Bowman Chrome Baseball is as consistent and familiar as the
set it based on, Bowman Baseball.
Very little changes from year to year. For this year’s Bowman Baseball, Bryce Harper was the face of
the box along with newcomer Garrit Cole.
For that release it was Yu Darvish who stole the show with his cards
garnering the top prices paid on the secondary market. So it is not surprising that Darvish
has replace Cole as the featured player alongside Harper for 2012 Bowman Chrome
Baseball. If Bowman Chrome
has been a part of your collection in the past, you will want to get in on this
year’s set too. If you are new to
Bowman, there are some nice cards to be found here.
Bowman Chrome Baseball falls under our classification of
trading cards. Hobby boxes contain 18 – 4 card packs and feature one
autographed card in every box.
Here is a look at some of the cards we pulled.
Base Set
Robinson Cano, front and back
Brandon Phillips, Jayson Werth, Ian Kennedy
Prospects
Manny Machado, front and back
Guillermo Pimentel, Matt Benedict, Anthony Garcia
Refractors
Justin Verlander, front and back
Andrelton Simmons, Gabriel Lino, Danny Winkler
Blue Prospect Refractor
Austin Barnes #250
Base Purple Refractor
Kole Calhoun #/199
Inserts
All-Star Futures Game
Wil Myers
Franchise All-Stars
Mets - David Wright & Zack Wheeler, Brewers - Ryan Braun & Scooter Gennett
Legends In The Making Diecuts
Trevor Bauer
Become The Bowman Scout
Promotional Card
The Hit
Williams Jerez Refractor Auto #/500
Overall Look
Chrome carries the design of Bowman Baseball which has always
has a straightforward design. These Chrome cards are sharp and inserts are
where most of the design elements come into play. Lots of color parallels,
diecuts and insets based on the Futures game all look great. The additional notation of "refractor" on the backs of the cards is always helpful.
Quality and Variety of Players
This set offers 220 base cards and 110 prospects offer the
best of the MLB and a variety of primed prospects and young hopefuls to make
for a good mix.
Do the hits hold up?
In additional to rainbow hunting, the variety of different
hits makes this year’s Bowman Chrome standout. The first auto cards from speedster Billy Hamilton, along
with autographed Rookie cards from Bryce Harper, Trevor Bauer, Will
Middlebrooks and Yu Darvish to name a few. There were Blue Wave Redemption
cards to be had, but the allotment has been filled. What is still left is the Become a Bowman Scout
promotion. Details about the
promotion can be found at Facebook.com/BowmanBaseball
Will you want to collect them all?
A base set is a definate yes and rainbow collectors will
want to expand into the different colored refractors.
Rating
4 1/2 out of 5
Review box provided by Topps
I think a Cole Kalhoun refractor falls in every five packs or so.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I wondour how many cards from 2012 have pictures of Bryce Harper on them, but are not actually Bryce Harper baseball cards.