Retail Review - 2011-12 Upper Deck Series 1 Tin

2011-12 Upper Deck Series 1 Retail Tin

-----------------FRONT----------------------------BACK-----------------
Notable Commons:
11 Michal Neuvirth $1.00
15 Roberto Luongo $1.00
26 Steven Stamkos $1.25
80 John Tavares $1.25
99 Carey Price $1.00
126 Taylor Hall $1.25
160 Jonathan Toews $1.00






























Young Guns: 3, 1:6 Packs
203 Greg Nemisz $6.00
207 Brandon Saad $6.00
243 Matt Frattin $12.00












EA Sports Ultimate Team: 2, 1:8 Packs
EA5 Jonathan Toews $5.00
EA12 Dion Phaneuf $3.00














All-World Team: 1, 1:12 Packs
AW23 Patrick Kane $5.00















UD Canvas: 2, 1:6 Packs
C45 Tomas Pickanec $2.50
C80 Roberto Luongo $4.00















Hockey Heroes: 1, 1:12 Packs
HH3 Andy Bathgate $2.50
















Winter Classic Oversized: 1 Per Tin
WC8 Semyon Carlamov $4.00

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Design: 4/5

Pros: Nice clean design with a different face shot on the back and full stats.
Cons: Some of the photos are pretty boring and the silver foil names over white background, while hockey themed, is hard to read.

Set Building: 4/5
Pros: 200 base cards, 50 rookies! Young Guns tend to hold alot of value with collectors.
Cons: The rookies are short printed as they usually are with UD. Thankfully there are no -super shortprints- like with Pinnacle. That value the cards hold will mean lots of $$$ spent finishing your set.

Rookies: 5/5
Pros: 3 Young Guns per tin is pretty decent and they hold alot of value.
Cons: With 50 of them to collect, you'll be spending alot on the secondary market.

Inserts: 4/5

Pros: They have a pretty good variation this year. I really like the Hockey Heroes and the Canvas cards. Whatever they're using for an art filter looks great! The over-sized card looks amazing also.
Cons: EA Sports ads on my cards.

Autos/Relics: 1/5

Pros: None.

Cons: 1:24 Packs for a Jersey, no autos at all inserted. Pretty ugly.

Value: 18/25
I was really impressed when I opened the tin. The first thing you see is the oversized card in plastic. When you take the card out, the packs are inserted into a plastic tray. It really made me feel like I was opening a 'box' and gave alot of value to the pack ripping experience.

I'm a big fan of Young Guns and they where smart enough to put 3 per tin. Just the right number. However I would me much more happy if you got a jersey per tin, especially since there is no chance for an autograph! I might pick up another tin, but I'd really want to hit a jersey or one of the canvas Young Guns next time!

Retail Review - 2011-12 Pinnacle Hockey

-------------Front------------------------Back-----------
























2011-12 Pinnacle Blaster

Commons:
4 Taylor Hall $1.25
8 Alex Ovechkin $1.25
19 Tyler Seguin $1.25
31 Carey Price $1
53 Jeff Skinner $1
62 Michal Neuvirth $1
87 Sidney Crosby $2
91 Steven Stamkos $1.25
196 John Tavares $1.25
219 Jonathan Toews $1










Rookies:
273 Alexei Emelin $3











Rink Collection:
20 Chris Pronger $4














Breakthrough:
7 Ryane Clowe $1.50
20 Loui Eriksson $2

Fans of the Game:
8 Pressly $4



















Foundation Tandems West:
7 Halak/Pietrangeld $n/a (one sold on Ebay for $5)











Game Night Materials 35 Drew Doughty (Black Swatch) $10

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Design: 3/5

Pros: The photography is pretty great. Blows most of the competition's cards off the ice. (Just look at the couple I scanned for front and back base card scans. Card backs have alot of interesting text to read.
Cons:Boring card back design. No stats whatsoever and it re-uses the front image.

Set Building: 1/5
Pros: Tons of players to collect, 250 total!
Cons: The rookies #251-280 are short printed. Not too bad considering Upper Deck does the same thing, however Pinnacle made the last #281-290 autograph versions. Putting this set together will be near impossible without spending a ton of cash.

Rookies: 1/5
Pros: You get at least one per box... I mean it could be worse right?
Cons: 40 rookies total in the base set, 30 of those are short printed, the last 10 are super short printed autographed cards. You'd have to be extremely lucky to pull one, at least in retail! Rookies have the 'foil' finish and don't blend with the rest of the set.

Inserts: 3/5

Pros: Plenty to collect. I'm not sure how rare the Foundation inserts are but they seem to sell well on Ebay and I don't see many listed. They could be retail exclusive? The foil cards don't scan well, but they do look nice!
Cons: Boring designs. All of the inserts have the same picture on the front and back. Has anyone ever cared about Fans of the Game? Also nothing is serial numbered.

Autos/Relics: 3/5

Pros: One per box, the only reason the box wasn't a complete bust!

Cons: No serial number again!

Value: 11/25
I don't think I'd buy this again. It seems like the perfect product to build a set, with the outstanding photography and decent insert/jersey to pack ratios. They had to screw it up by making the rookies impossible to get though!

Retail Review - Retro - 2010 Topps Chrome Baseball Blaster x2

2010 Topps Chrome Baseball Blaster x 2

8 Packs Each - $11.98 Each

(Click images for larger)


I'll list both boxes together for convenience.








-------FRONT-----------------------BACK--------------














Notable Base Cards:
165 Derek Jeter

Rookies: 13
172 Bryan Anderson
173 Jon Link
180 Jason Donald
184 Ike Davis
185 Andrew Cashner
189 Wilson Ramos
193 Lance Zawadzki
195 Starlin Castro
198 Carlos Santana
206 Mike McCoy
212 Stephen Strasburg
213 Jake Arrieta
216 Drew Storen

Refractors : 6
1:3 Packs

70 Max Scherzer
78 Placido Polanco
83 Orlando Hudson
105 Mike Pelfrey
144 Alex Rodriguez
144 Alex Rodriguez

X-Fractors: 4
1:3 Packs

23 Nick Swisher
125 Jon Lester
132 Michael Cuddyer
166 Mike Napoli





Refractors Purple: 1
1:12 Packs

82 Lyle Overbay /599








Refractors Blue: 1
1:191 Packs

47 Rich Harden /199






-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Design: 4/5

Topps almost never goes wrong with the main set's card design. This was the first year Topps had exclusive rights to the MLB license so they displayed large team logos in the corners of the cards. The only problem I have is that some of the text on the back of the cards blends in with the backgrounds.

Set Building: 5/5

Chrome is always a great set to put together. The only real difficulty would be the maximum 3 base cards per pack you get.

Rookies: 3/5

Decent rookies pulled from these blasters, I usually see refractors of rookies but not this time. The Strasburg would have been much nicer in 2010!

Inserts: 3/5

Refractors only this time. I like the finish on the refractors though, they even scan well! X-Fractors are retail exclusive like previous years. The blue refractor was a tough pull and I wish it was a Yankee for my personal collection. There are apparently Chicle inserts, the pack says 1:81 packs to pull one.

Autos/Relics: 1/5

Didn't get any. Odds on the pack are 1:171 packs so its a pretty tough pull. Rookie autographs only.

Value: 16/25

Had fun opening these. The refractors are always great to pull from a pack and look at. Liked pulling the Strasburg and the two A-Rod refractors. Also needed the Jeter for my personal collection!

Retail Review - 2011 Press Pass Legends Football Blaster Box

2011 Press Pass Legends Football Blaster Box

3 Packs - $19.99











Base----Front-------------------Back----------













Base Rookies + Legends
1 Blaine Gabbert
8 Tyrod Taylor
18 Stevan Ridley
27 Julio Jones
28 Torrey Smith
29 Greg Little
38 Dane Sanzenbacher
42 Luke Stocker
43 DJ Williams
45 Aldon Smith
87 Mike Rozier 1981-1983
89 Dick LeBeau 1956-1958


Bronze Foil Parallel

42 Luke Stocker /250









Past & Present
1:14 Packs

PP9 Warren Sapp/Nick Farley





Saturday Signatures
LS Luke Stocker

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Design: 2/5

You know it's not too bad, but I have to knock off a point for having no team logos, city names, or anything! The air brushed helmets and jerseys are pretty ugly. It's too bad because I like the gloss finish in the middle of the card and the foil design.

Set Building: 3/5

Seems like a small set, 90 or 100 cards. You'd have to buy alot of boxes to put one together though, and only if you are a fan of college football and don't care about the missing team logos and names.

Rookies: 5/5

Pretty much all you get in this product except for a few legends cards.

Inserts: 3/5

Each blaster seems to have one #'ed card, and one insert. It could definitely be worse.

Autos/Relics: 4/5

Relics are pretty hard to get, 1:9 packs, I didn't pull one so I can't comment. On the other hand, you'll find an autograph in the other 8:9 packs. For the price, it's not too bad. Sage seems to give you one more autograph per box, but with lower quality players and on sticker autographs. I'd take an on card auto any day over a sticker!

Value: 17/25

This was a short break, but its nice to get the guaranteed auto. I really don't care for the base cards, its too obvious that they are missing the team licenses. A different picture on the auto card would have been nice too, kind of lazy of them! Wish I was a Luke Stocker fan, 3 cards in this box where his!

Retail Review - Retro - 2009 Topps Chrome Baseball Blaster Box

2009 Topps Chrome Baseball Blaster Box

8 Packs - $11.98











(click images for larger)










Base Card Design Front and Back



Rookies: 7
180 Phil Coke
181 Jordan Schafer
182 Joe Martinez
183 Trevor Crowe
184 Shairon Martis
200 Rick Porcello
204 Jason Jaramillo

World Baseball Classic Stars: 2
1:4 Packs

W14 Luis Durango
W88 Tai-Chi Kuo







Refractors: 1
1:3 Packs

182 Joe Martinez RC








X-Fractors: 3
1:3 Packs

80 Carlos Zambrano
94 Joe Mauer
191 Ryan Perry RC






Gold Refractors: 1
1:98 Packs

141 Kenji Johjima /50

Design: 5/5

I'm a fan of the 2009 Topps design. It's a clean design with lots of diagonal lines but doesn't get too crazy like recent Panini designs. Lots of information is included on the backs too.

Set Building: 5/5

Topps Chrome is always a decent set to put together. No short prints to search after in the set, and it's a pretty low numbered (although you'd only get 2-4 base cards per pack.)

Rookies: 4/5

I pulled lots of rookies, at least one per pack counting parallels.

Inserts: 3/5

I don't care much for the WBC inserts, and there seems to be alot of them in the set. You can't go wrong with refractors though, and the XFractors are retail exclusive I believe. I got lucky and pulled a gold refractor, too bad it wasn't a Yankee!

Autos/Relics: 1/5

No relics, and autographs are inserted at an insane rate. Such is the fate of retail pack busters! The easiest autograph to pull is 1:308 packs. I can only give the score a 1 because of this.

Value: 18/25

It was a fun break, and I'm glad I got it 40% off. It's nice to get a 'hit' in every pack with a refractor or insert but I kind of miss the days when those where rare (and actually valuable).