Monday, September 30, 2013

Product Review: 2013 Topps Chrome Baseball Hobby Box

Last week was special for Baseball collectors as 2013 Topps Chrome arrived. Chrome has a very big following within the community and is one of the most popular products collected within Baseball Collectors. For the last 3 years we've found ourselves to be waiting on the day that Chrome is released and piece together the set for our own collection. This year is no different, and with the surging rookies for 2013 included this will be yet another great set to collect.

Hobby boxes come 24 packs with 4 cards, providing you with only 96 cards in each box. This makes collecting the sets or subsets a bit of a challenge but fun at the same time. With a set of 220 cards you will need a few boxes to put together a full set due to the other goodies Topps packs into each box.

The other goodies for collectors are the famous Refractors that make Chrome what it is. Refractors, XFractors, Blue, Black, Gold, Sepia, Red, Camo, Atomic, Pink, and SuperFractors make up the mass of parallels you can pull from a box. Not only the Base Cards have these Refractors but also the Rookie Autographs are included.

This year there a re a few new things to look for within the product. One being the 25 Base Card Photo Variations. These are popular and are a little tough to find so far. Of course the top players are included in these which will make it a hunt for those super-collectors to pickup. Some new inserts are also included into the 2013 edition. Topps 1972, Chrome Connections Die-Cut, and Dynamic Skills Die-Cuts are three new sets introduced. Die-Cuts are always a fan favorite so they will be popular in the secondary market.

Autographs run wild in 2013 and not only with Rookies. Ten Autograph Inserts including rookies and Veterans are to be found within the hobby product. Some of these include 2 or more autographs including a Division Die-Cut Boxloader that is in the shape of a pennant.

Not to be outdone, Topps also has inserted random Hot Boxes to be found. These Hot Boxes are only Refractors. No word on the odds within a case to pull one but if you do end up finding one of these your sure in for a treat. 96 Refractors within one box is just crazy!

We've talked enough about what you could find, lets see what we did find within our box:

Base Cards: 74 (0 Doubles)
Refractors: 7 - Puig, Chapman, Altuve, Beltran, Lutz RC, Bumgarner, Lynn,Youkilis
XFractor: 4 - Justin Upton, Gio Gonzalez, Jedd Gyorko RC, Evan Longoria
Blue Refractor: Hiroki Kuroda
Black Refractor: Matt Holliday
1972 Refractor: 2 - Derek Jeter, Joe Mauer
Close Connection: 2 - Verlander, BJ Upton
Dynamic Skill: Jered Weaver
Autograph: 2 - Rob Brantly, Adam Eaton Redemption


No matter what you think of Topps Series 1 or 2, Chrome just makes them so much better with the technology doesn't it? Trying not to be too biased but I love Chrome, shape clean cards and with some of the best parallels in the hobby. We came away with 74 cards of the base set, which leaves us well short of the 220 needed. We'll need either a couple more boxes or try to source out the remaining cards needed for our 2013 set. The Refractors that we pulled were great as always, with no change to the technology to the Refractor, XFractor, and Black Refractors. However the Blue Refractors are a lighter Blue this year. A nice change and look just as sharp.
The new die-cut inserts are great. The Close Connections have very crisp cuts and are a very solid die-cut. The design of the Dynamic Skills is nice with the honeycomb background. The 1972 Topps inserts are nice and remind us of Archives, but in Refractor form.
The Autographs we pulled are not the best Rookies to pull and we even pulled a Redemption. You can never go wrong with On-Card Autographs and even with the two players we pulled you can't be disappointed. Eaton is the best of the two even though it's a redemption.
Taking into account that we paid around the $80 price point and received 2 Autographs, a great assortment of Refractors, and along with the inserts and zero doubles with the 74 Base cards we did pretty well. The price point is perfect for this product, you won't find the value of any other box coming close. Zero doubles is great as well as it does well for Set collectors, even though you come short of 100 cards you still feel the value of what you have opened. The inserts this year were well done and the Die-Cuts will be popular in the secondary market as well with set collectors. Overall this wasn't an amazing box but the value in the box is top-notch. We'll continue to open a few more boxes and collect the set as always. Highly recommend this product to any baseball fan. Even if your not a baseball collector this could be one to look into and try.

Most cards/hits pulled in our breaks end up on our site storefront www.packgambler.com, or our COMC account ThePackGambler. If you are interested in any of the cards we have mentioned please send us an e-mail at packgamblersales@gmail.com

Gambler Overall Rating: out of 5
Cost: 5/5
Autographs: 5/5
Parallels: 5/5
Inserts: 5/5
Concept: 5/5
Fun Aspect: 5/5

Monday, September 23, 2013

Product Review: 2013 Panini Prizm Baseball Hobby Box

As we watch the last month of Baseball's regular season, we are delighted to have another Panini Baseball release with Prizm. 2012 marked the first year of Prizm to collectors with a very good showing and a desire for a return this year. Well collectors sure will be happy to hear it's back and packing some extras to the product as well.
2013 will stay with the same packaging format of 20 packs and 6 cards per pack. The set is a very large 300 cards strong which will also have 5 Short Print Highlights to hunt down #'s 301-305. Prizm will continue with it's Prizm Parallel's which will be Prizm, Orange Die-Cut /50, Gold /10 and Finite 1/1.

Inserts will come in six different series. All will have parallel's to collect as well. You'll find Band of Brothers, Fearless, Rookie Challengers, Superstar Spotlight, Top Prospects, and Team USA. Some new inserts for 2013 with some cool designs. Team USA also has Autographs to be found numbered out of 25 and 1/1.

Every box will contain two autographs. Both will be sticker autographs but the checklist is 90 cards deep with stars like Puig, Clemens, Wright, Trout, Bagwell and Machado to name a few.

For a box around $100 there is a lot to watch for when busting a box. Lets see how we did in our break:

Base Cards: 62 (0 doubles)
Base Rookie Cards: 40 (0 doubles)
Base Card SP: 1 - Miguel Cabrera #305
Base Card Prizm: 4 - David Ortiz, Alex Gordon, David Wright, Derek Jeter
Base Card Orange Prizm Die-Cut: 1 - Ian Kinsler /60
Band of Brothers: 1 - Phillies (Utley, Halladay, Howard)
Fearless: 3 - Posey, Strasburg, Pedroia
Rookie Challengers: 1 - Dylan Bundy
Superstar Spotlight: 1 - Clayton Kershaw
Top Prospects: 1 - Carlos Correa
Team USA: 2 - R.A. Dickey, Dustin Pedroia
Team USA Prizm: 1 - Mike Trout
Autographs: 2 - Anthony Rizzo, Ben Zobrist 


This years design of the base cards are a little different from the previous year but with the same principle of chrome like presence. Adding the 5 Short Prints to hunt down will be a little tricky if you go by the box. We managed to pull the Cabrera but not sure if these are 1 per box or not. being a SP probably not. The Orange Die-Cut Parallel's are new for 2013. They do add to the fun of busting open the box to see if you pulled an orange or gold parallel. Also being numbered will help the secondary market sales for Prizm.
Inserts are plenty in this box as we came across a variety of them. First up the Rookies and Prospects. Both Top Prospects and Rookie Challengers designs are great. Nice selection of players in each and is also nice to see some prospects showing up in a regular set. Not sure if I agree with putting the RC logo on the Rookie Challengers. these cards aren't the RC cards for that player since they are in the base set. Either way two nice sets to collect.  
 
 Band of Brothers and fearless are two new additions to the Prizm baseball product. Band of Brothers isn't too appealing as an insert but like the idea instead of just going with the norm when grouping players from the same team on a card. Fearless is a great looking card. the colors in the design really pop and look great with every player I've seen. Very nice set to collect just for the design itself.
Superstar Spotlight is another new insert for this year. It is similar to the Dominance/Brilliance sets from last year inthe fact they have taken the best players and put them into one insert set instead of two. It has a basic design and reminds me a bit of Elite. Team USA are back this year and continue to focus on the best to play for the team. We managed to pull a Trout Prizm Parallel from the three we pulled. The design is a little different and shows a bigger USA baseball logo on the front.
As for the autographs we weren't too impressed with the players we pulled but again you can't expect too much from the box. the two autographs are nice for this price range and if you do happen to pull a top player or HOF player it's a bonus. Both are sticker autographs and follow the same design as the base cards. Rizzo and Zobrist aren't top notch but will come in handy for trading or giveaways down the road.
We did alright in our break overall. Pulling 102 of the base cards leaves us about 2-3 boxes short from even trying to finish the set. So if your a set collector this one could be costly to put together unless you search out shows or stores for your missing cards. The parallel's really are nice in this product and finding the right player could provide some good secondary value. The inserts are also nice and can be easily collected to completion. Fearless would be recommended to finish. Pulling two autographs are never a bad thing however unless you pull a decent star your not going to break the bank on your pulls. You could find a parallel or a star in your box which would be a good pull though. If you go in will any higher expectations than this is not the product for you. It is a fun break overall and the design of the cards are great to look at. This product is mainly for set builders or just having some fun ripping some baseball cards. I'll probably bust a couple more boxes before the year is up and see about building the set.    

Most cards/hits pulled in our breaks end up on our site storefront www.packgambler.com, or our COMC account ThePackGambler. If you are interested in any of the cards we have mentioned please send us an e-mail at packgamblersales@gmail.com

Gambler Overall Rating: 4.58 out of 5
Cost: 4/5
Autographs: 3.5/5
Parallels: 5/5
Inserts: 5/5
Concept: 5/5
Fun Aspect: 5/5

Wednesday, September 18, 2013

Product Review: 2013 Topps Tier One Hobby Box

The 2013 Topps Tier One product came out a couple of weeks ago and we tried to fill a 4 box break of it last week. Unfortunately we weren't able to fill the break so we decided to break the 4 boxes and write a review on the product.

So as you might already know, each box this year includes 3 cards, 2 Autographs and 1 Relic. Every 4th box will include an extra Relic in that box to look for. Autographs range from /399 to 1/1. You will receive 1 On The Rise Autograph per box with some of the hottest young up-comers of the game. The 2nd autograph could be the same, Crowd Pleaser or Autograph Relic.You could also pull Autograph booklets and Cut Autographs within the product.

The most common Relics to pull are single swatches numbered /399 or less, but you could also find dual and triple relic swatches as well. Patches are also found and will be either All-Star Patches, Jumbo Prodigious Patches or Autograph Patches. The one relic everyone is hopeful for is the famous Bat Knobs. These are all 1/1 and include a long list of baseball stars of present and past.

The great thing about this product is that almost every Autograph is on-card. the exceptions being the booklets or dual autographs, it's always a great thing to see on-card autographs in a product. The cost of the product might be increased but worth it in the end if your able to pull one of those top star autographs.

Well lets see how our 4 boxes of Tier One did shall we:

Box #1: 
On The Rise Autograph: Felix Doubront /399
Crowd-Pleaser Autograph: Brian McCann /99
Tier One Relic: Frank Thomas /39 *Redemption*
Box #2:
On The Rise Autograph: Scott Diamond /399
Tier One Auto Relic Base: Craig Biggio /99 *Redemption*
Tier One Relic: Justin Upton /399
Tier One Relic: Buster Posey /399
Box #3: 
On The Rise Autograph: Chris Sale /50
Crowd Pleaser Auto Silver Parallel: Nomar Garciaparra /10 *Redemption*
Tier One Relic: Ken Griffey Jr. /399
Box #4:
On The Rise Autograph: Chris Archer /399
Tier One Autographs: Ozzie Smith Rose Ink /25
Tier One Relic: Billy Butler /399

I have to say this was 4 of the best boxes I could have asked for. Box #1 was the least valuable BV wise compared to the other three boxes. Box #2 had 4 cards which was nice to pull from our 4 boxes. Each box had a Super Star player in it which again is great to pull as some I've seen haven't been this lucky. The Base Autograph cards are a nice thick stock with a glossy film, the Autographs we pulled nicely written by the players instead of some of the less attractive autographs circulating recently. The Ozzie Smith Ink is more of a Rose than Red or Gold Ink. Numbered out of /25 and a Hall of Fame player like him is a great pull.
The Relics are pretty basic and not much different than a Topps Series 1 Relic. Might be a good idea to stay away from the relics next year and just make an all autograph set. Unless a patch it's not the ones collectors are after.
With all the Redemption news going around these days it's no surprise that 3 of our 4 boxes had a redemption. Even though they are Redemption's the Biggio and Garciaparra are going to be sweet cards. The Biggio will have either a Bat or Jersey Relic with it and numbered to /99 or less and the Garicaparra will be numbered to only 10 and should be a great looking card with the Silver Ink on the black design. 
The one Redemption I don't get is the Thomas Relic. How is it they didn't have time to put that into the product before the release? I've seen patches or Bat Knobs before but a single base relic? Great player to pull but weird. 

If buying these boxes separately it would be hard to be happy about box #1, but since we broke 4 boxes this was a very good outcome for us. Aside from the redemption's this is a cool product. Love the on-card autographs and the chance to pull big names. The value we pulled from 3 of the 4 boxes was great and the correlation of the cards was well done. It's too bad we couldn't run our box break for these 4 boxes but very happy with what we pulled.

Most cards/hits pulled in our breaks end up on our site storefront www.packgambler.com, or our COMC account ThePackGambler. If you are interested in any of the cards we have mentioned please send us an e-mail at packgamblersales@gmail.com

Gambler Overall Rating: 4.1 out of 5
Cost: 4/5
Autographs: 5/5
Parallels: 4/5
Relics: 3.5/5
Concept: 4/5
Fun Aspect: 4/5

Sunday, September 15, 2013

Product Review: 2013 Tristar SignaCuts Honors Baseball

To say we enjoy TriStar SignaCuts is an understatement. Tristar as been one of our favorite products the last few years and when the 2013 SignaCuts Honors Baseball product came out we were very interested.

As you know with Tristar they don't tend to give away a lot of information about their full lineup of players in their products. This has not sat well with some and others (ourselves included) like the thought of opening a box and pulling a ct autograph out of their products.

2013 Honors Baseball is very similar to the previously released SignaCuts Platinum Edition. Each card is numbered to only 25 and can be found in /10, /5 and 1/1 serial numbered. Their are 5 levels of cards to pull; Baseball Honors, Double Play (dual sided), Hall Of Fame, Fantastic Finds, and Diamond Finds.

The checklist on the box and online has a number of greats from the game and those of present. Musial, Spahn, Banks, Aaron, Ruth, Paige and DiMaggio are just some of the all time greats to be found. Some of the present stars are Puig, Trout, Hamilton, Pujols and Wright to name a few.

Each box is serial numbered to only 2160 and will contain 1 card sealed in a magnetic holder. The price your looking at is around the $50 range or so depending on your LCS or local card show. Pretty decent price for an autographed card with the chance of pulling a really cool cut autograph or a star player.

We decided to pick up a few boxes and try it out since we always have liked Tristar and Baseball being our sport of choice. Even though you could pull a nice Diamond Find or Cut autograph we went in with low expectations. Here's what we pulled:

Box #1 Ralph Terry Autograph #'d 4/5 (Autograph on a Label sticker)
Box #2 Bert Campaneris Autograph #'d 2/10 (Cut-Autograph from a older Topps card)
Box #3 John Montefusco Autograph #'d 3/25 (Autograph on a Label Sticker)
Box #4 Ken Forsch / Larry Dierker Dual Autographs #'d 6/10 (Cut Autographs both from older Topps Cards)
Box #5 Alan Trammell Autograph #'d 5/10 (Cut Autograph from a 1988 Donruss Diamond Kings card)
Box #6 David Ortiz Autograph #'d 3/10 (Plain Sticker Autograph)

Well a little disappointed we didn't pull a Hall of Fame players or 1 or 2 other more interesting players or stars but that's the way it goes some times. This bunch seemed to be the No-Hitter club with 3 of the autographs from pitchers with a No-Hitter. the Dual Sided Autographs are really nice and cool with the cut cards in them instead of sticker autographs. The Trammel and Ortiz were the best of the bunch and only stars pulled from 6 boxes.

Again being a Baseball collector these are cool to have in a collection but always would have been nice to pull a Hall of Fame player. Maybe better luck in the next SignaCuts coming around. Still hard to top the Triple Auto we pulled earlier in the year of Trout, Hamilton and Pujols, but we can always continue to try.

Most cards/hits pulled in our breaks end up on our site storefront www.packgambler.com, or our COMC account ThePackGambler. If you are interested in any of the cards we have mentioned please send us an e-mail at packgamblersales@gmail.com

Gambler Overall Rating: 4.3 out of 5
Cost: 5/5
Autographs: 4/5
Overall Players Used: 3/5
Design: 4/5
Concept: 5/5
Fun Aspect: 5/5

Thursday, September 12, 2013

Product Review: 2013 Panini Rookie and Stars Football Hobby Box

Last week we picked up the 2013 edition of Panini Rookie & Stars. This product has a strong following with collectors due mostly to it's value per box. Boxes tend to hover around the $100 or less mark and deliver 4 hits per box.

Here's some specs on the product; 24 packs per box with 8 cards per pack. The Base set is 200 cards with 100 of those as Rookies. You'll be able to finish the 100 card base set of the veterans but you'll be short on the rookies by around 75%. You'll find 16 inserts or parallels within the box which could be a combinations of the two and include the Longevity series of the Rookies & Stars brand.

As mentioned above you will pull four hits per box which could be Autographs and/or Memorabilia. With the focus on Rookies, you are most certain to be pulling them in this area, however you could find a veteran in your box but the odds of finding one are scarce with lower print runs.

This product is one step higher than Panini's Score brand and offers more value with the Hits per box and the Longevity inserts/parallels. It could be considered a low-end product in the market place, but considering the possible hits you could pull is leans more to of the lower mid-range products.

Here's how we did in our box:

Base Cards: 150 (50 doubles)
Base Card Rookies: 24 (0 doubles)
Base Card Longevity: 4 - Steve Smith, Adrian Peterson, Conner Vernon RC, Jasper Collins RC
Base Card Longevity Holo Foil: 1 - Marques Colston /99
Statistical Standouts: 2 - Eric Decker, Aaron Rogers
Touchdown Club: 2 - Cam Newton, Antonio Gates
Game Plan: 2 - Ben Roethlisberger, Matt Schaub
NFL Nation: 2 - Steven Jackson, DeSean Jackson
Panini Crusade: 3 - Andrew luck, Dion Jordan, Landry Jones
Longevity Signatures: 2 - Jon Bostic, Kerwynn Williams
Rookie & Stars Relic: 1 - Matt Barkley
Slideshow Autograph: 1 - Robert Woods /100
Slideshow: 1 - Vance McDonald /17 SP

The base cards look a little extra nice this year with the players image overlapping the team name on the side. Nice touch to a basic design instead of just a different border. We completed the 100 card base set but ended up with 50 doubles. Compared to only 24 rookies pulled in the box it would be a little better to have maybe 20 or so more rookies and less doubles in the base cards. Understandably knowing the rookies are much harder to obtain the set of I could contradict our point by saying 24 rookies is a good amount. However, would still like a better ratio in terms of doubles to rookies. Longevity has always been a staple of this product and pulling 5 of these in the box temps you into buying more of the product or singles to try to make that difficult set. The Foil stock is the same as in the past so watch for corner dings in packs or in the secondary market.
Inserts of plenty in this product again and each with different designs and themes than last year. They are decent for this product but you wouldn't expect much more.
New this year is the Crusade inserts. These are very hot and they look great. We pulled 3 in our box and we've seen/heard of sometimes 4 per box. the secondary market will be a feeding ground for them and collecting this insert set would be a lot of fun. We didn't pull any parallels but they are still top notch.
The two Longevity Signatures were nothing too fancy. Both sticker autographs of two rookies, only thing I would change is that the Longevity Signatures all had the Longevity Foil technology. We also pulled a Relic in our box of Matt Barkley. Nice design and nothing too fancy but still a relic.
The two big surprises in our box were the Slideshow cards. First pulled was the Vance McDonald, very cool design and innovation with the film embedded into the card. Only numbered to 17 this is the lowest numbered Slideshow in the product. The Robert Woods came near the end of the break and was double cool with the on-card autograph on the film slide. Again technology to embed these into the cards is very nice and both are interesting collectors pieces.
Overall we did really well with this box. We came out with a complete base set of the first 100 cards, and two really cool Slideshow hits. Panini continues to provide really great value to collectors and this is yet another great example of a $100 product providing that value. For the NFL collecting fan this is a perfect product for you to pick up and we just might grab another one to see what else we can pull from a box. Good luck on yours.

Most cards/hits pulled in our breaks end up on our site storefront www.packgambler.com, or our COMC account ThePackGambler. If you are interested in any of the cards we have mentioned please send us an e-mail at packgamblersales@gmail.com

Gambler Overall Rating: 4.8 out of 5
Cost: 5/5
Autographs: 4/5
Parallels: 5/5
Inserts: 5/5
Concept: 5/5
Fun Aspect: 5/5

Wednesday, September 11, 2013

Product Review: 2013 Panini Cooperstown Baseball Hobby Box

Last week Panini Released it's 2013 Cooperstown Baseball product for it's sophomore year. I didn't pick up a box of the 2012 product only a few packs here and there, and by the year was out I wish I did. I was sure not to miss out on the 2013 edition of this great baseball product. Panini has been very impressive with their Non MLB Licensed products and the 2013 edition would be no different.

Hobby Boxes are set to 24 packs with 6 cards per pack. Every pack has something waiting for you with 24 Colgan's Chips Disks, 12 Cracked Ice Parallels, 4 Historic Tickets, 2 Cooperstown Lumberjack, 2 Short Print Color Variations, 1 Box Topper and 1 Autograph of a Hall of Fame Member. That is a lot of cards aside from the base cards you'll be pulling from 1 box.

The Base set is 100 cards but also have 10 Color Variations numbered from 101-110 to collect in order have a fully complete set. Each card in the base set has a Cracked Ice Parallel with Green, Blue /499, Red /399, Gold /299, and Black #'d 1/1. Inserts are plenty in the product with Colgan Chip Disks taking up the bulk of what you will pull in a box. These are inserted 1 per pack and have a 165 Disk's to collect. Historic Tickets are a cool insert with some interesting facts of certain games played in history with a picture of what the ticket looked like. The best insert in the product belongs to the Cooperstown Lumberjacks. These are cards are printed on Wood card stock which is pretty cool technology. There are 100 cards in this insert set with some players having up to three different cards. Numbers Game, Museum Pieces, International Play and Induction round up the insert lineup for the 2013 product.

Not to be forgotten are the Box Topper Inserts which come in either a Felt Pennant of Blue or Red color and Lumberjacks Die-Cuts. The Lumberjacks are numbered to 175 and there are 24 to collect. The Blue and Red Pennants have 48 different for each and are the more common of the Box Toppers.

The Hall of Fame Autograph checklist is 98 cards deep and each are numbered from 699 down to as low as 6. Each card is an on-card Autograph and each player is in the Hall of Fame. Some players have 2 or more different autographed cards in the set so there are 56 different players in total. Included into the Autograph chase are Heroes Buyback Autographs with a checklist of 21 players.

Now with all of those details lets see how we stacked up against the odds and who we ended up pulling form our box:

Base Cards: 90 (0 Doubles)
Base Card Green Cracked Ice: 6 - Miller Huggins, Casey Stengel, Steve Carlton, Rube Marquard, Al Kaline, Christy Mathewson
Base Card Blue Cracked Ice: 3 - Honus Wagner /499, Holt Wilhelm /499, Pee Wee Reese /499
Base Card Red Cracked Ice: 2 - Dave Winfield /399, Johnny Evers /399
Base Card Gold Cracked Ice: 2 - Lloyd Waner /299, Frank Baker /299
Base Card Color Variation: Tony Gwynn
Colgan's Chip Disks: 24 (4 doubles)
Historic Tickets: 4
Numbers Game: 2
Museum Pieces: 3
International Play: 1 - Fergie Jenkins
Induction: 4 - Ozzie Smith, Phil Rizzuto, Frank Robinson, Jim Hunter
Lumberjacks: 2 - Joe Tinker, Bobby Wallace
Box Topper: Lumberjack Die-Cut Addie Joss /175
Autograph: Steve Carlton /180

Outstanding product overall from our perspective. The Base card design is great. Love the photography of the past players, the Non MLB License doesn't impact the design or the photos of the players in this product. It's done very well and you would never know looking at the cards. We were not able to make the set falling 11 cards short and are 8 cards short from the 10 SP's which we will track down to complete the full set. The Cracked Ice cards are very nice with Red being our favorite. Really like that they are numbered with the exception of the Green. Nice that you pull one every other pack in the box and some of the players will be decent value in the secondary market. Not seen the Black 1/1, but surely they would look just as nice.
The Colgan's Chip Disks were a nice idea to include them into this product as a historic collectible item from the past but not too happy about the assortment in our box. We ended up with 4 doubles from the 24 we pulled and would have liked to have each chip numbered so you knew the order. Either way they were a nice touch but would like to see something different next year.
Inserts are always nice in this set as it brings you back to the time of the event and you learn a little bit more about a moment or event that you might not have heard before. The designs are great and really standout among other sets as some of the best out there.
Lumberjacks are a personal favorite insert. Just love the technology on the cards, makes you feel almost like the card was made out of wood. Again great design and great checklist of players so you can't go wrong here. This will be one for us to hunt down and see about finishing the set.
To go along with the Lumberjacks inserts we were happy to pull the Box Topper of the same insert. We pulled a Addie Joss and it looks great. Always loved Die-Cuts and this one has a great design and even better that it's numbered to 175. The Felt Pennants are nice but would much rather these Die-Cuts instead.
Our Autograph was of Steve Carlton and numbered out of 180. It is an on-card autograph in blue ink and looks really nice on the black and white photography. You can never go wrong in any product that provides you with a Hall of Fame Autograph. This will be a great addition to the PC until I can get him on a MLB ball.
If you’re a baseball fan or historian of the game this product has to be on your list of a must buy for 2013. It's filled with outstanding items and is a product I'll never grow tired of. Great job Panini on making this product and really look forward to the 2014 edition and future baseball products that you produce.  

Most cards/hits pulled in our breaks end up on our site storefront www.packgambler.com, or our COMC account ThePackGambler. If you are interested in any of the cards we have mentioned please send us an e-mail at packgamblersales@gmail.com

Gambler Overall Rating: 5 out of 5
Cost: 5/5
Autographs: 5/5
Parallels: 5/5
Inserts: 5/5
Concept: 5/5
Fun Aspect: 5/5