Blog Bat Around: Your Say (and mine)

(As an aside, is that not a bad ass logo? early-80s hardcore FTW!!!)

I'd like to thank each and every one of you who answered the call for this edition of the Blog Bat Around. I was hoping to get this thing posted a week ago, but sometimes real life gets in the way at the most inopportune times. I apologize for the delay.

It's still great to know just how much the cardblogosphere has blown-up in the past few years. In just the last four years, we've gone for just a handful of cardblogs, to (literally) hundreds. I received BBA entries from cardblogs I didn't even know existed, and from others I hadn't read in years. For the first time since the days of Jefferson Burdick's old mimeographed newsletters, the collector has a voice in The Hobby. Cardblogs, Twitter, and communities like Freedom Cardboard have given us, the collectors, that voice. But is it being heard?

Now, to refresh your memories, here is the question I posed almost month ago...

Michael Eisner has just fired the entire Topps Product Development staff and chose to hire you to take their place. Mr. Eisner has given you carte blanche to do whatever you want with Topps Baseball -- as long as you keep it under $2/pack.

If you were in charge of Topps, and based upon what you've seen of 2011 Topps Baseball Series One, what (if anything) would you have done differently?

Here are some of the entries from around the cardblogosphere.

Community Gum said...

White Sox Cards said...

dfwbuck2 said...

Fleerfan said...

randombaseballstuff.com said...

lifetimetopps said...

night owl said...

FanOfReds said...

Craig Stone said...

The Lost Collector said...

dayf The Cardboard Junkie said...

thewritersjourney said...

Ryan said...

Mariner1 said...

Dan said...

bdj610 said...

(If there are any BBA submissions not listed, I apologize. I probably didn't read your entry, or if I did, I forgot to post it here. Please leave a link to your BBA article, and I'll add you to the list.)

After reading the submissions it seems that the majority of the cardblogosphere has come to this consensus...

• You really, really, like the design of this year's base set; but you wish it were bigger than 330 cards.
  

I can't disagree with this point. The Topps Flagship has been stuck at 660-661 cards since 2006 and baring a last-minute change of plans, looks like it will be again this year. Most of you would like to see the set expanded to at least 792 and as much as 880 cards. However, if you treat Updates & Highlights as a pseudo-third series, like I do, it already is.

Some of you mentioned that you'd like to see U&H reduced to the 110-132 card range. But let's suppose for a moment if Topps expands the base set to two, 440-card, Series with a 110-card Update set. That would still be the same number of cards as the current 330/330/330 format now. Don't get me wrong, I'd like to see Series One and Series Two expanded. But as long as U&H remains the Series Three/Traded Set hybrid it is now, I see no reason why Topps should change.

• You like the Platinum Diamond parallels and want them to come back next year.

I've never been a big fan of the parallel, but I like the Platinum Diamonds and most of you do too. I'm not so sure I'd want them back for 2012, but if they do come back I think they should come back as a one-per-pack parallel. There hasn't been a true one-per-pack parallel done in a long time, but the Diamond's might be the cards to do it with.

Topps Gold used to be a one-per-pack parallel, but ever since it went serial-numbered about a decade ago, it seems to have lost its luster (no pun intended) amongst collectors. Collectors back in the 90s used to actually build and collect Topps Gold sets. Now, not so much. If the Platinum Diamonds are "one-and-done," then I'd like to see the Gold cards revert back to one-per-pack.

• You really don't care one way or the other for the gimmicks, and they're not inducing you to buy more Topps product.

Gimmicks are what they are: A cheap ploy designed to appeal to the basest instinct of the collector. Gimmicks assume that the collector is inherently stupid. The idea of course, is to artificially create hype behind a product (as if Topps Baseball actually needs it), then make you buy more cards in the hopes of pulling some rare, previously unknown variation. Of course I'm probably giving Topps way too much credit and this is just an unintended side effect resulting from a strategy of adding cheap "value" to the product.

Right.

The good news is that the gimmicks aren't working anymore -- at least on us. The gimmick card has Jumped the Proverbial shark so much that collectors now assume Topps will do something stupid with all their low-price brands (Topps, Heritage, and A&G) and adjust accordingly. And with so many collectors now connected on the web, the novelty has worn off. Within hours of 2011 Topps Series One's release, reports were being posted to the web of the Twinks; and by the time Topps finally acknowledged their existence, it was old news. Collectors just don't care anymore.

• There are way too many inserts, but all of you like at least one of them.
  

Yes, 2011 Topps suffers from "insert bloat." But at least there's something for everyone. Like 19th Century minis? Well, here's the Kimball Champions. Reprints? Missing cards from old Topps sets of yore? 2011 Topps has got that too. Two players back-to-back on the same card? Yep!

So while most of us agree that the 2011 Topps insert program is excessive, not many can agree on what inserts should be cut. Part of this is due to bad long-range planning on Topps' part. The 60th Anniversary reprints should have been the crown jewel of 2011 Topps, just as the Through The Years reprints were in 2001. They should have been -- had Topps not already had the same set last year with The Cards Your Mother Threw Out. Everybody seems to like the Kimball Champions, but if you're going to base your whole product on the 60th Anniversary of Topps Baseball, what are cards based on a set released 60 years before Topps doing in this set then? Wouldn't Kimball Champions had been in 2010 Topps? Or saved for 2012?

I don't like the fact that there are separate inserts for Wal-Mart, Target, and Toys `R' Us, and all they do is add to the insert bloat. But if that's the price you have to pay to get an end-cap display in a high-traffic area, I guess Topps didn't have much choice.

• Topps Flagship really doesn't need a hit in a box, but it's nice to have anyway.

Some suggested that Topps should scrap the sticker autographs, and have all autographs on-card. This will happen when pigs fly. The Pirates will win the World Series before Topps Flagship gets rid of stickers. It will never happen, nor should it.

Remember the task in the prompt: Keep Topps under $2/pack. On-card autographs require a lot more time and overhead cost to produce than stickers. If you want to go all on-card, then you're looking at either fewer cards in a pack, or $3-$5 for a pack of Topps.

Nobody buys base Topps for the hits. Topps could get rid of the autographs and "relics" (or at least make them tougher to pull) and most of us will still buy it. Hits are nice to have, but in this product, not necessary.

• Nobody likes manupatches.

Stupid ideas in The Hobby tend to have a three-to-five year life cycle, and the manupatch is nearing the end. But if Topps continues with manupatches, at the very least they should stop calling them "relics." Because they're not.

The term "relic" suggests something of significance (i.e. "game-used"). Labeling manupatches as "relics" implies that it is game-used, when it is, in fact, not. It's false advertising.

Again, I'd like to thank everyone who participated in this edition of the Blog Bat Around. Hopefully the guys and gals at Topps will take these suggestions under consideration -- but given their track-record, I wouldn't hold my breath over it though.