Product Review: 2010 Panini Absolute Memorabilia

Before ramping up for another busy week in the real world, let’s take a quick look at another product review from yesteryear. Okay, this review isn’t so late that you’d expect “yesteryear” in its usual context, but this product is so 2010. Literally. The funky almost-a-trapezoid-but-technically-a-pentagonal-prism box says so…

The Box – Click for Detail

Hobby boxes come with 4 4-card packs for a total of 16 cards. I purchased this box from Dave and Adam’s Card World for $118.75, which translates into a $7.42/card ratio. That is definitely above my normal comfort zone, but a goal is a goal, right? Maybe next year I won’t tell myself to review every product on the football release calendar.

Pillow-Box packs are fun to open but hard to scan

The Breakdown:
Base Cards: 11 (0 duplicates)
   Rookie Cards: 3 (included in base card total above)
Inserts
   Marks of Fame (#/50): 1
Hits
   Rookie Auto (#/99): 1
   Rookie Auto (#/25): 1
   Gridiron Force Prime Jersey (#/50): 1
   Absolute Heroes Patch (#/50): 1

Click images for full-sized scans

FIRST AND GOAL’S FOUR DOWNS:
1st Down, Design: On the surface, these base cards aren’t bad. They have a fairly clean design, the player photos are prominent, and the bit of team color is a nice touch. However, there are some more glaring problems with the base cards that seem to overshadow the good aspects. When rainbow foil board was first used, it was pretty sweet. It was an easy way to pick out a cool insert card. Now, it just seems trite and overused, especially for a base card. Also, will Panini ever learn to incorporate the team logo on the front of the card? Other than the occasional side-helmet shot, this could be mistaken for a non-licensed product. Lastly, I realize I don’t know the inner workings of the industry, but it wasn’t possible to get game action shots of rookies…in a product that was released in mid-October? Really? Even if those are the last cards you finalize and print, I would expect to see full uniforms for rookies at this point in the release calendar. The pre-season releases get a training camp photo excuse. Mid-October releases do not.

2nd Down, Inserts: The main point of a product like this is the hits, so let’s not even bother discussing the non-hit insert I pulled. Granted, even if that weren’t the case, I don’t know that I’d take time to discuss this Marks of Fame card anyway. Moving on. The hits were generally underwhelming in this box. For a product that is approaching high end, I’d expect to see some autographs that aren’t just mid-level rookies with sticker labels slapped on a barely altered base parallel. I like that they took the time to add a white fade zone to make the autograph more prominent, but that’s just not enough effort for a product of this caliber. The jerseys were also disappointing. I’ll never understand the use of tiny number and letter die-cut windows. It just makes the small jersey swatch seem smaller. And how am I supposed to believe this plain red swatch is from a “prime” part of the jersey? The Steve Smith patch card is decent with the giant panther logo about to snack on Smith and the nice three-color patch, but I’d rather see non-rainbow foil and a bigger swatch window. Patches are still cool to see and touch, even if they are overused at this point in the game, so let me see more on this card.

3rd Down, Collation: It’s really tough to gauge the collation when you’re getting just 16 cards in a hobby box. Granted, I didn’t pull any duplicates, so that’s good. That would have been an absolute deadly sin for a box like this. I also pulled the stated hit seeding, so that’s hard to argue. I guess my thought would be there was probably a box somewhere that had four amazing hits in it or at least two sweet hits and really good base rookies. It would have been nice to even that out with my box of rather crappy hits and barely noteworthy rookies. Then again, maybe every box delivered this (lack of) quality.

4th Down, Overall Value: This has to be the worst part about this product, or at least the box I busted. If you had given me the exact same 16 cards in a blind review and told me they all came from the same box, I probably would have thought it was a decent box/product. However, this isn’t a blind review and I am painfully aware of the price tag this box carried, even two months after its release (I purchased this box just before the new year). There is no way the base cards are worth any where near the $7.42/card average. Granted, it is typically the case that base cards don’t carry their own weight. But in most boxes, the inserts and hits make up the difference. That is not the case here where even the “best” hits will struggle to get to $7.42. Kudos Panini America. You just got another $118.75 from me that you really didn’t deserve. Then again, I suppose the sole blame rests on me for pulling the purchase trigger. To begin with. As other wise bloggers have said, if you don’t like the products, don’t buy it. Hopefully some day I will learn that lesson. On the other hand, I still firmly believe you can’t acurately judge a product from eBay listings and product sell sheets. You need to touch and see the cards personally and you need to see a box in its entirety, not just some random shots of the best cards in the set.

RED ZONE RESULTS: UNSPORTSMAN LIKE CONDUCT, KEY-PLAYER EJECTED 2010 Panini Absolute Memorabilia was an absolute disappointment. The product lacked anything that resembled quality cards and reminded me of a lower-to-mid shelf product, rather than one that might be placed on the top shelf. Rainbow foilboard doesn’t make a card more valuable. 1997 Flair had sweet base cards that felt valuable. 2010 Panini Absolute Memorabilia does not. Overall, the product may not have been terrible, but was at least way over priced. It’s as if the only good player on offense dropped a pass to the endzone, drop-kicked the opposing cornerback out of frustration, was ejected from the game, and the home team went on to be routed by Little Sisters of the Poor. Please tell me you can do better, Panini. You have 50% of the pro football card market now. I don’t want to hate your company. Really, I don’t. But sometimes you make it so difficult to lend you any respect.

NEXT UP: 2010 Panini Limited

HOF Spotlight: Art Donovan

Name: Art Donovan
Position: Defensive Tackle
Pro Career: 1950 – 1961
Team Affiliation(s): Baltimore Colts, New York Yanks, Dallas Texans
College: Boston College
Induction Class: 1968

Brief Bio: Vastly overlooked in his high school and college playing days, Art Donovan became one of the greatest professional defensive linemen in history. Even as a 26-year-old rookie, due to his military service during WWII, Donovan was a pass rushing and double-team-splitting force to be reckoned with. He used that dominant on-field play and his contagious off-field morale to help transform the young and fledging Colts club into a championship-caliber franchise. During his illustrious 12-year playing career, Donovan was selected All-NFL in five consecutive seasons and played in five Pro Bowls. One of the league’s most popular players of his generation, he led the legendary Colts defensive line that won the league championship in 1958 and 1959.

Career Stats: 138 games played; 1 safety

Featured Card: 1952 Bowman #46. Donovan was in his third season in the NFL, his only one with the Dallas Texans, when he was featured on his own rookie card. Even as a defensive lineman, his rookie card is relatively valuable, with eBay listings ranging from $75 to a staggering $1,219.99, with an obvious grading preference. There are many various cards featuring Donovan in his much more famous Colts uniform spanning everything from vintage base cards to junk wax era HOF-specific sets to modern throwbacks and cut autographs with corresponding prices that you would expect for each type.

NOTE: You can find all of my Hall Of Fame Spotlight Features by clicking the HOF Spotlight banner above.

Heisman Highlight: John Huarte

Name: John Huarte
Position: Quarterback
College: Notre Dame Fighting Irish
Class: Senior
Winning Year: 1964 – 30th Award
Official Heisman Profile: Click Here
 
 
 

Interesting Notes: Huarte became the sixth Notre Dame Heisman winner in one of the tightest votes in history…was the clear leader of the successful 1964 Fighting Irish squad after playing just 50 minutes prior to his senior year…played professional football for 10 years, 8 of which were in the NFL…is now a very successful businessman as the owner and president of 14 tile and marble distribution stores in the western United States.

Featured Card: 1965 Topps #117. Huarte is certainly not one of the premier Heisman winners of yesteryear, and his card prices reflect this. There is currently only one copy of this 1965 rookie card listed on eBay and it carries a $25 price tag. There are several other vintage cards (usually 1967 Topps) for less than $10 and quite a few newer legend- and Heisman-focused cards that can be yours for $5 or less.

NOTE: You can find all of my Heisman Highlight Features by clicking the post banner above.

Product Review: 2010 Panini Epix

Next up in my barrage of better-late-than-never product reviews is 2010 Panini Epix. This one is also nearly four months late, but hey, that’s better than infinite months late, right?

The Box – Click for Detail

Hobby boxes come with 18 8-card packs for a total of 144 cards. I purchased this box from Dave and Adam’s Card World for $52, which translates into a $0.36/card ratio. That boils down to another mid-to-low shelf Panini product that was released before the midway point of the NFL season. The only question that remains to be answered is will this product be an undervalued success or an epic fail? (See what I did there?)

I’m picking up on an “X” theme here

The Breakdown:
Base Cards: 127 (42 duplicates)
   Rookie Cards: 7 (included in base card total above)
Parallels
   Silver Parallel (#/250): 2
   Gold Parallel (#/150): 2
   Platinum Parallel (#/50): 2
Inserts
   Epix Moment: 2
   Epix Game: 3
   Epix Season: 2
   Ball Hawks: 3
   Highlight Zone: 2
   Rush Hour: 1
Hits
   Epix Jerseys: 2
   Rookie Autos (#/499): 1
   Cowboys Auto Letterman (#/70): 2

Click images for full-sized scans

FIRST AND GOAL’S FOUR DOWNS:
1st Down, Design: When I look at the scan of the base cards again, I feel like it would be so easy to rip this design apart. But to remain positive, and to point out something very good, I would like to start by commending Panini on their use of team colors as an integral part of of the base design. After so many ultra-neutral gray boxes and borders, it is very nice to see some colors pop from Panini packs (Ooo…alliteration…nice…). I will say however that I’m not a big fan of the execution. I struggle though, because I don’t have that standout suggestion on how to improve the design. I think I’m caught on the use of a player cut-out on top of a graphic background AND a photographic background. If it were one or the other, I think my eyes would be less confused. For instance, get rid of the tiny photo triangles or make the X design ghosted like they did on the card back. There are always issues with X designs. SPx of the late 90s was awesome, but recent renditions have suffered. Upper Deck’s 2009 X concept for baseball was the bomb to some collectors and completely bombed with others. I guess it’s all in your own unique perspective.

2nd Down, Inserts: The parallels are not bad, but they could be better. In the scan above, you really can’t distinguish them at all because the only notable difference is the foil used to stamp the Epix text logo and the serial numbering on the back. However, in person, you can see a textured, refractorized, shineyness to them that really pops. The Epix Moment/Game/Season sets are pretty nice. I like that they feel like inserts and that the design is simple, effective, and different from the base set. My problem here is the name. Can you really make the adjective plural? I’ve heard of an epic game or moment, but an epix (epics) season? I don’t think so. It’s like the time in high school when my friend tried to be cool and wrote “Steelers Sux”. Trying too hard to use an X at the end of the word is often just that: trying too hard. The other inserts were an improvement from past Panini inserts, but still show a tendancy towards loud graphics and backwards design flaws. The jersey cards were nice in that they almost had their own design, but the swatch isn’t the focus of the card and comes in an oddly shaped window for no apparent reason. The autograph rookie card was your usual Panini sticker album, but at least they used a ghosted label to help the actual autograph pop. That hasn’t always been the case for Panini. I do really like the autographed letterman cards. There’s never much room for design elements with these, but they did a respectable job. I do really like the choice in pens. The silver Sharpie makes the autograph a focus of the design and even the thickness was appropriate. Chuck Howley never could have signed with Ed Jones’ thick pen and Ed Jones’ autograph would have looked lost if he used Howley’s fine point pen. I don’t know if Panini dictates these details or if the athletes decide, but I like the result.

3rd Down, Collation: How do you spell horrid? E-P-I-X. In 144 cards, I pulled a staggering 42 duplicates. There are no ifs, ands, buts, or what-the-hells around it, that is a terrible ratio. What’s worse? I didn’t even pull the entire veteran base set! Ugh. So I can’t even put up a “complete set sans rookies” listing on eBay like I could for other products (I’ve never tried that…I wonder if it would sell?). Nope. These all go straight into the I-hope-I-can-effectively-create-and-sell-random-team-lots bin. The box’s one saving grace? I actually got an extra hit over the “guaranteed” four. I have to assume it was the second Cowboys auto Letterman I pulled. Those things are usually more of the few per case hit variety rather than a few per box hit, so I was excited about that. But really, 42 duplicates? EPIX FAIL! (I’m sorry, I had to).

4th Down, Overall Value: This is a typical low-to-mid shelf Panini product. In this particular box, I got lucky with two Cowboys autograph letterman cards. Those two alone should be enough to cover the cost of the box. However, if my box was an anomaly, as I suspect it was, the value just isn’t there. At this point in the game, no one really cares about plain swatches from veteran jerseys and who is paying top dollar for a Devin McCourty autograph? The inserts, parallels, and even base cards aren’t bad cards, but there’s just not a lot of value in them. This also is not a set that generally lends itself to set collectors, so there’s also little trade bait here, unless you pull a lot of cards of someone else’s favorite player or team. At $52 per box, it’s certainly not a large investment or a huge risk to buy a box, but if you’re strictly looking for “the flip,” you probably want to look elsewhere.

RED ZONE RESULTS: TURNOVER ON DOWNS 2010 Panini Epix wasn’t such a poor product that a Pick 6 or an unsportsman like penalty was warranted, but it certainly wasn’t good enough to find paydirt. The bright rays of light this product showed were completely overshadowed by the clouds of terrible collation. I was naturally happy to pull an extra autographed letterman card, but having nearly 1/3 of my base cards be duplicates was just too much. Don’t feel too bad, Epix. You’re a start up product playing your first season with the big boys. There’s always next year.

NEXT UP: 2010 Panini Absolute Memorabilia

Pre-Sale Feedback Request

At the beginning of the year, I noted the current state of First and Goal and some goals for 2011 that I had in mind. One of the items was that I’d like to branch into stocking and selling sealed product through my newly formed business. I’d also like to branch into other sports, but to start buying and selling sealed baseball products seemed like a very large jump for me.

Fortunately, the first 2011 football product has been announced, 2011 Upper Deck. This got me to thinking that perhaps making the jump to sealed product would be easier in the sport I already know the most about. Also, this early release means I can focus on football and not have to wait until July. So here are some facts and then I’ll ask some questions.

THE FACTS:
20 packs per box, 6 cards per pack

Base Set:
o Regular Cards – 50 cards
o Star Rookies – 200 cards

Insert Cards:
o 1991 UD 20th Anniversary – 200 Cards
o Conference Clashes
o Class Of
o Saturday in Action
o Historical Programs
o Dream Tandems
o Star Rookies Stripe Redemptions

Autographed Cards (3 per box!):
o Rookie Lettermen Signatures (Varied #)
o Star Rookies Autographs (1:10)
o Ultimate Collection Rookie Signatures (1:480)

Price per Box: ~ $85 (subject to change until presale begins)
Price per Pack: ~ $4.50 (ditto)

THE QUESTIONS:

Any and all feedback to these polls above and your comments below are greatly appreciated!

Topps Takes New Approach to Designs

Well, alright, it may not be a new approach to an entire design scheme, but it certainly is an interesting concept. What am I talking about? Check out this press release from Topps regarding the forthcoming 2010 Topps Five Star Football:

NFL PLAYERS SHOW OFF THEIR ARTISTIC SIDE IN FIVE STAR

Topps announces it will be adding its popular player sketch-cards as additional hits to the highly-anticipated Five Star Football. Several gridiron stars have added their artistic skills including Tony Romo (image attached), Reggie Wayne, Vincent Jackson, LaDainian Tomlinson, Maurice Jones-Drew, Roddy White, Matthew Stafford, C.J. Spiller, Matt Ryan, Mike Williams, Tim Tebow, Aaron Hernandez and many more.

Each original 1 of 1 drawing features the artist/player’s signature on the card’s back.

The hobby exclusive Topps Five Star Football hits stores late February.

Click image for larger view

I think this is actually a really cool idea. In the late 90s, jersey swatches were supposed to get you closer than ever to the players you collected. Then it turned out that jerseys were just “event worn” or “player used” and the athlete never knew where his old sweaty laundry was going. Then seeded autographs (and some were inserted in-pack well before the jersey craze) were supposed to be the next big thing. But sticker labels and mass production led collectors to want more from the card companies. On-card autographs were viewed as the next best thing because you knew that the player actually held the card and knew what he was autographing. Now, Topps is taking it to another level by having the player draw/design the entire card himself, PLUS autographing the back. Who would’ve thought that on-card autographs on the BACK of cards would be acceptable? It works here.

It will be interesting to see scans of these things when they are released. Is an art chase hit still chased if the athlete can’t draw for crap? Does a no-name bench warmer suddenly become a hot commodity because he would be better employed, though much hungrier, as a free lance illustrator? I suppose only time will tell, but it should be fun to watch.

By the way, would anyone be willing to bet that Tim Tebow’s card includes a Scripture reference?