First Look: 2015 Topps Heritage High Number baseball
By Chris Olds | Beckett Baseball Editor
Heritage High Number is back in packs beginning on Sept. 23.
Topps revealed the details on 2015 Topps Heritage High Number on Wednesday, a product that makes a return in pack form for the first time since 2009. Topps released the Heritage update in packs in 2008 and 2009 along with a few basic Topps Update cards in every pack before placing the season-capper into boxed set form in 2012, which has been the routine since then.
This second helping of the 1966 Topps design will include one autograph or Relic in every 24-pack hobby box with a base set that begins with card No. 501 and adds 225 more cards to the overall set. This allows for 2015 call-ups to get their shot on a retro-styled Heritage card.
While the final 25 cards in the set will be short-printed, there also will be other cards to chase. Action image variations return as do Blue backs, minis (for 50 players; /100) and the standard Chrome parallels — Refractor (/TBD), Black (/66) and Gold (/5).
Inserts for this one will be a new batch of what we saw in the first series with some new inclusions, too — Rookie Performers, Now and Then, Award Winners and Combo cards.
For autograph collectors, there will be a new batch of Real One autos with Red parallels limited to 66 copies. There also will be Real One dual autos limited to only 25 as well as 1/1 1966 cut autos. For fans of auto Relics, the Clubhouse Collection cards return with auto Relics limited to 25 and dual auto Relics limited to 10.
For standard Relics, there are a few options — Clubhouse Collection (with Gold parallel /99), Clubhouse Collection dual (/66), Clubhouse Collection triple (/25) and Clubhouse Collection quad (/10).
Box-toppers will be back for this release, too, with ad panels (three-card strips), 1966 Topps buybacks and the 1966 Punchboards. Those will be limited to only 50 copies for the standard one with a jumbo patch Relic version limited to 25, an autographed version limited to 10 and a jumbo patch auto version also limited to 10.
A preliminary checklist was not released.
Chris Olds is the editor of Beckett Baseball and Beckett Sports Card Monthly magazines. Have a comment, question or idea? Send an email to him at colds@beckett.com. Follow him on Twitter by clicking here.
I just want a Paul Molitor manager card.
They had such a great update set in 2012.
And it did so well they over produced 2013 and really, really over did 2014.
If they had only incremented the production levels at a slower pace they’d have had a classic
and actually have grown the hobby base. Instead, they saturated the market like it was the 80’s
all over again with unlimited buyers, which is sadly not the case.
Depending on how many quality rookies are in this, the packs will likely do well, but they really need
to keep an eye on the secondary market. The ad panels are just not that popular and need to go away.
The secondary market provides a ton of clues at what the hobby wants. It would be nice if they listened
for a change.
I couldn’t have said it any better Richard….my thoughts exactly. Maybe they could offer say….1,000 boxed sets with special card/s thrown in plus offer hobby boxes. Year by year with so many products being offered…..it is really starting to pigeon hole me in in what I can and do buy or at least cuts back on the amount spent per product. Some nice looking cards being offered though…………
I agree with Richard & Joe about the over saturation and the greed aspect to this change of format.
This will be the first year since 2012 that I won’t be giving Topps my hard earned money for more of the same ol’same.
I HATE the 1 auto or 1 relic per box … I don’t need anymore clubhouse collection relics in my life, and I’m sure they will be 10 for every 1 auto. I HATE that only the last 25 cards will be SP when the whole High Number set should be SP. I HATE that there will be parallel and variant cards in this set. It was so much better buying the complete high number set to cap off the already difficult to complete Heritage super set each year. It was actually one of the things that I really looked forward to ordering each and every year since I returned to the hobby.
I agree with everyone…….but unless a ‘SP’ is actually a ‘SP’ (within a relative reason), then it is just a matter of speculation and is worth just what I and a few other ‘million or so’ speculators will pay for ‘any given card’. If Topps sells us on ‘super SP’d cards’ then with enough ‘super SP’d speculators’ buying those perceived SP’d cards (and the autographed cards, with those being ‘kinda SP’d at one a box……they still are pretty slow movers).
Topps Heritage has its ‘niche collectors’ ( I am a 2nd dairy buyer of the base sets + SP’s dating back to 2002….and had a 90% complete 2001 set-but thought I ‘had to sell it’ and did ok, since at the time it was still moving pretty well. But wish I had that still in my collection. I enjoy the chrome even more-dating back to the ’55 version ) & if they didn’t mirror the year they were representing (ie, 2015=1966)…then Topps would be ‘IN A PICKLE’ for design change. I say this cuz, look at the ‘cookie cutter’ card designs of 2012-2015 Topps Tribute BB. There are other examples…..but my ‘Blood Sugar’ is plummeting, so gotta go.
Ttyl
im done with heritage products…once was my favorite and I looked forward to it every year but im sick and tired of spending $80 on a box and getting a Justin verlander clubhouse collection relic….
I was a huge baseball card collector from 1961, age 6 through about 1994. The strike and the cancelled World Series drove me away from baseball for about 17 years.
Then one day I was shopping at Target, and I saw a pack of baseball cards: “Today’s stars in the 1962 design.” Well, I bought just one pack… and I was hooked again!
I personally think that Topps is way overdoing the non-cards. I don’t want refractors, pieces of uniforms, or cards comparing yesterday’s superstars with today’s top players. Give him ten more years, then tell me how Clayton Kershaw stands up against the great Sandy Koufax!
And if Topps really wants to compare to the “good old days,” then don’t make things so difficult to find. I still have Embossed Stars from 1965, but I never got a single one in a pack last year.
I like the idea of replicating errors and variations. 1967 Mike McCormick, Senators on the front, Giants on the back. 1969 Clay Dalrymple, and Donn Clendennon each with two different teams.
But there are far too many variations now. Keep it simple, Topps, and keep producing a great product. But knock it off with all the gimmicks! It’s too much!
Topps heritage is great. If your an auto collector. Heritage isn’t for you. This is simply a product to bring you back to simpler times. The gimmicks , errors and variations are a great idea because they existed back in those days. Heritage is all about tradition and HERITAGE. yes iam disappointed when my first pack of box is a relic but there are so many possibilities to look forward to and hope for because of those variations and if no variation then atleast I end up with 8 SP high number cards. I look forward to it every year.
I’m a Heritage guy. If I could only buy one product, it would be Heritage. Why? Because the fifties, sixties, and seventies–that’s when cards were cards. I do buy plenty other product, but I feel as though Topps lost the concept of cards as something fun long ago. Just my opinion. So I’d much rather see Jacob deGrom on a 1966 styled card (or other classic design) than those 2015 monstrosities with all the techno-crap going on. None of the Heritage “gimmicks” bother me especially. And, as its a smaller set, I prefer the update in packs (instead of 100 new cards, we get 200 and change). However they do it, though, I’ll bite. And I’d much rather the flagship stop doing their update in packs and return to a boxed set for that. I don’t need five cards of anybody in various All-Star poses and activities. Sure, I’d like more autos. Who wouldn’t? But I say that as a collector, not an investor or seller. It’s just cool to get an on-card auto on a classic design. Getting a Choo Choo Coleman auto out of a pack was the bomb. But they aren’t the big attraction for me. Building a set that at least looks like the way they used to make ’em is enough for me. As it happens, this could be a great year for an update in packs, given the crop of hot rookies we’ve seen–Bryant, Correa, Russell, Pederson, Broxton, Schwarber, Sano, Kang, Conforto, Syndergaard… Not a secondary market guy, but there should be secondary value there.
Does anyone know when pricing will be available for these?