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Monthly Archives: March 2011
FREE STUFF FRIDAY IS BACK! Win a $250 Steiner Sports gift certificate ***CONTEST NOW CLOSED***
03.24
***CONTEST NOW CLOSED***
Free Stuff Friday — our weekly ritual where we try and get some cool stuff into the hands of our readers just for answering some simple card-related trivia — is back after a bit of a break.
Thanks to Steiner Sports, we think this week’s prize package is better than ever before in its return.
What’s the prize? A Ray Rice autographed photo and a $250 gift certificate.
How can you win? Follow the directions below and answer the questions found after the jump in a comment right here … it’s that simple.
Tips: Don’t try stuffing the comments box — it’s one try per person per contest and we’ll check IP addresses — and make sure to include your email address so you can be contacted if you are selected as the winner.
Find out more about this week’s prize — and get the questions — after the jump …
First Look: 2011 Donruss Elite Football
03.24
By Andrew Tolentino | Football Editor
Fresh off the plane from the 2011 Industry Summit in Las Vegas, Panini America officials unveiled the first glance at a newly-revamped Donruss Elite line.
Slated for a June release, 2011 Donruss Elite will land with a familiar innovation to the hobby, but a revolution for the card company. Multi-player autographed memorabilia booklets —much like the Joe Montana / Tom Brady combo seen below — will first fall on Panini’s early-summer Throwback Threads insert set. Otto Graham, Sammy Baugh, Emmitt Smith and Dan Marino — among other greats — will also grace these surely-sensational hits.
“Of all the years I’ve been working on Donruss Elite, this is by far my favorite set yet…. [collectors are] going to be blown away,” said Panini America NFL Brand Manager Carlos Torrez.
With a $6 price tag, five-card packs come 20 per box, which should deliver four autograph or memorabilia cards, four Rookie Cards (limited to 999), one Aspirations or Status parallel, and seven additional inserts or parallels. Dough-endowed case breakers will find either a booklet or a dual-signed Passing the Torch card and at least one autograph from a league luminary.
Founded on a 200-card base set, 2011 Donruss Elite features a hotbed of veterans and rookies — key components in a long list of other limited finds.
We’ll have to wait for warmer weather to see these cards in person, but this six-card gallery should shed some light on the pending release. Read More
Upper Deck’s Evolution will be first video trading card … on the market
03.24
By Chris Olds | Editor
Two days after Panini America announced its plans for the hobby’s first HD video trading card, Upper Deck has pulled back the curtain on its previously top-secret Evolution insert cards to be found in the upcoming 2011 Upper Deck football card set.
What is Evolution? A video trading card.
Evolution will be the first video card on the market beginning April 12 as Panini’s cards, which will be autographed and limited in number, are merely slated for inclusion in NBA products later this year.
“I founded Upper Deck on innovation and even today we continue to reinvent the trading card,” said Richard McWilliam, Upper Deck’s owner and CEO. “I have always dreamed of bringing this type of technology to market and we are pleased to be the first to do so as the leader in the category. I believe Upper Deck’s ‘Evolution’ trading cards will capture the imagination of sports fans around the world for what trading cards can be and how far they have come.”
Upper Deck’s planned Evolution checklist will include cards of Adrian Peterson, DeSean Jackson, Tony Romo and Patrick Willis in standard-size format cards that are a half-an-inch thick because there is a video screen built into the card. The cards will include merely college football footage since Upper Deck has a Collegiate Licensing Company exclusive to use NCAA logos on its products.
“From the onset, it was important to us that this new insert was a trading card first, otherwise it would just be a video player,” said Jason Masherah, Upper Deck’s vice president of Marketing. “The cards are built like our premium booklet trading cards with a video monitor built into the card. The beauty behind these cards is that they are self-contained. You don’t need any other gadgets or a computer to play them. You simply open the cover and press play. A video screen with 60 seconds’ worth of highlight reel footage of the player immediately starts playing. The card also has a port so it can be recharged as well.”
Upper Deck looks at one of the best college basketball programs
03.23
By Susan Lulgjuraj | Contributing Editor
With college basketball on the forefront of the sports scene, Upper Deck picked the perfect time to release commemorating one of the most prolific college basketball programs in the country.
The University of North Carolina has had some of the greatest players come through the program including Michael Jordan, Vince Carter and Jerry Stackhouse.
The 90-card set highlights these players and more going back to the 1920s.
No memorabilia wins in Barry Bonds trial, but these prints just might …
03.23
By Chris Olds | Baseball Editor | Commentary
While the outcome is up in the air, one thing is certain — the Barry Bonds perjury trial probably can’t hurt the market for the sports cards and memorabilia of Major League Baseball’s home run king.
Why? The market for Bonds’ cards is as soft as it’s been in some time as the cloud of the BALCO investigation and whether Bonds used steroids or other performance-enhancing drugs have worn on collectors.
However, those of us who remember the late-night home-shopping shows around the time of Bonds’ past record book pummelings might remember a piece of trivia that comes into play to this day, which is, by the way, the third day of the Bonds trial. The 2001 500th Home Run print seen above was one of the many items hocked on television and one of the talking heads during those hard-sell pitches was the artist who created it, Steve Hoskins.
Who’s Steve Hoskins? He’s one of the people testifying against Bonds, alleging that Bonds knowingly used steroids and, in turn, lied to government investigators in the BALCO case. Hoskins was a childhood friend of Bonds who became a business partner with the slugger before their relationship soured over allegations of forging his signature and embezzling money from their business ventures.
You’ll never guess who tops MLB jersey sales …
03.23
By Chris Olds | Baseball Editor
One might think that everybody who wants a Derek Jeter jersey already has one, but 16 years after he made his big-league debut he’s still the game’s No. 1-seller.
That just shows you the power of pinstripes.
The New York Yankees shortstop topped the list of the 20 best-selling jerseys, according to Majestic sales figures last year released by Major League Baseball on Wednesday.
Two other Yanks, Alex Rodriguez (ninth) and Mark Teixeira (11th), also made the list, which was released for the first time.
The Philadelphia Phillies — another pinstriped team — placed three in the top five with newcomer Roy Halladay checking in third in his first season with the team, Chase Utley fourth and Cliff Lee fifth — though his stats include jersey sales for all three teams he has appeared on in the last year or so, the Mariners, Rangers and now Phillies.
Even Elizabeth Taylor had cards … but not many
03.23
By Chris Olds | Editor
Legendary actress Elizabeth Taylor died Wednesday morning at age 79, leaving behind a legacy of Hollywood greatness.
She appeared in more than 50 films, winning a pair of Academy Awards as best actress, but what she didn’t leave behind was an extensive history of appearing on trading cards.
Taylor appears on just 11 cards in the always-growing Beckett.com non-sport database and six of those cards can be found in the 2009 Americana set from Panini America.
The Hollywood icon was included in the Americana Movie Posters Materials sets (top), where a memorable poster can be found on one side of the card and then a swatch of clothing from the stars of the movie are found on the other.
MLB Network, MLB Productions examine Topps baseball cards in special
03.23
By Chris Olds | Baseball Editor
Opening Day isn’t far away, but the MLB Network has a little something else in store for baseball card collectors next Tuesday.
It’s a special on the 60th anniversary of Topps baseball cards.
Cardboard Treasure, a MLB Productions creation, will air at 10 p.m. Eastern only on the MLB Network. It also will likely include some behind-the-scenes looks at Beckett Media as the documentary crews visited Dallas in early February.
Free Stuff Friday will return this week
03.22
It’s been some time since we had a Free Stuff Friday – our day of free contests that gets cool stuff into collectors’ hands just for poking around on Beckett.com and answering some basic trivia questions.
So we’re bring it back … with a new look and perhaps some more exciting prizes in store.
We’re still working on lining up a big prize or two this week, but wanted to get the word out that it’s coming back … and it’s going to be better than ever.
What will this week have in store? Watch and find out right here on Friday. — Chris Olds
Does the hobby need an HD trading card? Yes and no …
03.22
By Chris Olds | Basketball Editor | Commentary
Panini America, the lone licensee of NBA trading cards, is taking the definition of what is a trading card a new direction.
It’s one that’s crystal clear and clearly defined — well, we think — as it’s something that’s pretty well known in television circles.
It’s high definition — and it’s coming to a trading card soon.
The company unveiled Tuesday its Panini HD program, which will introduce the hobby to the first video trading cards. These will be autographed releases with footage that can be watched in embedded video screens in the card. The autograph subjects will be Panini exclusive players, so you can expect Kobe Bryant, Kevin Durant and John Wall to be among them.
“As you can imagine, there’s no better way of authenticating an autographed card than showing you the player signing that card, showing you the player numbering that card and that footage being featured on that specific card,” said Mark Warsop, Panini America’s CEO. “I can’t think of any way that you can authenticate a hand-signed trading card any better than that.
“These will be super high-tech cards and they will be limited in number.”
A multimedia trading card isn’t a new creation — Upper Deck briefly experimented with CD-ROM cards in the late 1990s — but these apparently promise to be more than that … at least as a higher-end item that can be found in products this year.