Product Review: 2014 Topps Chipz Baseball

Who would have thought that these Chipz would be as collectible as first thought? I didn't think so, but for some reason this year I was intrigued. Was it the low price er pack? Was it that you could collect multiple version of a player? Was it that you could pull a relic? Nope, it was just the fun of it all. Ripping open a pack of 4 Chipz that could be anyone, any colour and worth every penny.

This years edition of MLB Chipz has introduced Colour Chipz and lower odds of finding a Glow-in-the-Dark, Magnetic and even lower odds for Relic Chipz.

Each pack will provide you with 4 Chipz and 1 Game board. Chipz have a number of parallel versions per player. Red, Blue, Black, Silver, and Gold can be found within packs. Silver and Gold parallels are the hardest to find running at 1-2 per box of 36 packs.

Along with the different coloured Chipz you can find Glow-in-the-Dark, Magnetic and Team Sticker parallels within each of the different coloured Chipz. What this means is you could see 1 player ending up with 30 different Chipz to collect for your favorite team or player.

Added into this mix are Mascots from each team. These also are found within the same parallels as above. The odds for Mascots are 1:4 packs which make them harder to pull overall plus even harder for the different versions.

After buying a couple of packs from a couple of places, we decided to buy a box of 36 packs and see how this measured up against buying a hobby box. Lets see how we did;  

Base Chipz: 47 (1 double)
Base Chipz Team Logo: 20 (2 doubles)
Base Chipz Glow-in-the-Dark: 20 (2 doubles)
Base Chipz Gold Foil Parallel: 4 - Cano, Price, Segura, Hamilton
Red Parallel Chipz: 13
Red Parallel Glow-in-the-Dark: 2
Red Parallel Team Logo: 7
Red Parallel Chipz: 13
Blue Parallel Chipz: 4
Blue Parallel Glow-in-the-Dark: 3
Blue Parallel Team Logo: 1
Black Parallel Chipz: 4 - Puig
Black Parallel Team Logo: 5
Silver Parallel Chipz: 1 - Cole Hamels
Magnet Parallel Chipz: 5

Base Chipz Mascots: 4
Base Chipz Mascots Team Logos: 3
Red Parallel Mascots: 1
Black Parallel Mascots Team Logos: 1

This was an interesting buy overall. Under $70 for the box, over 150 Chipz and a lot of fun. That is the best description for this purchase, fun. When you collect cards as your main hobby your not looking for high end chips to be pulled like Relics or Gold Parallels. Each pack was fun to open and fun to collect players and teams in different parallels. 

 The design of the Chipz are solid. Exactly like a poker chip in weight and size. The different colours look great and they really standout among the base Chipz. I personally like the Black parallels with Blue a close second. The Glow-in-the-Dark Chipz are a fun item. They really do glow in a very dark space. The Mascots are a nice added touch to the Chipz. When your building your team sets they can become the hardest part of your hunt.

 The assortment in this box was a little different than I expected. We pulled 5 doubles in the box and did not pull a Gold Parallel Chipz and only 1 Silver. Would have liked to see a Gold pulled but that's alright, we pulled lots of Chipz and now have to find a place to put them. That is one piece of advice, when you buy a box like this ensure you have some poker chip holders, or sheets to store them. It can be cumbersome to have 100+ Chipz in a box.

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: 4.6 out of 5
Cost: 5/5
Concept: 4/5
Design: 5/5
Parallels: 5/5
Inserts: 4/5
Fun Aspect: 5/5

Product Review: 2014 Topps Allen & Ginter Hobby Box

Since 2006 the following of Allen & Ginter has increased, the 2014 edition will be no different. With two of the top rookies Abreu and Tanaka making their first appearance on the famous brand, the 2014 release is one of the highly anticipated products of the year.

Like every year, A&G try and bring you back to the modern very early day of baseball card collecting. A white card front with minimal design around the player featured continues for this year’s release. A little different each year the base cards still provide a nice clean look. 300 cards again make up the base set with an additional 50 being Short Printed.

Of course with Ginter, collectors love to build the Mini set. This again returns and will be an instant favorite with collectors. Same as the base set you’ll have to track down 350 cards with the final 50 being SP’s. Mini’s continue with parallel versions which can be found in A&G Backs, Black boarder, No Number, Flag Back, Cloth, Wood and Printing Plates. The latest edition to the mini’s which collectors will either love or hate will be the Metal Mini’s. They will be numbered and are printed on Metal Stock. Should be interesting seeing the first of these hit the market.

Inserts also play a part within this year’s release. The Pastime’s Pastime, Fields of Yore, Air Supremacy, The World’s Captains, and Natural Wonder’s help build the Base card inserts. Mini inserts include Larger than Life, Little Lions, Into the Unknown, Where Nature Ends, and World’s Deadliest Predators. All inserts are found in ratios starting at 1:2 packs.  

Rip Cards, Buybacks, Autographs, Printing Plates and Relics all are continuing with 3 of these found in each Hobby box. Autographs and Relics are found within Box Loaders, Regular Base Cards and Mini’s. With the checklist being anywhere from Baseball, Wrestling, and other prominent figures within sport and really within the world make up the sets of these two. Rip Cards are a lot of fun and can provide a major hit to your box if you manage to pull one of these.

With 24 packs per box and 8 cards per pack your chances of hitting something really special are harder than you might think. The checklist is large and Ginter is famous for the rarity pull of the SP’s in either Autograph or Relic pieces. However, collectors continue to come back and buy multiple boxes or a case of this very popular product.

This collector picks up at least 1 box per year, here is how we did on our break;

Base Cards: 139 (0 doubles) 

Base Card SP: 12 - Kinsler, Alvarez, Pence, Alonso, Phillips, Olt, Wacha, Johnson, Eckersley, Davis, Niekro, Butler 
Ginter Code Cards: 2
Base Mini: 10 Parker, Trumbo, Snoop Lion, Piazza, Briggs, Gonzalez, Harper, Gwynn, Killebrew, Granderson
Mini Black Border: 2 - Choo, Davidson
Mini A&G Back: 5 - Day, Price, Musial, Posey, Palmeiro
Mini A&G Back NNO: 1 - Sonny Gray /50
Mini A&G Red Back: 1 - Jenny Dell #'d 02/25
Mini Larger than Life: 1 - William Tell
Mini Where Nature Ends: 1 - Claude Monet
Mini Little Lions: 1 - Persian Cat
Mini Worlds' Deadliest Predators: 2 - Polar Bear, Great White Shark
Air Supremacy: 2 - B-17 Bomber, V-22 Osprey
Fields of Yore: 1 - Shea Stadium
Nature Wonders: 2 - Moeraki Boulders, Sailing Stones of Racetrack Playa

Festivals and Fairs: 3 - Holi Festival, Pingxi Lantern Festival, Dia De Los Muertos
Worlds Capitals: 4 - Rome, Buenos Aires, Taipei, Brasilia
Pastimes's Pastimes: 12 - Darvish, Reyes, Beltre, Dickey, Bautista, Strasburg, Harper, Gonzalez, Gehrig, Longoria, Myers, Price
Framed Relic: 1 - Matt Cain
Full Size Relics: 2 - Laura Phelps Sweatt, Michael Eisner
Box Loader: 1 - Statue of Liberty

Get into this review by looking at the base cards. This years design is another simple yet sophisticated card front which Ginter is famous for. The photography is great and the player lineup is again stellar. Mini's are everyone's favorite and every pack someone opens turns over to see if it's a parallel version of that card. We had a few including a Sonny Gray No Number and a Jenny Dell Red Back hand numbered to 25. One thing we noticed about the mini's was some were cut differently. Wider or taller than some, this lead to a couple of them being damaged a bit it seems during the packing process. These tended to be the base mini's in our box. 

Continuing with Mini's. The inserts this year are again non baseball related but have a coupe that are interesting. Not impressed with the Little Lions insert of cats. The World's Deadliest Predators is a cool set and intriguing to read the backs of these cards.  

 Base inserts have two new ones that I really enjoyed pulling and reading about. These were Fields of Yore and Natural Wonders. Love the ode to older stadiums of baseball history. Natural Wonders gives us a peak into things we might not have known within the world. Might even get you thinking of taking a trip to one of these places.

 Not a fan of the Festivals and Fairs but it does give us a look into the past and current celebrations around the world. Pastime's Pastimes seem to come in almost every pack. Being a 100 card set you'll even love it or hate it. The design of the cards are really nice though so if you can get by about it being an easy insert you'll be fine.

Our Box Topper this year was the Statue of Liberty. Its a nice over sized card of a famous landmark in the US. I was hopeful for a cabinet card or maybe a Glossy 1/1 again like last year but this is a good Topper to pull. 

I pulled three relics in our box. The first being the Matt Cain Framed mini. Same as years past the framed mini's are nice. This year they have Red or Grey borders. We also pulled a Phelps Sweatt Relic which for Ginter it's a common non-baseball pull. Common meaning your bound to pull one or two non-baseball hits in your box. The last Relic I liked a lot was the Micheal Eisner Tie relic. Its a pretty cool non-baseball relic to get and of a pretty famous person in our culture. I've seen some multi-colour and different design relic of his already on the secondary market which would have been even cooler, but I'm very happy with this relic.

Overall Topps has done another great job with Ginter. It is a love or hate it product for baseball fans and has become an even bigger hobby product for all over the years. You'll find collectors of Ginter to shell out lots of cash for those hard to find relics and autographs. Baseball collectors (like myself) still enjoy the product as it is and enjoy the baseball content inside. The downside to this years product is the Little Lions, although they might be a hit on the secondary market. A word of caution though, don't be surprised if your hits are three average players or all non-baseball. Ginter has a tendency to be a wide variety of hit and miss boxes. Boxes ranging around the $100-120 mark you'll find three hits (any variation of a Relic, Plates, Autos, Rip Cards, or Book Cards) a lot of history and fun. We'd recommend it for any Baseball collector and hobby enthusiast.  

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: 4.5 out of 5

Cost: 5/5

Relics: 4/5

Design: 5/5

Parallels: 4/5

Inserts: 4/5

Fun Aspect: 5/5

Product Review: 2013-14 Panini Rookie Anthology Hobby Box

This will be the last year I’ll be able to rip open a new box of Panini Rookie Anthology. It’s sad to say but so true with the new Hockey agreement with Upper Deck. However let’s not get into a debate over that hobby news and instead celebrate the 2013-14 release of Rookie Anthology from Panini.

For the past two years this has by far been the best content for Hockey. The concept has always been great and we have loved everything about it. The same ideas from the past two years are combined into this years release as well.

Each hobby box has 10 packs with 5 cards per pack. You’ll find 4 hits within the box ranging from a variety of different sources. Crown Royale, Dominion, Luxury Suite, Prizm, Select, and Titanium Updates are all found within this loaded product. Add that up with a 100 card Base Anthology set and you’re off to the races to hunt down your favorite rookies from this past season.

Autographs, Jersey’s, and Patches reign supreme in each box. Not only will you find the hottest rookies in the NHL, but you could pull some of the veterans or Retired stars in one of these hits. With only 10 packs per box your bound to enjoy breaking multiple boxes or cases of this fine product.

To match the tradition of Rookie cards within Anthology, this year Panini has called them Rookie Selections instead of Treasures. These are numbered dual jersey Autographed Rookies from the past NHL Season. This 96 card rookie crop includes the famed “Double Rookie Class” to its fullest.

Let’s talk a look into our Hobby box and see what we pulled:

Base cards: 30 (0 doubles)

Score Updates: 2 – Gerbe, Brygalov

Score Hot Rookie Updates: 5 – Nordstrom, Fast, Trouba, Leivo, Murray
Score Hot Rookie Update Gold: 1 – Thomas Jurco

Select Update Rookie: 1 – David Warsofsky

Select Update Prizm: 1 – Daniel Carcillo

Prizm Update: 4 – Lecavalier, Pateryn, Heeter, Strome

Prizm Update Prizm: 1 – Greg Pateryn

Rookie Selection Dual Jersey Autograph: 1 – Nathan Beaulieu /249

Titanium Rookie gear Jersey: 1 – Jared Staal

Score Hot Rookies Autograph: 1 – Cameron Schilling

Prizm Black Autograph: 1 – Freddie Hamilton

Luxury Suite Rookie Autograph Prime: 1 – Tanner Pearson /25

Once again I’m very pleased with a box of Rookie Anthology. This years base cards are really nice and have a different flavor to them. I like the foil, however they can chip easily and you should be careful taking them out of the packs.

Updates, Updates and more Updates. I love this concept of Anthology. Always have been a fan of this idea. With the addition of Score into the mix you can really see a rise on the secondary market for those trying to complete sets with the updates. The Select Update set was my favorite as they tend to be the best base cards out there this year.

Moving onto the hits from this box. I came away with 5 hits, 1 extra from the stated run. This tends to be the tradition of Anthology which again I love. The basic relic from this bunch was the Staal jersey. Nice design but nothing really to it. Along with it was a Shilling Hot Rookie autograph. Again the design is basic but nice to have a rookie auto.

The Freddy Hamilton Autograph in Prizm is a really nice looking card. It looks so much more than the basic rookie autograph. The black colour scheme is great on that design. The Beaulieu is my favorite of course being a Habs fan. From the 96 rookies I could have pulled he’s not the most expensive but is a PC find for me so worth more than it will book at.

Lastly I pulled the nice Prime patch autograph of Tanner Pearson. A low numbered card that will definitely do well on the secondary market. The two colour patch is great and makes this the prize of the box.

Overall I’m very happy with this box. Five hits and a ton of Rookies for around $100 is a great deal in the hobby market currently. Panini has always delivered more out of Anthology the past two years and this one is no exception. Anthology will be missed in the hobby as a mainstay, but I’ll be ripping open boxes from 2011-12 to 2013-14 for as long as I can find them. Well worth the money and a fun box to rip into.

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: 4.5/5
Relics: 4.5/5
Parallels: 5/5
Inserts: 5/5
Fun Aspect: 5/5