Yearly Factory Inspection

While I certainly pay some attention to every new release, the drop date for Topps' factory team sets is circled, in red ink, on my calendar each and every year.  Marketed towards casual collectors and kids, these pre-assembled sets offer a healthy sampling of both the new edition of Flagship and the roster of your favorite team.  While some may see them as a lazy rehash of the already circulating Series One and redundant bloat in an already engorged hobby, there is still plenty for me to like about these blister packs.  Thus, I have grabbed one off of the rack at my local card shop or big box store  since 2014, when I discovered what set them apart from their twin brethren.

So, why not just collate a team set of Series One and be done?  First of all, in order to draw extra intrigue and motivation to purchase, these factory team sets usually include one of two of the featured team's big off-season signings or trade acquisitions that came in too late to be included in the S1 checklist:

In any other normal off-season, Yu Darvish would have likely been making his Cubs uniform debut in this product.  However, with the sluggish pace of transactions during the 2017/18 winter, the ink on the ace's contract dried well after the deadline for both S1 AND the factory sets.  Thankfully, Brandon Morrow signed back in November and the new Chicago closer debuts in Cubbie Blue in Yu's stead (Photoshopped though it may be).

This maiden Morrow now Cubgrade the late-inning arm's representation in my Cubs All-Time Roster Collection binder.  This may make some collector's skin crawl, but I have no apprehension in breaking this team set up in order to meet my individual needs and goals.

Moving on, it's not just entirely new players to the organization who pop their heads into these blisters; additionally, there's yet more uniformed personnel who don't yet appear in the 2018 Flagship roster:

  

 

  

These cards serve as previews for who may be included in the forthcoming Series Two and Update sets later this summer and fall.  Or, heck, they may not show up in anything else whatsoever - I guess we won't truly know for certain until this October.  Either way, these factory sets offer a greater glimpse into the roster construction of your favorite club.

Also, can we all just agree that, no matter how you feel about this waterslide design, that Zobrist card is a piece of art?  A leaping grab on a beautiful summer day, set against the lush, green ivy of Wrigley Field.  Paging Once a Cub - this horizontal hero would make a wonderful addition to your Ivy Frankenset!

One further characteristic that distinguishes the factory team sets from the rest of Flagship are the usual photo variations.  Every year, there's a few cards which feature different pictures than their standard counterparts:

Although, at least for the Cubs, this year's plastic pack only contains one photographic switcheroo, courtesy of Willson Contreras.

The factory team set version is on the left, while the the Series One take is set to the right... personally, I think that this change is a serious downgrade...  I'll take a jubilant athlete over a generic batting snapshot any day of the week.

Lastly, the rest of the team is, in fact, filled out with cards that are basically duplicates of their Flagship equals.  Some may feature slight variations in cropping or positioning; but, for all intents and purposes, they are merely copies of the originals.  Although, as illustrated in the WillCo side-by-side above, the factory team set cards lack the foil found on the Topps logo in the upper left corner.

 

 

Like I said, there's not much here that distinguishes these cards from their pack-pulled brothers, other than the lack of foil.  However, the ability to instantly acquire a team-set of my favorite team (plus the benefits included above) heavily outweighs this slight let-down.

One further difference is found on the back side of each card.  As you can see, in the upper right corner, these factory set singles have their own numbering system, which technically makes them entirely different cards, even if they convincingly ape Flagship.  So, dedicated team and player collectors can count of these blister packs for yet another variation.  On the plus side, the fact that Topps included a specific "team set" notation under the numbering, removing any question about one is holding in their hand, is a nice plus.

Also, since including social media handles on the rear of their cards now seems to be a set thing for Topps, they went ahead and included Twitter and Instagram @'s on the back of the FTS, as well.  Last year, while the account info found it's way onto Flagship, the factories featured a generic hashtag promoting Topps' own social media instead.  In 2018, they appear to be fully committed.

All in all, the new players and the further fleshing out of the team roster make these blister packs a worthy purchase, at least in my opinion.  The prices on these puppies can range anywhere from five to eight bucks, at least from what I've seen (I've found that big boxers usually charge a tick less than your local card shop).  Thus, I can certainly see where other collectors would see these as a simple redundancy and a waste of cardboard, time, and money.

What's your opinion on Topps' factory team sets?  Please feel free to share these thoughts in the comment section below!
 

Popping a Blister

The weather in the Chicagoland area was absolutely B-E-A-U-T-I-F-U-L this past weekend.  Temperatures in the sixties and seventies, crisp sunshine all throughout the daytime hours, the rain finally went away after what felt like 40 days and 40 nights... one really couldn't ask for better in Chicago during the early spring time.  So, what'd I do to make the most of this wonderful outdoor situation?  Why, I went to the mall of course - duh!

Oh... you thought I'd have some story revolving around being outside, didn't you?  Whoopsy daisy.
There's always next weekend.

While I may not have made the most of this unicorn of Chicago weather, I definitely do not feel like my weekend was a waste.  This Sunday, while at the Orland Square Mall in south suburban Orland Park, I came across an item that I've been hunting feverishly for several weeks now.  Thank goodness the wife decided that she wanted Cheesecake Factory for lunch!

After downing a large bowl of gumbo and a massive slice of strawberry cheesecake, the wife and I decided that we should probably try to work off some of those calories.  Being the responsible, American consumers that we are, a lap or two around the attached shopping mall seemed like the most appropriate way to do so.

While she found entertainment in stores like Lush, Francesca's and Charlotte Russe, I was content to meander through the Square's not one, not two, not three, but FOUR sports memorabilia stores.  Seems like over-saturating the market to me, but what do I know?  Gotta capitalize on those Cubbies, I suppose.

After perusing the newly-christened Clark Street Sports location, Plaque's Plus, and Brewery Collectibles, taking note of all the new Cubs knick-knacks, I found nothing that truly caught my eye.  After all, I'm a card-carrying card collector - I don't have much use for memorabilia that's not shaped into a 2.5" x 3.5" rectangle.  I have my Sandberg Cubs jersey that I'll never have to update (always buy a legend, kiddies) and I've sported the same now-dirty blue, Cubs hat for over ten years now.  I don't particularly need anymore swag, nor do I have use for such novelties as Cubs lawn gnomes or wooden trains.

The final stop in my sports-themed retail tour was Lid's Chicago Locker Room - aka, their place to peddle all of their non-hat items.  It was here that I somewhat surprisingly came across the item that I'd been frustrated in trying to track down for a few weeks:

No, not the key-chain; the piece of baseball ephemera that I'd be tracking like a hunter in the Serengeti was the 2017 Topps Factory Team Set for the Chicago Cubs.  Walking around a lot in five year old shoes oftentimes leads to blisters, but blister packs of baseball cards?  Hot dog!

This collated set of 17 cards includes all of the major players from the defending World Series Champion powerhouse and comes packaged in blister pack form.  The fairly unassuming and unheralded, souvenir-type issue is one of my most anticipated releases, year in and year out, which is why I've been stalking all of the local big box chains (Target and Walmart) since they first started popping up, sometime last moth.

These are the one kind of blister that this runner doesn't mind popping up.

Why do I care so much about these cards - they're just the Cubs Flagship cards from Series One, right?  Well, yes that is what makes up the bulk of the plastic bubble:

The only thing different here is that the Topps logo lacks foil and, honestly, I think that is a much better look and easier to read.  Furthermore, if you flip these "repeats" from Series One over, you'll notice something different about them:

Much like Opening Day, the social media handles have been replaced by a generic Topps hashtag.  Also, in the upper right corner, a discerning eye will notice that these cards are numbered with their own system, in order to indicate that these cards have different origins.  As an added bonus, just below that, they actually remove all shadow of a doubt and tell you outright that these cards hail from the sealed team sets, rather than the Flagship packs.

In summation, Topps appeals to the "gotta collect 'em all" nature of our hobby by tweaking a few things on their already established product and re-release them into the wild.  Just like retail/hobby exclusive parallels, Opening Day, and the inevitable torrent of reprints, Topps can collect an extra 8 bucks per pop with very little work.  From marketing and profiting standpoints, it's really quite genius; from a collecting standpoint, it's annoying and OCD-triggering.

Obviously, that's not much reason to be excited about a product and, if that's all these blisters were, I'd welcome them with the same temperament that I do those puss-filled pustules on the bottom of my running-thrashed feet.  In order to fully entice collectors, Topps has to offer a little extra incentive:

If you can read this blurry scan of the back packaging, you'll see there's more to these packs than what initially meets the eyes.  The three names that I have circled in red did not appear in Series One of Flagship and, in fact, are making their Cubs baseball card debut*.  Therefore, I needed these puppies for my Cubs All-Time Roster Collection.

With that, that's how these cards...

...ended up replacing these cards...

In my Cubs All-Time Roster Collection binder and my pages look infinitely better because of it.  Cubbie Blue just works so much more with this collection than Royal Blue, Oriole Orange, what should be Padres Brown.  Of course, I'm biased, but whatever.  The Photoshopping looks good too; not too unnatural.

So far in the young 2017 season, all three of these off-season additions have proven to be valuable  reinforcements.  Wade Davis has already racked up a pair of saves and Koji Uehara has yet to give up a run in three appearances setting the former up.  On the other side of the ball, platoon outfielder Jon Jay is batting a robust .364 thus far.  So far, so good.

While these Cubbie debuts were the main draw for me, that's not all that these factory-sealed packs uniquely provide to collectors.  Additionally, the consumer can find previews of what's to come in Series Two:

For instance, here's three key cogs who didn't make an appearance in the first series and now we now what their cards will most likely look like in the next wave.  As neat as that is, I think the most notable thing here though is that Getty managed to snap a picture of John Lackey on the mound where he doesn't look downright ornery.  Also, I love the follow-through picture chosen for the Javy Baez card, but I do wish that they zoomed out just a touch more - let us see the scene around him (and all of his hands)!

Here are four more guys who didn't make an appearance in Series One, at least not in the traditional sense.  All four of these men ranked with the league leaders in the categories of ERA (Lester, Hendricks), pitching wins (Lester, Arrieta) or RBI (Rizzo) and, thus, appeared on League Leader cards.  Since this is the first year that each of the top three for each stat has gotten their own, individual cards, one could be forgiven for thinking that these were their traditional base cards - I know I did, initially.

I imagine that this is the reason why Topps decided to save these heavy hitters for Series Two.

Lastly, one other thing that these blister packs oftentimes include is slightly different versions of the already released base cards, excepting the already discussed variations on the backsides.  Sometimes, they change up the front of the cards, as well:

As this Kris Bryant card exemplifies - card one in both Flagship and the Cubs set - it's not uncommon to find re-cropped images on the front.  In the spirit of Highlights Magazine, can you spot the difference here?

Okay, so that should have been pretty obvious - the layout has changed from horizontal in S1 to vertical in the factory pack.  As someone who has an unfair, inherent dislike for horizontally layed out cards, I am usually in favor of such a switch.  This case is no different, as the "lower third graphic" takes up much less space on the horizontally oriented piece.  Although, like the Baez card from earlier, it's still cropped way too tightly.

In conclusion, that's what these factory team set blister packs have to offer:  new card numbers for old cards, re-worked versions of previous cards, Series Two previews, and, most importantly, some franchise baseball card debuts.  On the latter point, without the cards of Davis, Uehara, and Jay, there's no way I'd be plopping down any money on this stuff - I'm a sucker for Cubs debuts and Cubgrading.

Anybody else plop down some dinero for a pack?  Who appears for the first time in their new duds for your favorite franchise?

I wish all blisters offered up new Cubs cards when popped.

_____________________________________________________________________________

* Wade Davis appears as a Cub in the concurrently released Gypsy Queen product.  If anyone has a copy of that card available for trade, I'd love to take it off of your hands!

Right Off the Assembly Line

So, yesterday I took a little trip over to my LCS with the intention being only to find a couple of special binder pages for my unusually sized trading cards.  I told myself that that was legitimately all I was allowed to buy.  Predictably, that was not the case as I rebelled against myself (like everytime I go to the LCS); however, what I couldn't have predicted was what the purchase was:

I was completely unaware that the 2016 factory team sets were out on the shelves already.  While I suppose they come out right about this time every year, I do not recall seeing anything about their release and, in searching the internet right now, I still can't find anything about the 2016 sets.

That's okay - I got mine anyway.

Anywho, I get irrationally excited about this little team bundles, even though they're mostly just foil-less versions of Flagship.  Why is that? Oftentimes they include the very first Cubs cards of big off-season acquisitions.

This year's set is no exception - behold, Ben Zobrist's very first card as a Cub.  I saw he made the Gypsy Queen checklist too; however, it appears the factory team set beat Gyspy to the shelves.

Of course, the image is Photoshopped because Spring Training isn't long enough to take pictures (I know, it's all about deadlines... grumble, grumble).  They did a pretty decent job here, although the "Chicago" breast plate is a little high up on the chest.

No matter - Zobs is now officially "Cubgraded" in my CATRC binder.

By far my favorite card from the set.

I was able to make one more such "Cubgrade" thanks to this gem of  a Jason Heyward card.  However, it's not actually his first Cubs card - it's his third.  Zobrist has to wait all the way until Gypsy Queen, despite signing at the sign time (a few days earlier even).  I guess that speaks to the "J-Hey Kid's" collecting pull.

However, while it's not his first, it is his first readily available card:

I don't own either of these - I had to pull the scans off of Ebay because there weren't even any copies on COMC, which should speak to their availability.

I'm still not sure how the Spring Fever promotion works and if my LCS honors it, he sure doesn't make it clear.  Something about redeeming ripped packs?  Anyway, it's not something you can just pull from a normal pack.

Meanwhile, the Heritage Heyward technically is something you can just pull, it's just the odds are vastly against it; it's one of those much-maligned short-prints that only fall at crazy odds.  That's a rant we've all heard though, so I'll spare you.

On the plus side, I now have Jason's first non-Photoshopped Cubbie card!  It reminds me an awful lot of this card from last year: 

Jon Lester also got the introductory press conference treatment on his 2016 team set appearance (and eventually Series 2).  I wish with all of my heart that we could see more of these images for the new off-season acquisitions (when available) instead of obviously altered pictures.

As I said last year, I'd rather see a snapshot from an authentic event instead of altered history.

There was one other winter signee who made an appearance in the product too:

This isn't John Lackey's first Cubs card - he too shows up on the Heritage checklist and it's not even a stupid short-print:

I must admit, I prefer the Heritage card.  If the image is, in fact, altered, Topps did a fantastic job; to the naked eye, it appears to be a typical early spring training, posed shot and nothing appears out of place.  Thanks to Nick, this card already rests in my CATRC, so no further "Cubgrading" is happening here.

That said, it's definitely cool to have another Chicago-fied Lackey in my collection already.

Now, obviously, none of these above-featured cards appeared in Series One or Opening Day.  The other thing about the factory team sets is that they always feature previews of cards due to appear in Series Two or Update.  Sometimes, the images used change by then, but we do get a little glimpse of the future here:

Here we have a very cold Javy Baez in last year's playoffs.  Perhaps that's not smoke in the corners of the card - maybe it's actually frost?

This is the first time I can remember seeing this look sported on a baseball card - please correct me if I'm wrong.  In fact, this is a look that I don't EVER remember seeing on the baseball diamond in any capacity until Cuban import Jorge Soler made it somewhat of a punchline last April:

Darth Soler - image courtesy of NWI Times

Seeing as the weather in a Chicago April (it did snow the last couple of days) is quite different than that of Cuba.  Meanwhile, Javy was born in Puerto Rico and lived most of his life in Florida.  Thus, I guess they can be forgiven.  

However, I don't understand how that can be comfortable to play baseball in; I don't even like wearing a face mask for winter running, and running requires a lot less movement of the head or hand/eye coordination.

The only other card that appeared that had yet to show in a Topps product was this fist-bumping image of Travis Wood.  Of all the relievers to include, I found Travis a bit of an odd choice - why not a more high-leverage arm like Pedro Strop or Justin Grimm?  

Not that Woody isn't a key cog, its just odd to see a long-reliever/lefty specialist get love from Topps.  Perhaps this is a good sign?  Either that or it's just because he used to be a big part of the starting rotation.

Meanwhile, the rest of the 2016 Factory Team Set were all carbon copies of cards found in Series One or Opening Day:

Nothing all that exciting, but new Cubs cards for my collection nonetheless.  So, that's always a good thing.

Also, I gotta ask, has anyone else seen these pop up yet?  I'm still curious as to how I completely missed their release, seeing as pretty much anything else produced by Topps comes into stores with a fair amount of promotion.

But there you have it, I went into that shop looking for a handful of binder pages and I left with 2 "Cubgrades," 2 cards not yet seen in 2016 and 17 new Cubs cards overall.  Oh... and I did end up with those pages too.  All in all, I'd say it was a pretty productive trip.

Productive as a factory assembly line, you might even say.