Target Made Me Pay in Dollars

Topps comes out with quite a few baseball products this time of year. Stadium Club, Archives, Chrome, Allen & Ginter, even Bowman Platinum is making a comeback. Update will be out right smack in the middle of the postseason. I haven't purchased packs of many of them, but they're starting to trickle in via trade.

Still, I do like a low price point. And Topps Bunt, a new physical product based on their smartphone app, fit the bill pretty well. A 24-card value pack set me back a mere $3 at Target recently. I haven't looked over the whole 200-card checklist yet, but the pack I got was pretty full of players like this:

2016 Topps Bunt #179 Jose Canseco

Jose Canseco was one of the first cards to fall out of this pack. Canseco, of course, was baseball's steroid poster child, and the first of only four players in the 40-40 club (three of which are tainted by steroid scandal). The back of this card has a paragraph about his 1988 season in which he set that mark, but nothing about how "clean" he is. Nor his hilarious Twitter account, which would be perfect for a digital-themed set like this. 

2016 Topps Bunt #138 Nomar Garciaparra

Nomah (sorry, Boston) was in here too, and this turned out to be a bit of a Red Sox hot pack. He's on the Dodgers broadcasting team now, and I heard a bit of him earlier this week as the Rockies regular channel didn't televise either game of Wednesday's split doubleheader. The Rockies and Dodgers were rained out on Tuesday night, and the Rockies came darn close to sweeping L.A., if not for a 9th-inning grand slam.

There were two grand salamis in that game (way better than calling it a Papa Slam), the first from rookie Stephen Cardullo, who recently broke into the majors at the ripe old age of 28, turning 29 the same day he hit his first Major League home run in Game 1. And as I write this, Nick Hundley just hit one to left-center for his first Major League grand slam, helping the Rockies trounce the Diamondbacks to begin the holiday weekend!

If you want Papa John's at a discount today, don't miss out.

2016 Topps Bunt #83 Roger Clemens

Roger Clemens, a 300-game winner, doesn't pop up in sets too frequently anymore. He's definitely not as well-liked a guy as Ken Griffey, Jr., who still gets more cards than most active players. For multiple-team stars like these past three, Topps is definitely using their most well-known team for the photo and logo. You probably won't find too many unfamiliar uniforms in Bunt, but the product could continue to evolve if Topps decides they like the physical/virtual crossover.

2016 Topps Bunt #139 Stan Musial

Stan Musial was always a Cardinal, winning a whopping seven batting titles during his career. As you'd expect, Ty Cobb holds that career record with an amazing twelve, exactly what you'd expect from the all-time batting average leader. Musial won three World Series in his career, and even threw a pitch in 1952 in what amounted to a publicity stunt.

I like the action shot, but I'd put his Archives card from this year above it. The design of 2016 Bunt, which is now starting to show up in the app itself, is pretty plain and logo-dominated. It's been compared to 2011 Topps Lineage, and minus the foil, I can see the similarity. It even has the same 45-degree bend in the bottom design element.

2011 Topps Lineage #33 Tony Perez

Topps was a few years ahead of putting accent marks on player's names, something the MLB is finally taking seriously on uniforms. Tony Pérez, a key member of the Big Red Machine, got a great batting cage shot in 2011 Lineage. I'm fairly close to completing Lineage, but I still need to go through the checklist and figure out which ones I'm missing. It can't be more than a dozen.

Lineage has another similarity to Bunt, and that's the team logos. Logos in Bunt are a dominating element in the design, but Topps was careful to use period-correct logos, just like they did in Lineage.

2016 Topps Bunt #166 Carl Yastrzemski

In a set with all these legendary retired players (which aren't too common in Bunt outside of the insert sets), I think it's the least they could do. No one wants to see Jackie Robinson with a big "LA" logo behind him.

2016 Topps Bunt #180 Robin Yount

So far, it's been a lot of the same players as I pulled in those packs of Archives and Stadium Club. This shot of a young Robin Yount isn't quite as interesting as his dirt bike card, but those 1980s Milwaukee jerseys are pretty cool, back from their American League days. This photo would fit well in one of the insert sets, as we'll see soon.

2016 Topps Bunt #48 Dwight Gooden

Dwight "Doc" Gooden has been in the news lately following his 30 for 30 episode, along with Darryl Strawberry, the darlings of the 1986 Mets. Strawberry's name is even burned into my little league baseball bat. And I love those 1980s Mets uniforms. This pack is worth it for the throwbacks alone.

2016 Topps Bunt #23 Xander Bogaerts

Yes, I actually did pull a few active players, too. The Red Sox streak continues, this time with the third different logo in four cards. Bogaerts is from Aruba, one of only five Major Leaguers to hail from the island nation. The only other one I've heard of is Sydney Ponson. Xander is only in his fourth year, but he's becoming a fan favorite in Boston, and earned his first All-Star selection this year.

2016 Topps Bunt #62 Starlin Castro

Ex-Cub Starlin Castro is now in the same division as Bogaerts, and though the Yankees are in a rebuilding year, they're going all-in on the youth movement. It's been working for the Cubs, and it's good to see the Yankees turning an eye toward the future instead of clinging to aging players. Of course, the Yankees still honor their past, as we can see the memorial #8 patch of Castro's sleeve in honor of the great Yogi Berra.

A lot of bloggers have been suggesting that Topps Bunt could possibly replace Topps Opening Day. Personally, I think just because they're both on the lower-end of the pricing spectrum doesn't mean they don't both have a place in the market. Sure, Opening Day could be better differentiated from Topps Base, but if the market can support numerous high-end products like Museum Collection, Triple Threads, and Tier One, then why not more than one set for the low-end crowd and kids without money to burn on "hits"? Opening Day has all those awesome insert sets, and doesn't focus on retired players the way Bunt does.

At a buck or two a pack, I don't see a problem with keeping them both around.

2016 Topps Bunt #144 Yasiel Puig

Yasiel Puig has gone through some transaction drama in the last month, first being demoted to Triple-A, then placed on waivers, then claimed by the Brewers, only to end up right back on the Dodgers after the transaction fell through. Not many players in this small set have spent recent time in the minors, but the back of this card has it right—Puig has a "flamboyant style".

The back of each card also reminds us how this set blurs the lines between physical and digital. It's physical enough that I couldn't buy it with digital coins at the Target checkout lane, but Topps was sure to print "Collect and Trade this card in the Topps Bunt app today!" on the back of every card. Below that are logos for both the Apple and Google Play App Stores.

It would be cool if I could actually add this card to my digital Bunt collection just by virtue of owning a physical copy, but that's not the case (yet). At least they gave me a scratch-off code for a digital pack, and I won another code in a recent contest at Sport Card Collectors.

I'd also love to see Topps develop a web app for Bunt, as the mobile apps are a bit clunky and hard to navigate, especially when your collection grows.

2016 Topps Bunt Unique Unis #UU-3 Shin-Soo Choo

And now we come to the inserts. I only found two, so I can't quite say whether these are up to par with the awesomeness found in Opening Day, but I find them pretty appealing. Fans of throwback uniforms are sure to like this one, Shin-Soo Choo is sporting some 1970s-era Rangers gear, and Topps even gave us the date of this card for us! I always appreciate that. It's a hint of 1997 Upper Deck, and also their Topps Now product.

2016 Topps Bunt Programs #33,924 / #P-30 Carlos Gonzalez

Using that code I won from Sport Card Collectors, I was lucky enough to pull Carlos Gonzalez' card from the Programs insert set, which even has the same card number on the virtual back. It also has a Digital card number up in the 30,000 range (amazing how many digital cards they've released). The base cards of retired players have the same backs as their printed counterparts, but active players that can score points in the app's fantasy scoring system get the same card back as normal Bunt digital cards. Last time I posted a Bunt card, I was on an iPhone 4S with a different aspect ratio, and Topps was about 30,000 cards from designing this one.

I'm sure this makes a lot more sense if you've actually used the app. My collection of digital Pokémon is coming along nicely, too. 

2016 Topps Bunt Light Force #LF-8 Luis Gonzalez

The final (physical) insert card from the pack is dubbed "Lightforce", and I must admit that I don't really get the theme here. It definitely has sort of a spacey galaxy thing going on, and it seems to be color coded to the old Diamondbacks uniforms. Which is nice, because it looks like it could actually be a shot from the Hubble Space Telescope. 

After looking at eBay, it seems like all the cards from this insert set have the same color scheme, it just happened to coincide perfectly with Arizona's old colors. Which by the way, are light years (sorry) better than their current dark gray monstrosities. That link opens a PDF, by the way, in case you are still running Acrobat 6 on Windows 98 and are worried about program startup times.

I guess that tongue-in-cheek sentence above really does indicate that maybe, just maybe, digital cards aren't so crazy after all. It wasn't so long ago that it was quite a lengthy ordeal to open a PDF on an underpowered computer over a dial-up connection. But now I can go walk around outside and collect Pokémon, open PDFs in multiple tabs in barely more than the blink of an eye, have my car read me a text message, deposit a check through my phone, and now carry around on that phone the same cards that I put in my 9-pocket pages.

Welcome to the future.

Happy National Baseball Card Day!

If you've ever glanced at trending hashtags on any of the major social networks, you've likely run across something like "National [product] Day". National Popcorn Day is in mid-January. National Scotch Day was toward the end of July, as was National Chicken Wing Day to wrap up July.

You're darn right I had wings that day.

Next month, we have Talk Like a Pirate Day on the 19th, and Elephant Appreciation Day on the 22nd. Something to look forward to. You may or may not "celebrate" these holidays, and you're unlikely to be getting a paid day off for any of them, but if you're reading this, you ought to know that today is National Baseball Card Day!

This probably explains why the Rockies TV team were talking cards during the game yesterday in the bottom of the 5th. They opened and compared their haul from a few packs of 2016 Topps, and play-by-play announcer Drew Goodman regaled us with tales of pulling Willie Mays cards, "flipping" cards, and learning back in the early '80s that a prized Ozzie Smith rookie card was worth much less than he and his friends thought it was. Color analyst and former Rockie Ryan Spilborghs reminisced about stale gum, and his unopened Upper Deck set with Ken Griffey, Jr.'s rookie card, which he incorrectly said was 1991.

So in honor of this momentous occasion, there's no better time to see the highlights from a blaster of 2016 Stadium Club, making a strong case for the best Topps product three years running.

2016 Stadium Club #167 Micah Johnson

Awesome photography remains a staple of Stadium Club, and here that means bunting! Over time, this card of Micah Johnson will surely find its way into the many bunting mini-collections in the Cardsphere, including mine that Jeff from 2x3 Heroes kickstarted for me.

Pretty much everyone has compared this year's Stadium Club to 1997 Fleer, and at a glance, it is very similar. The fonts are a little different, Stadium Club uses silver foil instead of gold, and 1997 Fleer lists the position.

1997 Fleer #339 Jeff Bagwell

1997 Fleer also has those cool little foil seals above the last name, denoting for Jeff Bagwell that he was both an All-Star and a League Leader in 1996. I'm not sure in what, though. I had to look that one up, and his 48 doubles led the NL that year.

The difference mainly comes in on feel. 1997 (and 1996) Fleer used an unusual matte finish that's very distinctive. Stadium Club cards are at least twice as thick, and while in a page or display case these might be hard to tell apart, when it's in your hand, it couldn't be easier.

2016 Stadium Club #146 Johnny Bench

There are a lot of horizontal cards in this set, and many of them are terrific! Like he did in 2014, Hall of Fame Reds catcher Johnny Bench makes an appearance, here guarding the plate against the Mets in Shea Stadium. I have to wonder if this is from the same game as his 2014 card, a card I believe was also taken in Shea based on the memorabilia he's signing.

Autograph shots and an imminent play at the plate? No wonder this brand is so great.

2016 Stadium Club #294 Jackie Robinson

As in past years, black-and-white photos of old-time players make a stunning appearance. Jackie Robinson appears in Ebbets Field in a photo that I can't ever recall seeing on a Topps card. Robinson seems to suffer the most from recycled photos, as Night Owl has repeatedly pointed out. In fact, after looking at that post, I recognize this photo in a much more closely-cropped and colorized format from 2010.

The photo looks way better in its original form, capturing the essence of Ebbets Field in one of its final years. There's an ad for 1956 Chevrolet on the outfield wall, so the move to L.A. was just a few years away. Chevrolet still maintains an advertising relationship with Major League Baseball, giving away shiny new GM products to MVPs of both the All-Star Game and World Series. Other car and gasoline ads line the wall, and something that you won't see at ballparks anymore, a tobacco ad.

2016 Stadium Club #6 Brandon Phillips

This behind-the-batter shot is a common photo in recent Stadium Club sets, and it's a tough shot to get with the batter's box and baseline so perfect. Those chalk lines get destroyed after just a few batters, so this one of leadoff hitter Brandon Phillips in an away uniform is clearly the first batter of this game. Maybe even the first pitch.

2016 Stadium Club #3 Matt Kemp

Here's a similar photo of Matt Kemp, then with the Padres. He became a Brave just before this year's trade deadline, his first time playing away from the NL West. I can't tell quite what's going on here (he might be rounding third), but it's a perfect all-dirt "Tatooine" card, a prime candidate for a mini collection, one that Daniel collects.

2016 Stadium Club #113 Andrew McCutchen

McCutchen has another one of these horizontal beauties, and the batter's box line is already pretty disrupted. It could still be the first inning, though. To my eye, McCutchen looks abnormally small here. I guess it's just a weird angle, but you'd expect to see more grass in this photo, and maybe part of the catcher. That seems to be the dirt path back to the dugout behind his head, a feature found in PNC Park. I still think this was taken with a weird focal length or something, since it's unusual to see a batter so alone yet inside the batter's box.

2016 Stadium Club #142A Corey Seager (RC)

There are vertical cards, too. I just got a little caught up with all that infield dirt. Rookie of the Year candidate Corey Seager is showing off his maple bat in the locker room, and he gets the "RC" logo just under the Stadium Club logo in the upper left. Seager's birthdate of 4/27/94 makes him just a couple weeks younger than Dinger, who was "hatched" at Mile High Stadium on 4/16/94.

2016 Stadium Club #93 C.J. Wilson

The photos get weird for a bit, so brace yourselves. C.J. Wilson is doing some sort of karate move in the infield without his hat on. He's holding his blue glove between two fingertips in his right hand, and under the magnifying glass, I think that's a baseball card in his left hand. Maybe even his own.

Pitchers.

2016 Stadium Club #227 Robin Yount

That makes Hall-of-Famer Robin Yount leaning on a dirt bike next to a saguaro cactus seem, well, still rather weird. But it just adds to the charm of Topps Stadium Club.

Good to see he has a helmet by his side. That sport can be dangerous otherwise.

2016 Stadium Club Contact Sheet #CS-7 Miguel Cabrera

Triple Crown winner Miguel Cabrera had the only insert card in this $20 blaster, one of ten cards to be found in the Contact Sheet insert set. Clearly, it has a filmstrip theme going on, though not quite as literally as those 1994 Leaf Slideshow inserts. Still, a photography-themed card fits with the ethos of Stadium Club perfectly.

Allow me to nitpick a bit. If this really were a set of negatives from a roll of film, the colors would be inverted. I do like the checkmark over the bottom photo, as though that were the one selected from the roll. But that's not actually the photo used on Cabrera's card in the main set, which would have really tied this insert set in to the master product better.

2016 Stadium Club Gold #98 Ian Kinsler

In addition to that insert card, I pulled a couple parallels. This one of Kinsler (to go along with his silver-foil base card) is the Gold parallel. Though you might not find a batting cage shot in 1997 Fleer, the gold parallels would be a bit easier to confuse. Despite the similarity, I still think there's a low likelihood of confusion, way less likely than a reprint from a Topps set like Cards Your Mom Threw Out, or even something like Donruss Originals.

2016 Stadium Club Black #229 Babe Ruth

Finally, here's a Black parallel, seeded 1:8 packs. On average, you'll find one of these in each blaster, but not necessarily of The Sultan of Swat, Babe Ruth himself. As huge an influence as he was, it's surprising that he's not found on more cards. Photos of him seem to be somewhat rare, but getting my Black parallel on a monochromatic card is perfect. I don't know if the black lettering would look quite as good on a full-color card. I'll just have to keep my eyes peeled for one next time I'm at a card show.

Thanks for reading, and enjoy your National Baseball Card Day!

Break Time!

The All-Star Break is upon us.

It's billed as the halfway point of the season, but in reality it's about a week or so past that. The Rockies have predictably begun their July slide, winning only three of their last seven, though somehow they've managed to hold onto third place. They're an even .500 in the four games I've attended this year, and I witnessed them trade blowouts with the Phillies this weekend, stopping by Coors Field twice over a four-game set to enter the Break. Thursday's 11-2 win was plenty of fun to watch, with Trevor Story hitting two home runs, including one monster to deep left field, almost to the concourse.

Sunday's game was much more in the Phillies' favor. The Rox dropped the contest 10-3, despite Carlos Gonzalez crushing one to the third deck in right-center. I've seen him hit more than a few that direction this year, though none quite as far as that. I hope it bodes well for his appearance in tonight's Home Run Derby, where he's matched against the defending champion, Todd Frazier. Like Cincinnati last year, this year's home crowd in San Diego also has a hometown participant to root for in Wil Myers.

This year's field is heavily weighted toward the NL West, which is sending three participants—Myers, CarGo, and Corey Seager. The other five divisions have one representative each. Fortunately for the Derby, Petco Park is less of a pitcher's park than it used to be, which may not matter much anyway with batting practice pitches.

2016 Topps Archives #104 Evan Longoria

In addition to the Home Run Derby selection, the All-Star Final Vote has been completed. Evan Longoria finished fifth out of five in the American League final balloting. Personally, I gave my AL votes to Ian Kinsler, though he finished third to Michael Saunders. Of course, my NL votes went to Trevor Story, not only because he's a Rockie, but because he had quite a day on Thursday when Final Vote balloting was underway. Sadly, he finished third to Brandon Belt, but if his rookie season is any indication, he'll have plenty of other chances to play in the Midsummer Classic.

2016 Topps Archives #57 Charlie Blackmon

Charlie Blackmon appeared in 2014's All-Star Game, going 0-for-2. Arenado and CarGo are the lone Rockie representatives this year, but Blackmon's made enough of a name for himself (or has a good enough beard) to earn representation in 2016 Topps Archives.

Usually it doesn't take this long for me to start talking about the cards, but I've seen a lot of baseball in person this weekend, which is my idea of a great summer. Blackmon gets the 1953 Topps treatment, one of three classic designs found in 2016 Archives, along with the 1979 design used for Longoria's card, and another you'll see later.

Longoria, by the way, was one of the players the Rockies passed over in the 2006 Draft, along with Clayton Kershaw, Max Scherzer, and a few other now-obvious selections. The Rockies did draft Blackmon two years later, though this 1953-style card doesn't provide that level of detail.

2016 Topps Archives #130 Tom Seaver

I haven't bought much 2016 product yet, and when I took this trip to Target, I was on the hunt for the recently released Stadium Club set. There was none to be found, so I ended up with this pack of Topps Archives instead. It wasn't my first choice, but I consistently gravitate toward this set, and the distinctive matte finish on the cards still remains.

This card of Tom Seaver represents a common gripe about Topps Archives. From 1977 through 1982, Tom Terrific pitched for the Reds, yet he is shown as a Met on this 1979 design. There are lots of factors going on here, since he played for several teams throughout his career, and Topps only chose three set designs for the base set this year. He's probably most well-remembered as a Met, the team he played for when he won his only World Series championship in 1969.

I suppose we're a fickle bunch, us card collectors. But let's be honest here; Evan Longoria wasn't even born in 1979. And Charlie Blackmon certainly wasn't born in 1953. His parents might not even have been. But here we are, complaining about Tom Seaver appearing as a Met on the '79 design instead of as a Red. Which is fine with me. Isn't the whole point of this set to see players as they weren't pictured?

2016 Topps Archives #12 Robin Yount

I guess franchise players like Robin Yount take that debate out of the equation. He earned his way into the 3,000 hit club with one team, and though he never won a World Series, he was the face of the Brewers from almost their inception until 1993, a few years before they switched leagues.

Like Yount, quite a few players now in the Hall of Fame hung up the spikes in 1993, including Nolan Ryan, Carlton Fisk, and George Brett. Other than the inaugural ballot in 1936, 1999 marked the first time that at least three players were elected on their first ballot in the same year. Fisk needed a second ballot to get in, but Yount, Ryan, and Brett all got in during their first year of eligibility. That's becoming less rare, as both 2014 and 2015 each saw three first-ballot players enshrined in Cooperstown, primarily the Braves' 1990s rotation.

2016 Topps Archives '85 Father/Son #FS-GG Ken Griffey Jr. / Ken Griffey Sr.

Ken Griffey, Jr., along with Mike Piazza, are the newest members of the Hall of Fame. Junior outshined his dad in that department, but still got a nice 1985-themed Father/Son card in this seven-card insert set. Both Griffeys hail from Donora, Penn., which is worth keeping in mind for a later card in this post. This card is new enough to reference Ken Jr.'s induction to the Hall, while also serving as a checklist of sorts, providing the card number of each man's rookie card.

2016 Topps Archives #279 Josh Donaldson

After 1953 and 1979, the third set represented in Archives this year is 1991, one of the first sets I ever collected. They only made minor changes to the design, just slightly modifying the team logos in the lower right (never really noticed that chevron before), and changing the anniversary counter in the upper left from 40 to 65. The watermark logo on the back is changed in the same way, but they got the brick red color just about perfect.

Twenty-five years really zips by. Seeing a set you collected as a kid in an Archives set is the baseball card equivalent of hearing songs you listened to in high school on the Oldies station. Still, these 1991 cards might be my favorite ones yet to appear in any Archives set.

2016 Topps Archives #271 Ted Williams

Ted Williams, the last player to hit over .400, gets a card in the 1991 style as well. These are sort of like sunset cards, in that we get complete career statistics on the back. Williams played from 1939-1960, and that .406 mark appeared in only his third season. It is pretty cool to see a stat like that on such a recent card, especially since the industry hasn't ever had the opportunity to feature a current .400 season on the back of a post-war card.

In case you were wondering, Williams went 185-for-456 in 1941. Interestingly, he had exactly one more hit in the following season, but somehow worked in 66 more at-bats, good for a still-awesome .356. Those early-'40s years helped him on his way to a .344 lifetime average, which stands as sixth-best in baseball history.

I find it interesting that Topps chose the 1991 design for The Splendid Splinter, as Williams started up his own card company in 1993, though he was a bit late to the party, closing up shop during the strike of 1994 after just two sets.

2016 Topps Archives #282 Lou Brock

I pulled a couple other 1991 cards, and though you wouldn't know it so far, this turned out to be a bit of a Cardinals hot pack. Lou Brock joins a long list of Hall-of-Famers, and while I have few cards from his era, this photograph is new to me.

2016 Topps Archives Blue #61 Kolten Wong /199

This is the only parallel I pulled from the 18-card pack, and while I like Kolten Wong as much as the next guy, he hasn't made as much of a name for himself yet as most others in this pack. Granted, there are some real superstars here, but a blue-bordered parallel numbered to 199 is a hit no matter how you slice it.

2016 Topps Archives #141 Stan Musial

The Cardinals hits wrap up with this Stan Musial. It's just a base card, but it might be my favorite one in the whole pack. I absolutely love that Popeye expression he's wearing, as the legendary lefty is definitely staring something down. The old Topps logo appears, like it does on the rest of the '79s, and the back of the card even has a trivia question on it.

Your category is Baseball Dates. The question is, "What happened on June 2nd, 1925?"

Nothing in particular jumps out at me, but the upside-down answer gives almost any baseball fan more than enough information. That was the day "Lou Gehrig replaced Wally Pipp—and the rest is history."

Lou Gehrig appeared in last year's Archives set on a 1983 design, and he's in 2016's set on the same 1979 design as Musial. Not sure if there's a connection there in how Topps chose its trivia questions, but a reference to Gehrig's amazing streak of 2,130 consecutive games played on a card of the 1988 Donruss Puzzle guy from Donora, Penn. shows how awesome this set is. When you look closely at a pack like this, it's not even a disappointment that Target was out of Stadium Club.