Helping to keep everyone up-to-date on what is coming out and what might be worthy of your time in the Baseball Card Hobby for the current week. Check out our Discord for more discussion on this and any other hobby chatter - Prospects Live Discord.
This week we have one scheduled release - 2023 Panini Three and Two.
This post will be updated if more news, product information and/or product drops occur throughout the week.
2023 Panini Three and Two
Back for it’s second year, 2023 Panini Three and Two is scheduled to release on Friday, June 16th.
There are two hobby configurations - a regular Hobby box and a First Off The Line (FOTL) Hobby box. Each format comes with an autographed card in a factory sealed magnetic case, a relic card in a factory sealed magnetic case, and three base/insert cards. The FOTL format has exclusive red parallels, which is likely the only difference. The FOTL format went to dutch auction last Thursday, June 8th, with a starting point of $500 and a floor of $200. I didn’t see where it ended, even though I had the website up, it often doesn’t refresh to show you when it goes out of stock. On my browser, I saw it get all the way to the floor, which likely is where it did end - last year it started at $600 with the same floor of $200 and sold out just above the floor. Regular Hobby boxes are currently around $200 pre-sale and Panini will be selling them on their website on Friday. This will be updated once Panini posts their price. There are no retail formats. ***Update - Panini will be selling regular Hobby boxes for $200 per box with a max of 10 boxes (1 case) per transaction on their website.
The design isn’t really anything special - base cards are full border and relatively traditional looking. Autos are going to be sticker autos, which is always a bit disappointing. Jumbo patches are pretty awesome looking, but as with most products nowadays, they are player worn/used and not game worn/used. The one base insert we get a look at is called On The Horizon and it looks pretty cool, but doubt it has any traction from a value perspective.
The checklist is not yet released as of writing. Given the images released, it is almost assuredly the same approach Panini has taken with their 2023 baseball products so far - prospects that did not debut prior to the 2023 season, ex-MLB players, and possibly a current player or two (Bobby Witt, Jr. for example, as he was in 2023 Donruss Baseball). ***Update - Panini has announced that Willie Mays will be signing cards for Panini moving forward, starting with 2023 Panini Three and Two. It has been at least 10 if not 20 years since Mays has signed trading cards, so this is relatively big news given Mays’ stature in baseball history. *****Update - the checklist has been released. As expected the only active MLB player as of the end of 2022 is Bobby Witt Jr. Otherwise the product is made up of prospects (as of the end of 2022) and ex-MLB players. The biggest note on the prospects is that Ethan Salas will have autos in the product, his first with Panini (he has signed in one Onyx multi-sport product so far).
I didn’t pay up for this last year, and I don’t see myself doing it this year. I may buy singles in the aftermarket of PC players, but they have to be cheap for me to be interested. And aftermarket singles will mostly be that - relatively cheap, especially for the ex-MLB players. “Prospects”, on the other hand, can hold value for some of the more desirable guys, like Jordan Walker and Jordan Lawlar.