[rjcj2017]

Baseball banger bros,

I got a blaster of the new 2023 Topps Update baseball from the local Walmart this morning.

Much to my surprise they are no longer inserting manufactured relics/patches in these blasters like they have done since what, 2013ish? All three series, every year?

Instead they have replaced those with 3 weird looking parallel cards.

I know some/most would prefer the parallels anyway, but it definitely feels like the Fanatcis Effect is underway.

Won't be buying any more of these - not specifically because of the manufactured relics, but it was just a very blah box of "rookie debut" cards and random veterans.

[Phillies_Joe]

I have tons of these from multiple years - some are cool / good, some meh. Think your right - most people would prefer parallels. We can now only get our manufactured "relics" out of hobby boxes (where the ROI is about 10% per box) - YEA us!!!!

[rjcj2017]

I have tons of these from multiple years - some are cool / good, some meh.  Think your right - most people would prefer parallels.  We can now only get our manufactured "relics" out of hobby boxes (where the ROI is about 10% per box) - YEA us!!!!

I bought two more blasters this morning and realized I miss the manufactured relics more than I thought I would.

In the DBN Era of High Prices for Less Content, they almost felt like hits sometimes.

[ZSDOne]

I bought two more blasters this morning and realized I miss the manufactured relics more than I thought I would.

In the DBN Era of High Prices for Less Content, they almost felt like hits sometimes.

Yeah, some of them were definitely pretty cool 

But it's clear that Fanatics strategy is to parallel everything to death with several products that are literally nothing but adding some different design elements to the regular Chrome card.

It's really tacky - but then, Fanatics is kind of the perfect company for the DBN era

[bonds20001]

What are the parallel cards??  Are they the Halloween themed?  Which I think is very odd?  Gets old real fast after pseudo-holiday...

[rjcj2017]

What are the parallel cards??  Are they the Halloween themed?  Which I think is very odd?  Gets old real fast after pseudo-holiday...

Most of the ones I got in three blasters were orange and black striped backgrounds ... I guess those would be Halloween.

I did get one parallel #d to 50 of Elvis Andrus that had Halloween ghosts and witches on it and stuff.

All things being equal I think I would still rather have a manufactured relic.

[kerryandbeth]

I like most mem card styles.

[jack pfiester]

This really solidifies my decision no to buy new product. Thank you for saving me $$$$

[rjcj2017]

This really solidifies my decision no to buy new product.  Thank you for saving me $$$$

Hey, you know, I've been saying for years these card companies should sponsor me to do a "Retail Breakdown" segment - only thing is, they wouldn't send me loaded blasters, I would buy them on my own (with their money) so that people got a realistic look at what to expect.

And then I'd get to keep the cards of course. Maybe I'd do giveaways or something.

Or not.

[kerryandbeth]

It would be easy to do online breaks for purposes of previewing or reviewing products.. All you need is a quiet room, video setup, and table. Then you can advertise a sale of what was busted during the video.