So how is everybody feeling about the Topps era?

[RKH916]

Been long enough now for people to get a decent gauge

Personally, I've lost all interest in sealed wax. Have stopped watching rips of new product on YT and haven't purchased a box since base flagship. Haven't had any desire to purchase any Topps singles at all.

If I do any ripping from now on I'll be putting cash aside to set on fire with some 90's/early 2000's that I actually enjoy. Maybe some older Panini stuff, never got to rip stuff like Innovation

[anusinha]

Started off strong with flagship and then chrome. More or less completely downhill from there. Anyone know what sets are upcoming?

[Ismael80]

Meh. Haven't bought a single Topps card so far. Lost interest watching breaks on YT. The designs are awful across the different products release so far.

[Stackfan]

Originally Posted by anusinha

Started off strong with flagship and then chrome. More or less completely downhill from there. Anyone know what sets are upcoming?

Similar to how i'm feeling... Flagship was fine; for what it was. Chrome was pretty good. Finest/Midnight/Topps 3 / Cactus Jack Chrome have been pretty irrelevant given the high price of entry, lackluster designs. Personally i just don't like picking up singles, on products i can't buy/try. Basically cant buy retail at retail or hobby at a hobby shop now; and were right in the thick of the NBA season.

[oldgoldy97]

Donruss looks like what I’ll buy next.


Whoops

[armyml]

Topps got me back into basketball since I'm trying to rainbow my favorite player in Flagship.(Only 4 cards away). Aside from that everything is the same.

Panini- High box prices and if you didn't hit an SSP insert or a chase player low #'d or auto you were boned

Topps- High box prices and if you don't hit an SSP insert or a chase player low #'d or auto you are boned

Give Topps more time with the licenses and there will be plenty of SSP inserts for people to drool over. They also seem more involved directly with the hobby(whether thats good or bad) in the form of the annual rip nights and community events.

Aside from that there hasn't felt like much of a difference aside from seeing more Topps being available than the Panini of the past.

[Rmst09]

It’s pretty clear that they aren’t attempting to cultivate the traditional version of the hobby. Much like the rest of corporate America they are blatantly focused on the bottom line, profits. Ive only engaged with the retail versions of the products. Flagship and Chrome. We had a good time ripping these and lucked out with some exciting pulls for the PC and quite a few to flip on eBay to keep us in the game. Not sure how I’d compare them to Panini so far. I’d say I’ve enjoyed their retail product product more Panini’s. I haven’t had any of their high end product in hand but I hands down prefer the look of Panini’s to what we’ve seen so far from Topp’s.
This is all undergirded by the distinct feeling that as a middle class citizen I should dislike fanatics.

[tjforce]

I continue to believe that the Topps Era is going to be very good for the Pre-2019 Panini Era.

Looking back all the things Panini launched from 2012-2018:
-Prizm Golds
-Kabooms (and Kaboom Golds)
-Downtowns
-Certain other case hits

This era is going to be looked at sort of in the way the mid-late 90s are going to be looked at: Amazing parallels/inserts that were almost impossible to pull from easy to afford products. As opposed to the 00's, which was mostly about Exquisite and doing napkin patches to death.

What I do know about Topps:
-TC Gold's /50 are still what people chase. Most of the other parallels are watered down to death and these Golds/50 will out sell some of the /10 parallels.

-They are desperately trying to create the next Kaboom case hit hype.

What we still don't know: How will Topps handle what the go to RPA will be. I'm interested to see how that plays out, since every year since 2003 has had one (Exquisite on top NT).

[BackToWax]

Flagship was decent, Chrome was good. Everything else has been horrific and the lack of retail has made things really boring.

I'm at the point where if they can't get some better stuff out, I'll just be buying Chrome and Chrome only each year moving forward.

[boxbuster7]

I haven't ripped 1 pack

singles market seems pretty top heavy for sure.

[hermanotarjeta]

Originally Posted by tjforce

I continue to believe that the Topps Era is going to be very good for the Pre-2019 Panini Era.

Looking back all the things Panini launched from 2012-2018:
-Prizm Golds
-Kabooms (and Kaboom Golds)
-Downtowns
-Certain other case hits

This era is going to be looked at sort of in the way the mid-late 90s are going to be looked at: Amazing parallels/inserts that were almost impossible to pull from easy to afford products. As opposed to the 00's, which was mostly about Exquisite and doing napkin patches to death.

What I do know about Topps:
-TC Gold's /50 are still what people chase. Most of the other parallels are watered down to death and these Golds/50 will out sell some of the /10 parallels.

-They are desperately trying to create the next Kaboom case hit hype.

What we still don't know: How will Topps handle what the go to RPA will be. I'm interested to see how that plays out, since every year since 2003 has had one (Exquisite on top NT).

Yes, it will be very interesting to see as Topps has never done high end right in any sport.

Dynasty will be nice, but there will be too many versions of each player. Will be definitely interesting to see if the do a “supreme” RPA/99 to be the go to card.

[Cardsareus84]

Flagship was good and Chrome was alright but those prices are gross. Especially when the pull rate was really bad. If I see another Essengue card I’m going to vomit. Everything else has been 100% swamp ass with a mix of mud butt.

[Asian62150]

Originally Posted by tjforce

I continue to believe that the Topps Era is going to be very good for the Pre-2019 Panini Era.

Looking back all the things Panini launched from 2012-2018:
-Prizm Golds
-Kabooms (and Kaboom Golds)
-Downtowns
-Certain other case hits

This era is going to be looked at sort of in the way the mid-late 90s are going to be looked at: Amazing parallels/inserts that were almost impossible to pull from easy to afford products. As opposed to the 00's, which was mostly about Exquisite and doing napkin patches to death.

What I do know about Topps:
-TC Gold's /50 are still what people chase. Most of the other parallels are watered down to death and these Golds/50 will out sell some of the /10 parallels.

-They are desperately trying to create the next Kaboom case hit hype.

What we still don't know: How will Topps handle what the go to RPA will be. I'm interested to see how that plays out, since every year since 2003 has had one (Exquisite on top NT).

For sure on the true golds. I've been tracking those and the true golds far outsell the sapphires, gets, waves, and sparkles.

Flagship and Chrome were good releases, but Topps totally screwed up the release timing.

Flagship should have been released first and then Chrome should have been released around now (between ASG and start of the playoffs). Finest/Midnight/Three/whatever else should have been done in between.

[oldgoldy97]

Originally Posted by Asian62150

For sure on the true golds. I've been tracking those and the true golds far outsell the sapphires, gets, waves, and sparkles.

Flagship and Chrome were good releases, but Topps totally screwed up the release timing.

Flagship should have been released first and then Chrome should have been released around now (between ASG and start of the playoffs). Finest/Midnight/Three/whatever else should have been done in between.

Yep. Topps played senior prom boy this year. Everything in the chamber unloaded immediately.

[weatherwarrior]

Originally Posted by oldgoldy97

Yep. Topps played senior prom boy this year. Everything in the chamber unloaded immediately.

Best comment ever. Lol

Flagship and chrome were fun. To me finest is a buy singles kinda thing. I like things like oils spills and some geometrics. Im not the only one as someone keeps outbidding me regularly.

Im not a fan of 3 or midnight at all. But I think finest has held true to what finest has been on the baseball side.

Id say they are running at 50 out of 100

Flagship was fine, chrome minus the prices was good, finest is hit or miss. Sometimes it is good but there is a lot of bad.

3 has nice looking base cards but in general is trash. Midnight had night owls which I like but the rest is gross.



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[byronscott4ever]

This is the question I ask repeatedly—what is better now?

Sad that Topps has had so many issues and feels baseball-centered…it’s like they were shocked to have basketball back instead of planning better

[Mattsurewood]

I love how everyone is trashing the Finest release---the design is indeed "different" (Finest baseball had the same design), but the inserts are very good

--The Masters autos are nice
--Aura inserts are nice, and rare (PR about 25)
--Pulse look good (PR about 425)
--The Man inserts always look good

Base parallels of Finest, to me, look real good as well..the oil spills and true blue/orange/reds look real nice.

[hermanotarjeta]

I think the initial excitement has come and gone.

If people approach this with tempered expectations, it won’t be as disappointing.

Feels like we are at a post hype low right now.

I was excited about buying chrome.

Now it will take something extra- spectacular until dynasty releases.

Oh well, it’s a whole lot of money saved for other things.

[daeve]

This is the Fanatics Era, not the Topps era.

[weatherwarrior]

Originally Posted by Mattsurewood

I love how everyone is trashing the Finest release---the design is indeed "different" (Finest baseball had the same design), but the inserts are very good



--The Masters autos are nice

--Aura inserts are nice, and rare (PR about 25)

--Pulse look good (PR about 425)

--The Man inserts always look good



Base parallels of Finest, to me, look real good as well..the oil spills and true blue/orange/reds look real nice.

This where I am on finest as well.

Finishers and Firsts are another nice set if inserts especially in parallels.

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[mfw13]

So far it's sucked....only a couple of products (one of which is a parallel of the other), wax prices that are just as ridiculous as when Panini had the license, and no retro products yet.

[dizzy4111]

The enshitification of everything

Horrible, overpriced AI garbage

[dizzy4111]

Originally Posted by Mattsurewood

I love how everyone is trashing the Finest release---the design is indeed "different" (Finest baseball had the same design), but the inserts are very good

--The Masters autos are nice
--Aura inserts are nice, and rare (PR about 25)
--Pulse look good (PR about 425)
--The Man inserts always look good

Base parallels of Finest, to me, look real good as well..the oil spills and true blue/orange/reds look real nice.

Finest looks terrible in hand. The quality of the stock, the etching, the nonsensical, busy, AI designs.

Awful product overall

[tjforce]

Some of y'all think these are nice?


This is AI slop of guys smelling their own farts.

[hermanotarjeta]

Originally Posted by tjforce

Some of y'all think these are nice?


This is AI slop of guys smelling their own farts.

LOL, yeah, I agree. There’s not much appeal to me for that card design.