least there was more player diversity this year and it wasn’t just all Seaver all the time.

Worst Manufactured Material

2013 Topps Pro Debut Travis d’Arnaud Hat Logo Patch

So many things are going on here, all of them wrong. Wrong team, wrong logo, wrong, wrong, wrong. I don’t know what Topps was going for with this one, but it sure wasn’t anything that made sense.

Best Parallel Insert Set

2013 Topps Archives Orange Parallel

Last year, I went with the Archives gold parallel here. This year, Topps changed the formula and the gold parallel just didn’t look that good. The orange parallel on the other hand was something unique among the multitudes of parallels released in 2013. Available only one per pack in 25 cent Archives packs at participating hobby shops, these cards fluoresce in UV light. Unfortunately, I didn’t pull a single Met out of more than 100 packs and had to go to eBay for these…

Best Base Insert

2013 Bowman Inception Jose Reyes Sapphire Reprint

With parallels, autographs, game-used, and manufactured material accounting for most of the inserts out there, it can be hard to find contenders for this category. I found three: the Jose Reyes sapphire rookie reprint from Bowman Inception, the Tom Seaver Cut to the Chase die-cut chrome insert from Topps Series 2, and the Matt Harvey Prodigies die-cut refractor from Topps Finest. I’ll give Reyes the edge here, though it should be noted that a David Wright version could be found in Bowman Sterling (the Reyes looks better).

Best Rookie Card

2013 Panini Prizm Scott Rice

Five Mets had Rookie Cards in 2013: Jeurys Familia, Collin McHugh, Zack Wheeler, Scott Rice, and Juan Lagares. All of them had at least a Rookie Card (and all of the standard parallels) in base Topps except for Scott Rice. After 14 years in professional baseball, Rice made his MLB debut with the Mets in 2013 and received Rookie Cards in just 2013 Panini Prizm.

Best Sticker Autograph

2013 Topps Opening Day Mr. Met Mascot Autograph

An autograph from the best sports mascot ever? Nothing else even comes close.

Best On-Card Autograph

2011 Bowman Platinum Matt Harvey

How does a card from 2011 Bowman Platinum qualify for the 2013 awards? Well, when it takes two full years for the cards to just be signed, you can’t really call these 2011 autograph cards. Harvey autographs were some of the hottest cards released this year and none were dated 2013. It’s been a strange year.

If you insist on having autographs from the actual 2013 product year in this category, here are a few worth noting.  Shown here are the first Mets autographs from Travis d’Arnaud and Noah Syndergaard, the last Mets autograph from R.A. Dickey, and an autograph on a thick slab of clear plastic.

Worst Autograph

2013 Topps Series 2 Collin Cowgill Chasing History Autograph

Sticker autograph, photoshopped black jersey, player who was traded shortly after the card was released. And then Topps made a second attempt in Topps Update that at least fixed the jersey issue. This card has no reason to exist.

Best Uniform Memorabilia Card

2013 Topps Tier One Matt Harvey
2013 Topps Triple Threads Jeurys Familia
2013 Topps Five Star David Wright Jumbo Jersey (blue jersey variant)

Technically, this should probably go to the 2013 Topps Triple Threads Harvey/Wright/Wheeler triple jersey card, but that was out of my price range. Instead, have a bunch of blue jerseys. Except for the Wright, which I haven’t been able to get yet…

Best Patch Card

2012 Panini National Treasures Matt Harvey

Depending on the variant, this one could qualify for best jersey or patch. Either way, this is one of those cards that was a must-have regardless of the price before Harvey’s card prices went through the roof. Because now you sure can’t afford it.

Best Bat Card

2013 Topps Triple Threads R.A. Dickey

Bat cards just aren’t very common anymore. This year, the only Mets bat card worthy of this award isn’t a Mets bat card at all. R.A. Dickey’s first bat cards came after all of his cards had been changed over to the Blue Jays, but I’ll let that slide.

Worst Memorabilia Card

2013 Topps Triple Threads Kirk Nieuwenhuis

Poor Kirk Nieuwenhuis. After being all over 2012’s autograph and memorabilia cards, he found himself with very little MLB playing time in 2013 and far too many cards. He got September off after the AAA season ended and then had loads of memorabilia cards in Triple Threads. After already having triple jersey autograph cards in last year’s Triple Threads. As if the unnecessary Future Phenoms card weren’t enough, Nieuwenhuis had three single jersey autograph cards. The green jersey cards I can see, but everything else is just filler. I suppose it isn’t really fair to single out Kirk when so much of Triple Threads was unnecessary filler, but the award has to go to someone.

Best Hobby Shop Promotion

Panini Black Friday

Every year, card companies try to find ways to get people to visit their local hobby shops. 2013 was filled with various promotions, from the Topps Series 1 Spring Fever redemption packs to Panini’s Boxing Day packs. Topps Archives had the most with vintage card redemptions, 25 cent packs, and ’80s card redemption packs with Topps Series 2 base, blue sparkle, and silver slate parallels. The best of the bunch, as usual, was Panini’s Black Friday promotion that combines discounts on Panini products with bonus packs containing cards featuring some of the hottest players in four sports with parallels, autographs, and unique memorabilia. Matt Harvey was the lone Met featured in this promotion.

Best New Product

2013 Bowman Inception

Coming into 2013, I thought the last thing the hobby needed was another Bowman product. With five Bowman products on the market already, what more was there to cover? Bowman Inception brought premium thick autograph cards and no filler. All on-card autographs, no chipping problems, no base cards, and no chrome. In other words, something different. Travis d’Arnaud and Jeurys Familia are the only two Mets in the base autograph sets, about average for the 62 total cards between the rookie and prospect autographs. As an added bonus, Jose Reyes was also among the sapphire reprints in this product.

Most Improved Product

2013 Bowman Sterling

Elsewhere in the Bowman franchise, Sterling was in sorry shape in 2012. With some of the most boring and uninspired autograph cards on the market and little else going for it, Bowman Sterling was a product without a purpose. For 2013, Sterling kept much of the same structure as the previous year’s product with a few key changes. Autograph orientation switched from landscape to portrait, a minor change that greatly improved the design. Other design changes improved how the base cards scanned to the point that the signatures no longer blended into the background. The biggest change though was with the refractor parallels. 2012 Bowman Sterling had six refractor parallels and none between base refractors (numbered to 199) and gold refractors (numbered to 50). The 2013 edition reduced the numbering on base refractors (now numbered to 150) and added three tiers above gold: green (numbered to 125), ruby (numbered to 99), and orange (numbered to 75). Canary diamond print runs were also increased from 1 to 3 and 1/1 superfractors were added. On top of that, the autograph checklist was increased from 88 to 106 with the Mets representation including the first certified autographs from L.J. Mazzilli and the first Mets autographs from Noah Syndergaard. More players and more parallels with a better design made 2013 Bowman Sterling a welcome improvement over last year’s afterthought.

Most Disappointing Product

2013 Panini Hometown Heroes

I’m tempted here to go with 2013 Topps Finest, but at this point I have no expectations for a product with lots of history and no real direction. Panini Hometown Heroes on the other hand was a new product that promised a new take on the formula that brought us Topps Archives and Leaf Memories. What it delivered was a bland design filled with autographs that have been done better by Topps over the last two years. While it did bring a few new or hard-to-find autographs, the design deficiencies made it hard to get excited about any of them.

Autograph Product of the Year

2013 Topps Archives

No surprises here. With 15 former Mets in the Fan Favorites Autographs set, including 8 shown as Mets (and the first autographs from Keith Miller), nothing else comes close. What’s even more impressive is that Topps featured an entirely new group of autographs in the second year of the new incarnation of Archives, for a total of 32 former Mets (15 shown as Mets) over two years of Fan Favorites Autographs. That’s still well under ten percent of the former Mets with certified autograph cards, so there’s plenty of room for next year’s Archives to keep the streak going.

Honorable Mention

2013 Leaf Memories

Leaf is no slouch in the autograph department and Leaf Memories combines 1990-style autographs from their three prospects, Rafael Montero, Domingo Tapia, and Dominic Smith, with buyback autographs from players from the 1980s and early 1990s. Among the buyback autographs are the first from Kevin Elster and Rick Aguilera, plus countless favorites from some of the best Mets teams in recent memory. Well, relatively recent at least. The large number of redemption cards though keeps Leaf Memories from threatening to dethrone Archives.

Game-Used Product of the Year

2013 Topps Museum Collection

Now in its third year (though only its second under the Museum Collection brand), some of the shine is beginning to wear off Topps Museum Collection. It has all of the memorabilia variety we’ve come to expect: jumbo jersey and bat relics, autographed memorabilia cards, quad relics, four-player relics, etc. This year, the highlights were jumbo bat cards from Darryl Strawberry, autographed double and triple memorabilia cards from R.A. Dickey, and jumbo Matt Harvey jersey cards. Jumbo jerseys from Johan Santana and Ike Davis weren’t quite as exciting and the usual assortment from David Wright seemed like a repeat of last year. Still, this year’s cards sold better than last year’s counterparts, which may be why I wasn’t quite as interested in them this year.

Honorable Mention

2012 Panini National Treasures

As usual, nothing could match the quality and player/material diversity of Museum Collection. Panini made a good showing though with 2012 Panini National Treasures. With autographed jersey and patch cards from Dwight Gooden, David Wright, Matt Harvey, and Kirk Nieuwenhuis, plus various booklets featuring Tom Seaver, Gary Carter, and David Wright and plenty of other former Mets like Duke Snider, Richie Ashburn, Keith Hernandez, and Jose Reyes featured in the other memorabilia sets, it should be obvious why National Treasures was a big hit.

Adventures in Group Breaking

Posted by on 21 December 2013 Comments Off on Adventures in Group Breaking

Breakin’ 3: Bowman Sterling-y

In case you’ve been living under a rock (or just don’t follow the sports card industry), group breaking is the hottest trend in sports cards.  For a (relatively) small fee, collectors who can’t afford the high prices of modern cases can still get a shot at a big hit, provided that they buy into the right slots.  Formats vary, but there are opportunities to get a big return on a small investment (or the reverse).  I’ve been doing the cost-benefit analysis on the various opportunities I’ve seen and finally found the right mix of return and risk in the year’s final offering from Topps as broken by collector favorite Brent Williams.  But before we get to that, let’s take a look at a couple of smaller breaks I tested the waters with earlier in the year.

2012 Panini Prizm

The first break I considered this year was the 2012 Panini Prizm team break from Brent Williams.  I decided that it wasn’t worth the risk at the asking price when I would probably walk away with a Lucas Duda autograph as the big hit.  Instead, I found a cheap 4-box break to buy into.  That should have been good for two base team sets on average, which would include a Matt Harvey Rookie card (because this was a 2012 product).  In the end, I got what I was hoping for: one full team set, a second team set minus one card, an extra Ike Davis, and a few inserts.

And of course a Duda auto.  There was no getting around that one.

2013 Bowman Draft Picks & Prospects

I never really know how to deal with Bowman Draft.  Prices for some of the cards that come out of it can be quite high, but the long-term value is highly volatile.  Positioned at the end of the base Bowman line, most of the Rookie Cards are duplicates from earlier releases (with new photos), which adds to the confusion.  This year, with increased production, decreased numbering on colored refractors, and more variants than ever before, I just bought up base and chrome lots, the base autographs, and a few cheap parallels and left it at that.  To make things interesting, I also bid on a few player slots in a 5-case break from RynemCaseBreaks.  I ended up with only two, Andrew Church (non-auto only) and Zack Wheeler.  With a total cost including shipping of less than $20 and a practically guaranteed 30+ card lot of base/chrome cards for each player, I wasn’t too worried about coming up empty.  Because there wasn’t much of a chance at a big return anyway.

I actually watched almost all of the 5-case break live and it was quite entertaining.  Some slots came up big while others were big losers.  The Bowman Black slot, a bargain at well under $100, was the big winner with both Kris Bryant and Austin Meadows pulled from the 5 cases.  That’s over $500 worth of cards for a slot that could have been a total loss.  On the Mets side of things, the $20 Andrew Church autograph slot came up big with base, refractor, and orange refractor (#d/25) versions pulled in the break.  The $120 Dominic Smith autograph slot on the other hand got just a base autograph (worth about $20).

My slots were not big winners.  In addition to the expected base and chrome cards, I got four parallels: two Zack Wheeler refractors, a Zack Wheeler ice parallel, and an Andrew Church black wave refractor.  Out of all of the base Mets pulled in the break, the best card was a green refractor numbered to 75.

2013 Bowman Sterling

And now, the main event.  Bowman Sterling isn’t exactly my favorite product.  Released at the end of the year, it usually features a mix of rehashed rookies and draft picks, a less popular second helping of autographs we’ve already seen in more interesting products.  Last year, a terribly bland design with refractors that barely looked like refractors did nothing to help the checklist of repeat signers.  Prices on the secondary market reflected these problems; I picked up a gold refractor autograph (#d/50) of Kirk Nieuwenhuis for $1.50 plus shipping and a black refractor autograph (#d/25) of Kevin Plawecki for about $10 more.  The Bowman Black autographs had some decent value, but the massive chipping that plagued thick Topps autographs in 2012 caused them to lose some of their appeal.  Sterling needed a revamp to justify taking a slot in the Topps lineup.

2013 Bowman Sterling is a completely different product from its 2012 incarnation.  Sure, the basics are still the same: 3 autographs per pack, 18 total autographs per box, dual sticker autographs, Bowman Black autographs numbered to 25, etc.  This time though, the autographs are in portrait orientation (typically more highly desired than landscape) and green, ruby, and orange refractor parallels fill the space between refractors and gold refractors.  Most Rookie Card autographs are, unfortunately, on stickers, but the product delivers where it counts: prospect autographs.  2013 draft picks Dominic Smith and Andrew Church return after Bowman Draft, but joining them are Noah Syndergaard with his first Mets autographs and L.J. Mazzilli (fan favorite Lee Mazzilli’s son) with his first certified autograph cards.  Add in some Zack Wheeler sticker autographs and you have a solid Mets checklist with a few must-haves for any serious Mets collector.

Shortly after the checklist was released, Brent Williams announced the possibility of a team-based group break of Bowman Sterling on launch day.  With 106 rookie/prospect autographs in 2013 Bowman Sterling and 144 total autographs in an 8-box case, the odds of getting all of a team’s base autographs are pretty good.  A quick calculation put the over/under of the value of the Mets slot at $90.  For the right price, this would be a great break to get in on.  Which meant that I probably wasn’t the only Mets fan who would be after this slot.

Two days later, Brent Williams announced that the Bowman Sterling break was on.  I was catching up on Twitter while waiting in line at the post office to mail out recent auction sales.  And I was a couple of hours behind on my tweets.  Skipping to the top, I saw that the price breakdown had just been posted.  The Mets slot was priced at $90, right on my estimated cost.  At that price, even getting just the base Mets autographs wouldn’t be a bad deal, especially with them all in one package sent the day after launch.  There was a chance of getting less, but there was also a decent chance of getting some nice bonuses.  20 minutes after the announcement, I claimed the Mets slot without hesitation.  And then I waited two long days for the break to begin.

2013 Bowman Sterling 8-Box Case Break – brentandbecca

I tried to keep my expectations in check.  All I wanted were the five base Mets autographs, one of the base Mets cards, and something extra.  Unfortunately, I missed the start of the break and came in about halfway through.  Among all of the Pirates, Philies, and Yankees autographs, I saw only a Noah Syndergaard base card and two L.J. Mazzilli base autographs.  From what I heard, I had missed a pair of Andrew Church base autographs and a Dominic Smith green refractor autograph.  That still left me three base autographs short of my goal as the break entered its final minutes.  And then the rest of them started hitting one after another.  The base Dominic Smith auto and a green refractor Zack Wheeler auto came up at the end of box number 7.  Box number 8 held the final two base autos, Syndergaard and Wheeler.  And with that, this break had exceeded my expectations.

And that’s it.  Nothing huge, but everything I wanted.  I also had a chance at both The Duel inserts featuring Mets, but I lost out on both of them to the other team featured on the card.  Now I’m just waiting for the post office to deliver the cards.