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 there is one scheduled release - 2023 Topps Pristine Baseball.
This post will be updated if more news, product information and/or product drops occur throughout the week. ***Updated for the 2023 Topps Tier One pre-sale info
2023 Topps Pristine Baseball
Back for its second year of resurrection, the mid-tier product 2023 Topps Pristine Baseball is scheduled for release on Wednesday, August 23rd.
There is only a single configuration - a regular Hobby box. The format is unchanged from last year - 3 autos per box, one of those being a auto relic card. Six “packs” per box, with the packs really being the star of the show, or more accurately, the meme of the show. Assuming nothing changes, each pack will contain an encased card (either an auto or a base refractor), another pack that contains a third pack plus two refractors wrapped in a paper band. That third pack contains all base cards plus an insert with a possibility of the insert being a refractor of some sort. This became a “meme” product because it’s literally the epitome of a Xzibit meme where he says that he heard you like packs so he put packs inside packs inside packs. As such, it’s a pain for breakers to open, but on the other hand, it hits well with a decent amount of color, at least in 2022. Somewhat of a love/hate relationship for those opening a lot of this. Currently Blowout is selling Hobby boxes for $369.99. Last year Topps sold boxes for $349.99 and given Blowout’s pre-release prices, Topps will likely keep their price point relatively the same as their 2022 price point. ***Update - Topps is keeping the same price point as last year, selling Hobby boxes for $349.99 with a customer limit of 4 boxes. They are also selling cases of Hobby boxes (8 boxes per case) for $2,649.99 with a customer limit of 2 cases. Cases sold out in an under an hour.
The design feels very similar to 2022 for the base cards, so if you liked last year, you’ll probably like this year and vice versa. A white background with a plethora of small filled in circles, last year this design element was basically a half circle while this year it is covering a majority of the card and follows more angular lines. This year we get double the amount of inserts, going from 3 to 6 with Fresh Faces being the only returning insert. We get a view of the die cut Oh Snap and standard Swings of Summer inserts. They are both reminiscent of 80’s/90’s designs and I prefer the Swings of Summer one, but neither are that interesting. The Going Going Gone insert, which also has an auto version, is a throwback to 2004 Topps Pristine, and perhaps other versions, where this was a bat relic card in that old version. The 7 Wonders insert is supposedly an Ultra Short Print, but we’ll see once these boxes start getting cracked how much interest there is in them. As usual, Topps is increasing the print run with a blue refractor being added to the base and base autos, more insert autos, more inserts, etc. It’s not egregious, but it’s an all too familiar theme year after year. Finally, it’s worth mentioning that autos should all be on card.
The checklist is similar to last year with a 300 card base set composed of rookies, vets, and former MLB players. All the 2023 rookies up to this point that we are chasing are there - Gunnar Henderson, Corbin Carroll, Masataka Yoshida, Jordan Walker, Kodai Senga, George Costanza, Josh Jung, Francisco Álvarez, Vinnie Pasquantino, Michael Harris II, Brett Baty, Adley Rutschman, Anthony Volpe, Triston Casas, and more.
I was surprised by Pristine last year as at first it seemed too much of a meme and just another mid-tier product that would get lost in the shuffle. However, in part due to the meme-ness, and in part to how the boxes broke and the cards looked, my opinion was changed and I ended up in a break plus picked up a PC single. We’ll see how this year breaks and how much Topps raises prices, but I am going to guess it still does pretty well in year two.
2023 Topps Tier One
Another mid-tier product, 2023 Topps Tier One is going on pre-sale on Tuesday, August 22nd at 12 PM EST. Hobby boxes and Hobby cases look to be part of the pre-sale. Last year Topps sold Hobby boxes for $199.99 on their website. Each Hobby box contains three hits in a single pack - two autos and one relic, although I have in the past seen four card packs on rare occasions. No checklist is out ahead of the pre-sale - we’ll see if Topps adds one during the pre-sale. The scheduled release date is currently Wednesday, September 20th.
More details to come…***Or maybe not! The pre-sale marketing page is now offline and the rumor is that the pre-sale has been at the very least temporarily cancelled.
And now Topps has confirmed the temporary cancellation as announced below.
