2015 Topps Series One Baseball Sparkle Cards and The Curious Case of the Shifting Logos

Earlier today we asked you to play a childhood game of “one of these things” with four 2015 Topps Series 1 Baseball Trading Cards. We showed you these Ryan Braun cards and asked you “which one is different.”

We had full faith in you collectors and you did not disappoint. The vast majority of you nailed it, that the card on the lower left is different. But the interesting part of this exercise was what you told us makes the card different.  Allow me to explain.

For those of you that said there is a sparkle on Braun’s elbow, you would be correct. 

For those of you that said the Topps logo had shifted to the other side of the card, you would also be correct. 

The card that was different was indeed a 2015 Topps Series One Baseball SP Sparkle variation. There is no official word yet, but these seem to be rather rare, falling approximately 1 card in every 2 hobby cases. What has also happened, again without any official explanation, is that on 21 out of the 50 total Series One Sparkle variations, the Topps Logo shifts sides. The Logo shift is consistent for each version, it’s not a printing error on just a few of copies of the card. All Ryan Braun base cards have the Topps Logo on the right of the card and all the Ryan Braun Sparkle variations have the Topps Logo on the left.

Included in the unannounced SPs along with the sparkles are 25 photo variations. Some of the photo variations have Logo shifts too, but that makes sense. It’s a different photo, sometimes even a different card orientation. What is curious about the Logo shifts on sparkle cards is nothing about the card changes except for the addition of the sparkle and usually those sparkles are not placed in an area that would necessitate shifting the Logo to the other side of the card. A curious case indeed.

Here is the complete checklist of Sparkle cards that also have a Logo shift. Tomorrow we will release our Complete Visual Checklist of 2015 Topps Series 1 Baseball Sparkle cards and Photo Variations.

Sparkle Cards with Topps Logo Shifts
25 Jose Bautista
60 Michael Wacha
62 Nolan Arenado
80 Adam Wainwright
83 David Wright
109 Doug Fister
120 Yoenis Cespedes
136 Manny Machado
149 Daniel Murphy
150 Giancarlo Stanton
205 Josh Harrison
242 Edwin Encarnacion
250 Evan Longoria
251 Anthony Rendon
262 Ryan Braun
272 Matt Kemp
315 Javier Baez
320 Shin-Soo Choo
321 Josh Hamilton
325 Felix Hernandez

336 Matt Carpenter