Product Review: 2012 Bowman Chrome Baseball Hobby Box

The annual Bowman Chrome Hobby box came out last week and like all years past provides a lot of players you have not heard of before. For a lot of the baseball collectors this box passes them by and they look for the single cards on auctions sites or trading forums. For the in-depth Baseball collector this is the box that most people wait for. it is packed with minor league players that were not apart of the 2012 Bowman release and also include autographs from these players.
The box specs are 18 packs per box with 4 cards per pack. You will receive 8 Refractors, 1 Futures Game Insert, 1 Franchise All-Stars Insert and 1 Autograph. New for this year Topps included a second autograph every third box. So if you land one of these your receiving an extra hit in your box.
Refractors are the same as they have been with Blue, Purple, Gold, Orange, Red and Super Refractor. All numbered from 250 to 1/1.
The inserts this year are also new with Future Game All-star, Franchise All-Star and Legends in the Making. These are included into the boxes with ratios of 1:18 to 1:24 for the base inserts. The Legends in the Making have Autographs which are numbered from 15 or less each. They are using the same crisp Die-cut design they have used with Finest and Platinum. And to think this might be enough, Topps has added in Game Used items from the Futures Game as redemption cards. This can be redeemed for Hats, Bats and Jersey's Topps obtained at the game.
I wasn't going to pick up this box for 2012 as in previous years I wait a bit for the prices to go down and then pick up a couple and sit on them for a year or two. I was in my hobby shop picking up some supplies and saw he had two boxes left on the counter and I decided to purchase one. I brought it home and was going to store it away for a couple of years and see if anyone could be in there. After looking as some box breaks and the checklist i decided to rip it open and maybe pull one of those redemption cards or a sweet autograph. Here are my results:

Base: 26 (no doubles)
Base Rookie Prospects: 35 (no doubles)
Refractors: (5) Mike Trout, Brian Pointer, James Shields, Corey Hart, Daniel Bard
Blue Refractor: Yadier Molina /250
Legends in the Making: Clayton Kershaw
Franchise All-Stars: Beltran/Taveras (Cardinals)
Future Game All-Stars: (2) Alfredo Marte, Rymer Liriano
Autograph: Chase Davidson

I think I should have stuffed this one away in storage for a bit. I wasn't overly happy with this box. The card designs are great and really standout with the chrome but overall I wasn't too impressed. I did go in not knowing what i was going to get and knowing that some or almost all of the cards in here would have no value for a few years to come. I think the main reason for being a little disappointed was the refractors. I would have liked to seen another color in there rather than just the one blue refractor.

I did manage to pull a Legends in the Making Die-cut of Kershaw, these cards are very sweet looking. I really do love the die-cuts from Topps this year, very impressive.the autograph of Chase Davidson is not too bad, he is a decent prospect in the Houston organization. The On-card autographs also help of course for secondary market value once these players make it up to the big league. I think with the addition of the Futures and Franchise All-Star inserts they have taken away from the Refractors or other Rookies to pull from this product. They are nice cards but will hold no value in the community.

For this product it is really a hit or miss on who you pull. If you pull a Top Prospect, Refractor, Black or Veteran Autograph you have really have made good on this buy. Again you might just have to wait a while for those prospects to make it up and they could take an average or below average box to the upper levels.

Gambler Overall Rating: 3.6 out of 5
Cost: 3.5/5
Autographs: 3.5/5 
Parallels: 3.5/5

Design: 3.5/5

Rookies: 5/5
Fun Aspect: 3/5