While the football variation of playoff contenders seems to be garnering all the attention the basketball version has had a bit of a shake up. This year there is an emphasis on manufactured rookie patch autographs. Manufactured patches don't normally go down too well with collectors, so it'll be interesting to see the reaction to this product. With the emphasis on rookies game worn jersey/patch cards aren't really possible, so I'm guessing this is Panini testing out the waters to see whether the patch cards get a better reception than event worn cards. Below is a box break on this product. The product will retail at $6 a pack and $120 a box, with many online retailers offering pre-sale deals. The product will officially hit shelves on the 23rd of February.
Also in the break Panini dropped a couple of exclusive announcements. Including the fact that the NBA version of the 24 carat gold cards will be available in NBA Gold standard, which is due out in May. No more details about the cards were revealed. It was however revealed that as well as Kevin Durrant Panini has signed deals with Paul Pierce, and David Robinson. Other things revealed with very little detail in the video was that there would be buybacks and veteran autographs as part of this years NBA playoff contenders patches.
A few hours after writing a post in which I talked about the first golden ticket being found it turns out that another one has been discovered by a member of the blowout cards forum. With the Aaron Rodgers being found yesterday, today the Mark Sanchez version has been pulled. The member is intending on redeeming the card at Panini headquarters tomorrow, so hopefully we wont have to wait too long to get a proper scan of one of these cards. Until then this will have to do.
Yesterday night details of the short prints in Panini's latest release of Playoff Contenders Football became available online (the full list can be seen at the bottom of this post). I have to say I'm a bit underwhelmed and a little bit disappointed. I like the idea of players having short print cards of them in their alternate/throwback jerseys, and my initial impression was that was what Panini was going to do with this release, however that's not the case. As you'll see from the list at the bottom of the page some of the variations are as simplistic as a player having the ball in the other hand, or the player standing in a different position. I personally think this is a bit of a squandered opportunity, I can't see many collectors chasing short prints because a player has the ball in different hands. I hope in future that Panini takes this idea further and has all the players in alternate jerseys for short prints next year.
Keeping on the theme of Playoff Contenders Football, someone has already pulled a redemption card of the Aaron Rodgers version of the much talked about gold ticket card. The card is now listed on eBay and looks set to easily break the $1,000 card.
2010 Panini Contenders Football RPS Rookie Ticket Autographs - Some Feature On Card Autographs - -184 Jermaine Gresham (White Jersey SP) 201 Andre Roberts (White Jersey SP) 202 Armanti Edwards (Black Jersey SP) 203 Arrelious Benn (White Jersey SP) 204 Ben Tate (Facing Forward SP) 205 Brandon LaFell (Running With Ball SP) 206 CJ Spiller (Blue Jersey SP) 207 Colt McCoy (Brown Jersey SP) 208 Damian Williams (Blue Jersey SP) 209 DeMaryius Thomas (Blue Jersey SP) 210 Dexter McCluster (Red Jersey SP) 211 Dez Bryant (White Jersey SP) 212 Emmanuel Sanders (Black Jersey SP) 213 Eric Berry (Left Arm Covers # SP) 214 Eric Decker (Orange Jersey SP) 215 Gerald McCoy (White Jersey SP) 216 Golden Tate (Left Leg Covers Name SP) 217 Jahvid Best (Blue Jersey SP) 219 Jimmy Clausen (Black Jersey SP) 220 Joe McKnight (Green Jersey SP) 222 Jordan Shipley (White Jersey SP) 223 Marcus Easley (Ball In Right Hand SP) 224 Mardy Gilyard (Left Hand Out SP) 225 Mike Kafka (Green Jersey SP) 226 Mike Williams (Exch) 227 Montario Hardesty (Ball Covers Numbers SP) 228 Ndamukong Suh (White Jersey SP) 229 Rob Gronkowski (White Jersey SP) 230 Rolondo McClain (Hands Above Waist SP) 231 Ryan Matthews (Facing Forward SP) 232 Sam Bradford (Both Hands On Ball SP) 233 Taylor Price (Ball In Right Hand SP) 234 Tim Tebow (White Jersey SP) 235 Toby Gerhart (Ball High On Chest SP)
This just my round-up and opinion on some of the hobby news stories that have broken over the last day or two.
First up as many of you will be aware Topps diamond card give-away has been launched, giving people a chance to collect and trade classic cards from the last 60 years of Topps baseball. The giveaway also gives people a chance to win Topps diamond rings and 1/1 cards that have diamonds embedded in the cards. Within a few hours of the giveaway starting people are already reporting having redeemed one of the diamond embedded cards, the first collector with proof posted this to the blowout cards forum. I personally love the idea of the giveaway, and it adds a level of ease to trading that us overseas collectors aren't used to.
Today Panini announced that collectors will be able to collect real gold cards from this years incarnation of playoff contenders football. The cards will be inserted into packs in the form of redemptions to stop the cards becoming damaged, and one would assume to stop people pack searching the packs for incredibly valuable cards. There are 52 cards that feature veterans as well as rookies. Panini have also released details that there are in fact short printed variations of the rookie on card autogrhs the product is famous for, however information how limited these short prints are hasn't been released to the public. A more accurate description of the gold cards and a box break of playoff contenders can be seen below.
And finally topps has announced today that they will be inputting buybacks for the highly sort after Albert Pujols rookie auto into packs of 2011 Tribute Baseball. There will be 30 buybacks, each of the buybacks will be good for one of the following cards.
2001 Bowman Chrome Autograph
2001 Topps Finest Autograph
2001 Topps Reserve Autograph
It may just be a ploy to get people to buy one of their least popular products, but it has the looks of a ploy that may just work on a lot of collectors.
I'm still relatively new to the concept of how products are put together, but something piqued my interest when watching the production line video of National Treasures Football that Panini posted on their blog last night.
At 4:52 the camera hovers on a patch card of Steve McNair that's waiting for an autograph. Now this is where things seemed a little odd to me. I assume that the autograph will be sticker and not cut, but Steve McNair passed away in July of 2009, so we can assume that the autographs being used weren't originally intended for this product. I'm not sure whether it's common practice for companies to hold back reels of sticker autograph's to use in multiple sets, but it must have done so in this case. I'm sure many Titans fans are excited about having a chance to pull an amazing looking cards of one of the best players in franchise history, for me however it get me questioning whether other auto's in this set (and other sets) are simply left overs from other products. Don't get me wrong I love the look of this set, but for such a high price I would expect more than left over sticker autograph's, then again this could be common practice that I'm just not aware of yet. I have tweeted Track Heckler to ask where the McNair autograph's came from, but at the time of writing this I haven't received a response. If this is a one off it's understandable, but for such a premium product to simply be using run off stickers (and this possibly affecting the checklist and design of the cards) seems a bit lazy to me.
People always say that it's important to make a good first impression, and wow does timeless treasures do that. Panini have released the second round of images of their soon to be released high end football product. The main selling points are on card autos for all the rookies, massive jumbo game worn patch autos, and a checklist featuring some of the best players to ever play the game. Panini have also managed to get cut auto's from legends who sadly no longer with us including Walter Payton and Jim Thorpe.
The only set back is that the 8 card pack (2 base, 6 auto or mem cards) will set you back $400! If I could afford it I would definitely take a gamble on this set. Topps are really going to have to step up their game if Five Star Football is going to compete with this.
Below is a few of the cards feature and a video looking at some of the mem cards that are yet to be signed. For a more complete gallery check out Panini's blog post here.
