Product Review: 2009 Donruss Threads

Of the three retail boxes I recently purchased, this was the one I was least excited about. I had seen card scans on other sites when the product went live and wasn’t real wild about them. I guess the allure of buying fresh wax was too much for me to turn away.

2009 Donruss Threads – Retail Box

2009 Donruss Threads is available in retail boxes of 8 packs of 5 cards. I paid $19.99 (plus 6% sales tax) for my box from K-Mart, which calculates into around $0.53 per card. Not the cheapest per card rate out there, but by no means high-end either. Let’s jump to the breakdown:

Base Cards: 38
Rookie Cards: 1 (#150 Jason Phillips)
Inserts: 2 (College Greats Shonn Greene and Gridiron Kings Darrius Heyward-Bey)
Hits: — (none)
Duplicates: — (none)

Click image for full sized scan

FIRST AND GOAL’S FOUR DOWNS:
1st Down, Design: How would be the best way to put this? Awful? Dreadful? Just down right bad? This certainly is not the worst base card design, but it will never win awards to beauty, either. The very bold diagonal lines really draw attention away from the point of the card, the pictured football player. The player name plate cutting straight across the picture is also distracting and adds needless barriers. The one nice part? I like how the player pops out of the top of the design and then fades into and behind the design on the bottom. That nice subtle touch is lost, however, by the overall needlessly loud design elements. One last thought, I know serial numbers are all the rage now, but do we really need to number every rookie card produced? It’s great that I pulled one of 999 copies of Jason Phillips’ Donruss Threads rookie card, but honestly, who cares? If it’s more than 250 or so, don’t bother serial numbering these things.

2nd Down, Inserts: The College Greats insert is interesting. The design ties in nicely to the base card, although in this case that is actually a bad thing. I know that a lot of football collectors hate seeing college uniforms and logos in their NFL sets, but I do not mind it as much. What I do mind is having a set called “College Greats” and showing rookies. Granted, some of the rookie class of any year could be considered to have had great college careers. But why not show old time players? When the early football sets are released, collectors are excited to see the rookie class in their new uniforms and numbers. If you absolutely need to have a college themed insert, don’t use the rookie class. Period. In a nice contrast is the Gridiron Kings set. I have aways really liked these inserts, and this year’s effort is actually well designed. I like the painted image, the silver accents, and the overall clean appearance. Again, I don’t know that rookies should be included in sets like this (case in point Hey-Bey who has done absolutely nothing to be considered a king, even in lowly Oakland). At least he is in his new Oakland uni.

3rd Down, Collation: It’s tough to gauge a product line’s collation when you are only getting 40 cards. The biggest indication of a problem would be duplicates, which I did not have in my box. I only got two inserts, which is a little disappointing, but again, there were so few cards that it’s just too hard to say if the collation was good or poor.

4th Down, Overall Value: Retail boxes will never deliver great “value” as it is usually defined in the Hobby. The lack of good inserts and very rare “hit” pulls (that are not rare at all in hobby boxes and are therefore not valuable in and of themselves) makes resale value tough. Donruss Threads did add Brett Favre’s very first Vikings card as a retail exclusive. Those base cards sold for as much as a lot of good autographs, so certainly that adds a level of value. However, overall, you are almost always going to get what you pay for in the retail portion of the Hobby. At $20 for a box, that’s just not very much.

RED ZONE RESULTS: KEY PLAYER EJECTED, LEADS TO A TURNOVER ON DOWNS I thought of this red zone result right after I decided to add this element to my product reviews. I wanted to save it for a “deserving” product. To me, 2009 Donruss Threads is that product. The base card design is just unforgivable with today’s highly advanced graphic design technology. Maybe I was close minded, but I was unable to get past the use of rookies in college themed inserts and the overall lack of value . Sorry Donruss/Panini, you struck out with this one. Enjoy the early shower.

Product Review: 2009 Donruss Classics

First and foremost, I must begin this review with a disclaimer. The cards I purchased to review this product were from a retail box. Insert rates, value of cards pulled, and overall impressions may be different for you if you purchase a hobby box. 2009 Donruss Classics is available in retail boxes of 8 packs of 5 cards each. I paid $19.99 (plus 6% tax) and somehow got 41 cards, which turns out to about $0.52 per card. I actually really liked this set last year, so I was excited to see what 2009 had in store.

2009 Donruss Classics – Retail Box

For some product details, you can see my early product preview post. Granted, this is a retail box so the card count and collation is much different, but at least I had an idea of what I was getting into. Now for the product breakdown:

Base Cards: 37
Rookie Cards: — (none)
Doubles: 1 (#70 JaMarcus Russell)
Inserts: 3 (Team Colors Hakeem Nicks, Classic Singles Merlin Olsen, Monday Night Heroes Randy Moss)
Hits: 1 (Monday Night Heroes Jonathan Stewart)

Click image for full sized scan

FIRST AND GOAL’S FOUR DOWNS:
1st Down, Design: When I was returning to the hobby last year, 2008 Donruss Classics was the first box I bought because it was one of the first releases of the year. I instantly fell in love with it. This year, Donruss gave us a lackluster base card design. The overall design is not bad, I even like the graphic elements near the bottom of the card where it says “Donruss Classics 2009″. What I do not like is the brown/copper background. The design is gaudy and it is just not a good color. Maybe the same pattern in a ghosted gray would have been better, but I would much rather see a completely different element, like the faded football field of 2008’s base cards.

2nd Down, Inserts: I do not have much to go on here, so take this with a grain of salt. I actually like the Team Colors insert I pulled. The card is colorful and vibrant and looks nice. Simple, but nice. I like the concept of the Classic Singles insert set (along with Classic Doubles, Classic Triples, and Classic Quads). As a fan of a lot of retired players, I love a product that offers a chance to pull some older football greats. That said, I am undecided on the design. Something seems missing as it just looks a bit empty. The Monday Night Heroes insert isn’t bad, but it also has that empty feel. I hate when you can tell exactly where the swatch window is supposed to be for the jersey parallel of a card. That means the window is well placed and doesn’t cut out a good part of the card (and the jersey card I pulled is good), but the non-hit like I pulled just winds up looking odd.

3rd Down, Collation: In such a small retail package, the biggest indication of collation is duplicates. In just 41 cards, I pulled a double. Not cool. I was happy to pull a “hit” in a retail box, and somehow I got an extra card, but I’m still not pleased with the double. It at least could have been of a better player than JaMarcus Russel.

4th Down, Overall Value: For a retail box, this is hard to gauge. I only paid $20 for the box, but that just means you get what you pay for. If you are looking for a cheap way to build a base set (without including the RCs) or would like an affordable gift for a loved one who enjoys football and/or collecting, this is a pretty good box to buy. If you’re looking for resale value or VERY cheap per card prices (perhaps those are polar opposites), you should stay away.

RED ZONE RESULTS: MISSED FIELD GOAL I sorta knew what I was getting when I bought this box from reading other online reviews and seeing card scans. I also knew not to expect much from a retail box. The jersey card was certainly a perk, but not pulling any rookie cards, having a duplicate, and the overall poor design of the base product were just too much to overcome. For a product that had a good outing last year, perhaps this was just an off performance. Hopefully if Donruss keeps this line going in 2010, it won’t push the ball left and will be able to get some points on the board when they are needed most.

Live Today: 2009 Playoff Absolute Memorabilia

Hitting hobby shop shelves and online retailer homepages today is 2009 Playoff Absolute Memorabilia. Carrying a per pack SRP of $40, this product is being released in cases of 18 boxes of 4 packs of 4 cards. Hobby boxes are currently going for about $120, a rather high price tag for 16 cards.

 

Each tiny thumbnail leads to a full sized image

Per Box Breakdown: 4 packs of 4 cards each (16 total), including 4 Material or Autograph cards (at least 1 of which will be an autograph), 1 Rookie, 1 Parallel, 1 Insert, and 1 other Insert/Parallel or Rookie.

I would like to start by saying that when I was younger, I LOVED the Playoff brand. They were sorta high-end, but had some really nice and classy designs. I will admit I was out of the hobby for a few years so I do not know exactly when the change happened, but I know that I am not pleased with this product. Panini, which currently owns the Playoff name, has once again created a Frankenstein checklist with a plethora of insert and parallel sets. Most of the cards feature a relic and/or autograph, proving that Panini is only interested in gimmicks and trying to get the most money out of collectors. Granted, I am not a high-end buyer. I probably never will be because I have too many interests to devote enough money to card collecting to buy those high-end products. Maybe this product will give collectors their money’s worth, but at about $7.50 per card, and that’s going with a big online retailer, I find it hard to believe. Normally I try to give all new products equal share on this site (when I remember that they are being released, sorry 2009 Topps flagship) and just present the facts, a few images, and my humble opinion. But this product takes the cake. I did not even bother typing out the long list of sets included with 2009 Playoff Absolute Memorabilia because there are a total of 95 freaking sets, including all of the inserts and parallels. To see the entire and freakishly long list of sets, you can view the pdf sell sheet here. To me, that is completely ridiculous. It’s as if their design team came up with a bunch of ideas and the manager just said “oh hell, let’s just use them all!”. Either that, or Panini execs are trying to make up for the fact that Leaf R&S and Score looked almost identical this year.

Do some of the cards from this product look cool? Sure. Do I think it’s entirely too expensive? Certainly. The only “absolute” things about 2009 Playoff Absolute Memorabilia? It is absolutely ridiculous and I will absolutely not be buying any.

Did Panini buy EA Sports Too?

I should start this post with a disclaimer: I am by no means a video game expert. My most advanced gaming system is a PS2 and I think I own 6 games for it, 4 of which are from the Guitar Hero line (not including a fair number of PSOne games). I love playing video games, I just already have too many hobbies demanding time and money to really get into gaming.

That admission aside, I will say I definitely pay attention to games as they come out. Obviously as a recent college grad and a big football fan, I am quite aware of the reception Madden 10 has been receiving. According to many, the most recent installment of this now legendary series could be the best yet, which says a lot considering each year has seemed to be a big hit. I have not had a chance to play it yet, but I have noticed something interesting from the case cover:

Click image for larger size

It seems to me this whole putting player cutouts on a white background and then throwing some ink blots at them is a popular design theme this year. Just 10 days ago, I wrote a post about Panini’s lazy attempt at creating multiple products this year by seemingly recycling a similar design for 2009 Score and 2009 Leaf Rookies & Stars. Either EA Sports employs the same design team as Panini, or this style is far more popular than I could ever have imagined.

I just hope Beckett doesn’t start getting exclusive pre-release copies of future Madden releases that feature better graphics, playability, and built-in cheat codes than the average gamer could ever obtain.

I should also note that the inspiration for this post came from looking at Joe’s Football Friday Contest over at The Priceless Pursuit. There is still time to register for your chance to win a mystery football autograph, so sign up now!

Update: Joe’s contest is now closed.

Laziness Hits a New Low

In the past several months around the sports card blogosphere, a lot of a time has been spent writing and reading about the companies’ lackluster design attempts and the recycling of those poor design styles. This topic has recently been touched on a lot with the announcement that Upper Deck has now lost its NBA and MLB licenses in just a few months span. I often hear people complain that year after year, certain product lines continually reuse the same awful card designs, despite critical reviews and slumping sales.

I try not to get too worked up about brands being similar two or more years in a row. After all, this has been happening for a long time. In the 1960s and 70s, card companies often reused photographs from one year to the next, let alone had similar card designs. I do, however, have an issue with several products in the same year that look almost identical, and I’m not talking about Upper Deck’s flagship being the same for each major sport in a given year. This year, in the span of just over a month, Panini will release four separate football products. Not only do 2009 Score and 2009 (Leaf) Rookies & Stars have spin off products that are essentially glorified parallel sets (Score Inscriptions and Rookies & Stars Longevity, respectively), they also look like rip-offs of each other. Take the images below for an exhibit. The top row features scans of 2009 Score inserts while the bottom row shows 2009 Rookies & Stars inserts:

 

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Notice any similarities? Let’s see…photo cut-out of player on very loud background…check. Random “paint splashes” and other crazy shapes…check. Needless diagonal lines poorly incorporated into the design…check. Mostly white background with either odd pastel or maybe team colors on aforementioned splashes and shapes…check. Some cards incorporating a design that only shows a cut-out of the player from the waist up…check. Text moving in multiple directions on the same card…check. Set logo appearing in an area of the card where it could easily be swaped out for the logo of another set produced by the same company…check.

To me, what we have here is just poor decision making. When I first saw images from 2009 Score, I admit I liked it. There is a huge movement towards guaranteed “hits” and high-end products while kids and budget collectors (especially in today’s economy) are left with very few collecting options. 2009 Score had a low-end feel to it, and a price point to match. Cool. Then 2009 Leaf Rookies and Stars came out and I noticed a troubling thing. They are essentially the exact same product. The only difference? Leaf Rookies and Stars promises a bunch more hits and each box will yield you less than half as many cards as a box of Score, but will cost you more than twice as much. So really, Panini has acquired two fairly old name brands that were very different, completely destroyed both of them, and then passed them off as Crap and Crap Deluxe, because R&S is really just Score with more inserts and hits. I can understand going through a dry spell. I’m sure we’ve all experienced writer’s block or creative constipation. But it appears as though Panini has one guy in charge of creating designs for all non-Donruss brands and he was only able to come up with one concept…so he just made some subtle differences and passed it off as two separate product lines. Poor form, Panini. Poor form.

Remember when Score and Leaf Rookies & Stars were two separate entities and appealed to different markets while looking completely different…because they really were two separate products? I do:

Click each image to view a full sized and original scan

Live Today: 2009 Score

Despite being bought out several times, Score is back for its 20th anniversary in football cards, with its latest edition coming from Panini America, a.k.a. Donruss. This classic set is available in boxes of 36 packs of 7 cards each. The 400-card base set consists of 300 stars and rising performers and 100 rookies.

As is the case with all Donini products, you can expect a bunch of inserts and a whole host of parallels. 2009 Score inserts include Hot Rookies (30), The Franchise (20), Future Franchise (20), Young Stars (20), and 1989 Rookie Reprints (10). The base set and each insert set (except the 1989 Rookie Reprints) has at least 6 parallels, which include Glossy, Scorecard (# to 499), Gold Zone (# to 299), Red Zone (# to 100), Artist’s Proof (# to 32), and End Zone (# to 6). The base set and 1989 Rookie Reprint insert set also have an Inscriptions parallel featuring autographs (# to 20 or less for the Reprint inserts).

Each tiny thumbnail leads to a larger image

Quick note: Each thumbnail leads to a very large image, except for the base card of Ben Roethlisberger. I couldn’t find a higher resolution image for the base card. Sorry for the inconvenience and possible eye strain.

Per box breakdown: 36 packs, 7 cards (252 total) including: 36 rookies (1 per pack), 36 glossy parallels (1 per pack), 1 Scorecard parallel, 1 Gold Zone parallel, 6 Hot Rookies inserts, 3 The Franchise inserts, 3 Future Franchise inserts, 3 Young Stars inserts, 1 1989 Rookie Reprint insert, and 6 other random inserts/parallels.

From the images I have seen, Score seems to be delivering on its budget reputation. The cards are ridiculously cheap (a box of 252 cards will only set you back around $20-$30), but the design shows it. There is certainly no pizazz when it comes to the base set or even inserts (glossy cards are a parallel), so you definitely get what you pay for. For me, I think the base card’s border is a tad over done and there is way too much going on in the background of the other inserts, leaving them with a rather tacky appearance. The one idea I love is the 1989 Rookie Reprints. Donini pays tribute to Score’s early days when they ruled the rookie world in football cards, without feeling the need to create an entire retro set a la Topps and Upper Deck. A set of 10 rookies is a little too small in my opinion, but doing the entire 100-card rookie subset in this design could have been overkill as well. So I guess I’ll take what I can get. Too bad I’m not stoked about any of this year’s top rookies (I still claim Derrick Williams and Deon Butler are severely underrated).

What is your first take? Do you love the chance to build a set or collect cards of your favorite team/player(s) without breaking the bank, or is this low-budget release not worth the cardboard it’s printed on?