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By: Danny Laurel
UPDATE: Here is the FULL CHECKLIST!
Topps’ Five Star baseball was introduced to the masses in 2012 to a lot of speculation on how it would perform. There are other high-
end products for baseball already, so could Five-Star bring something special to match its football counterpart? It still remains to be seen with its initial release. Prices for autographs and relic cards skyrocketed out of the gate, but a lot of famous names had items selling for under average amounts. Then it was realized that packaging issues created a lot of nics and chipping on cards, so that made some wary of this high risk-high reward product.
2013 Topps Five Star football has just been released to much acclaim, so it stands to reason that there should be improvements with this next baseball edition, and so far, it looks like Topps does listen to feedback. Initial product information for Five Star baseball has all the bells and whistles one should expect from a product in this price point. Each case will contain three boxes, and in each box collectors should expect one base card, two autographs, one auto patch or autograph, one auto book card or silver signature, and one jumbo patch, swatch, batting glove or bat plate, knob.
The active and retired player autos will have Rainbow foil parallels numbered to 25 and will have a Five Star parallel that will be a 1/1. There will also be quotable autographs that will feature a special inscription from there player. These will be numbered to 10 with a parallel limited to one copy.
Other notable autograph inclusions:
- Autographed Active/Retired Patch– Five Star active/ret. patch #/35, gold foil parallel #/10, Rainbow Foil Parallel #/5, and Five Star parallel numbered 1/1.
- Silver Signatures- Signed in silver ink. Blue parallel #/25, Red #/20, Purple #/15, Gold #/10, Rainbow #/5, Five Star 1/1.
- Autographed Book Cards- Five Star 3 and 4-piece book cards include three,four relic pieces numbered to 49, and 1/1 versions featuring all patches. A jumbo relic version is also numbered to 49. All feature a gold parallel numbered to 10 and a Rainbow foil parallel that’s 1/1.
- Five Star Dual Patch Book– Early images show two players from same team signing on each side of book. Each numbered to 10.
- Additional Book card autos- Five Star 25 signatures book will be numbered to 1. ALso a 5-Star dual signature patch book numbered to 10 and a MLB silhouetted batter logo patch book that’s a 1/1.
One of the many complaints from collectors about the 2013 baseball products is the lack of superstar rookies to drive products. There is no Harper, or Strasburg, Darvish, etc, so it’s good to see that Topps is digging deep to provide some more legends to compensate. Enter: The Cut Signatures. The 5-Star signature cards will be 1/1’s with a signatures book card including a cut auto on one side and an on-card auto on the other side. These will be 1/1 and early images look amazing. Also included, Greatest Lineups of all-time book cards. These will feature cut signatures of players from the greatest starting lineups of all time. One can only imagine what lineups they will come up with.
Rounding out 2013 Five Star baseball are various low numbered relics, jumbo patches and relic book cards that contain plenty of bat plates and bat knobs. The ideas are nothing new, but these are items that are still fresh on collectors minds and haven’t over stayed their welcome quite yet. It remains to be seen how much these high-end products can hold up. Eventually this stuff will run out and they will need to keep pushing the envelope.
For some though, the 100 subject base card set can still be a fun challenge. Each card is limited to 60, so putting together a set can be a significant secondary market challenge.
Take a look at the gallery and let us know what you think!
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