The Pack Gambler Retro Break: 2003-04 Pacific Heads Up Sweater Edition

Target is becoming more and more our Retro break provider. This time around we have 2003-04 Pacific Heads Up Sweater Edition. This is a cool product to bust open. Not only will each box provide you with 2 Relics, but you'll also pull a manufactured mini jersey.
I had my eye on this box for about a month until the other day I noticed there were only 1 box left from about 5. So without hesitation I picked this one up to bust.
So the configuration of this box is 24 packs with 6 cards per pack. Each pack will contain 1 Pacific Complete card, 1 insert or parallel card and 4 Heads Up base. The great thing about this product is that the Rookies, Relics and Parallels are all serial numbered. 
Another item about this set is the rookies. They are not found regularly through the box and you will only come across 3 in your box break. they are all short printed and have serial numbering of /899 per card. Some of the names you could come across include: Lupal, Bergeron, Eric Staal, Marc-Andre Fleury and Alexander Semin.
The Hobby Ltd. Parallels are an interesting card with a foil type pattern across the front of the card. Each of these are numbered as well and have lower serial numbers for inserts. Typically we go in with low expectations on Retro boxes, however with the Rookie crop in this year and the added serial numbering we had some higher expectations for this one. Let's see how we did:

Base Cards: 96 (2 doubles)
Base Rookies: 3 - Nikolai Zherdev, Fredrik Sjostrom, Matt Stajan (all /899)
Pacific Complete: 24 (0 Doubles)
Base Cards Hobby Ltd.: 3 - Nikolai Khabibulin, Robert Esche, Chris Pronger (all /299)
Base Card Rookie Hobby Ltd.: 1 - Dominic Moore /250
Stonewallers: 3 - David Abischer, Nikolai Khabibulin, Martin Brodeur
Rink Immortals: 2 - Steve Yzerman, Peter Forsberg
In Focus: 2 - Joe Sakic, Henrik Zetterberg
Fast Forward: 2 - Alexander Mogilny, Markus Naslund, Rick Nash
Prime Prospects: 4 - Lombardi, Burns, Michalek, Zherdev
Prime Prospects Hobby Ltd.: 1 - Nikolai Zherdev /175
Authentic Game Worn Jersey: 2 - Jay Bouwmeester, Ziggy Palffy (both /1200)
Mini Sweater: Marion Gaborik

Only 5 cards away from a complete set! Oh so close. Interesting we had 2 doubles in the box which is rare for these types of boxes. The card design is not too bad on these ones and with the Hobby Ltd. across the front it adds a little to question "What is this?" if looking at them in a commons box.
Love the serial numbering on the cards. Adds much more value to them or in some cases less as the jersey relics are numbered /1200 each. There are short printed relics but not sure the numbering on them.

The Prime prospects Nikolai Zherdev Hobby Ltd. Parallel is the lowest number we pulled coming in at /175. Too bad this wasn't 2004 or else we could have pulled in some nice coin for this card.
The inserts in the product are also nice. Designs and player selections are good and give a sense to the collector to try for the set.

The Mini Sweater we pulled was Marion Gabroik of the Minnesota Wild. It comes with a full body stand to display the jersey. The front crest logo is stitched on and looks great. The shoulder logos and name/number on the back are not but still a great add for a collector. These also have been heard to have a production run of 1000 per jersey. Not sure on that either but the BV for them are $12-30 each unless you pull Yzerman or Brodeur which raise it up by $10.

With only 5 cards missing from the complete set we'll see about finding them and complete it. Lemieux is one of the cards missing which has a BV of $6 so we'll see if we can find a cheap one somewhere to fill it in. The box was $39.99 which is a real bargain as the base set, short printed rookies and inserts are all good book values. Add on the mini jersey and your laughing. Now onto finding those 5 missing cards for 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

Thanks for supporting us at The Pack Gambler