By Chris Olds | Beckett Baseball Editor

Panini America‘s next baseball-focused brand, Cooperstown, will showcase not only the greatest in the game but also the best around them.

And that’s not all as Cooperstown also will showcase Hall of Famers who served in the military via a 10-card insert set called With Honors, a lineup that will include the likes of Jackie Robinson, Ted Williams, Whitey Ford and more  when it arrives in late August.

Each of the 10 cards will tell the player’s story away from the field, noting which wars the player served in as well as more about his story.

The lineup includes military photography and will also include Bobby Doerr, Bob Feller, Charlie Gehringer, Joe DiMaggio, Hank Greenberg, Stan Musial and Johnny Mize in addition to those previously mentioned.

In other news about the product, a preliminary checklist shows 30 cut signature subjects will be in Cooperstown’s Famed Cuts set with as many as 61 copies of some cards made and other players being 1/1s. Some of the notables there will include Joe DiMaggio, Mickey Mantle, Lee MacPhail, Carl Hubbell, Don Drysdale and Lefty Gomez. 

The preliminary checklist for the Famous Moments Signatures insert, which will showcase autographs of players with artifacts tied to achievements at the Hall, will include Don Larsen, Carl Yastrzemski, Maury Wills, Denny McLain, Brooks Robinson, Shawn Green, Don Mattingly, Tom Seaver, Jeff Kent and Nate Colbert, who, for example, hit five home runs in a doubleheader on Aug. 1, 1972.

The 100-card Cooperstown Signatures set will be largely on-card sigs, according to the preliminary checklist, save for a handful of Hall of Famers who are no longer alive (Gary Carter, Dick Williams, George Kell, Robin Roberts, Sparky Anderson and Bob Feller who are signed on stickers). Most living Hall of Famers are signing for the set with notables in this one tentatively include Yogi Berra, Johnny Bench, Ford, Tony Gwynn, Reggie Jackson, Ernie Banks, Willie McCovey, Frank Robinson, Yaz, Cal Ripken Jr., Nolan Ryan Tom Seaver and Rickey Henderson. Some players appear on more than one autograph card to represent additional teams.

For an update on the non-player signers, click here.

Chris Olds is the editor of Beckett Baseball magazine. Have a comment, question or idea? Send an email to him at colds@beckett.com. Follow him on Twitter by clicking here.

By Chris Olds | Beckett Baseball Editor

Panini America released the basic box breakdown information and additional preview images for its forthcoming 2011 Playoff Contenders baseball card set on Friday, the second of its MLBPA-approved products and the first to have a deeper MLB player presence inside.

Now scheduled to arrive on Feb. 22, Contenders will include six autographs per 24-pack box with two of those featuring 0n-card sigs. It also will include the first Panini signatures of spokesman Josh Hamilton and NL Cy Young winner Clayton Kershaw.

The autograph checklist will include more than 150 prospects — with 50 of those signed on-card — while every 12-box case will include 72 sigs. Meanwhile, each base card and prospect will have a 1/1 Championship Ticket as well as a 1/1 press plate.

Also to be found will be Sweet Signs baseball sigs — trapped leather cuts — featuring past greats such as Stan Musial, Cal Ripken Jr. and Will Clark, while also showcasing some prospects. Lastly, there will be Future Stars Signatures cards featuring prospects primied to make their mark.

Chris Olds is the editor of Beckett Baseball magazine. Have a comment, question or idea? Send an email to him at colds@beckett.com. Follow him on Twitter by clicking here.