2018 Topps - The Big Breaks!

I want this to be a positive post.

You see, I kinda like 2018 Topps. I know it high-fashion to crap on the flagship (and I certainly do my share of that), but I dig this year’s design and too deep into the dorkdom of all this not to get excited about the new releases each year.

Just look at that… bright, bold, colorful, and lots of action. It’s great-looking set.

So, as I said, I want this to be positive. I’m going to ignore most of the insert sets…

… like this pair of Topps Fire knock-offs that will excite no one. Or the couple of other insert sets that I didn’t even bother to take pictures of.

And I’m certainly going to skip over this damn thing…

…which came in the blaster I bought.

Or this utter piece of stupidity…

… that was my “hit” in the hobby box I picked up. Why should I dwell on these rubberized manu-patches when I could instead showcase this awesome-ass Keon Broxton…

… now that’s what I’m talking about! That’s big fun!!!!

And under no circumstances will I breath a word about THESE…

…since it would drive me to speculate about who at Topps said, “Hey, you know those awful-looking cards were made of Derek “Since we can’t make Mickey Mantle cards anymore” Jeter this summer? The ones that look almost exactly the same? Yeah! Let’s reprint those at half-scale with some stupid sales numbers that only a bored Darren Rovell would every give two turds about and make them part of an insert set!!” I def don’t wanna think about that.

Like, I want to talk about how cool the ’83 silver pack cards are… usually I don’t go for super-shiny stuff, but these are nice.

So nice that it distracts me from the fact that EVERY CARD have the SAME write-up on the back that says nothing that any collector doesn’t already know.

Yeah. Like, who wants to think about that??

Um… where was I?

Oh, right, positivity.

Joking aside, I do think the base set here is pretty great.

And check out the color on this one. I know it’s probably filtered, but still. This one sticks with me.

And as for the inserts I didn’t hate…

I found some parallels. I guess I don’t HATE these, but I have no need for them. These, with the inserts above, are up for takes if anyone is interested. The ‘83s included.

I also found this guy, numbered out of 99. It’s a vintage stock parallel or something. Better than the rainbows and stripes varieties, but still of no use to me.

And I picked up a pretty nice SP, which is actually more S P’d this year, compared to last year’s update, when they P’d them not so S. Any Dodger fans interested?

And I found a home run challenge card of Michael Conforto. I haven’t looked too deeply into this promotion yet, but it sounds kind of fun. A bit of a throw-back to the old Upper Deck Crash the Game cards.

The one insert set that I really dig are the regular 1983s. For one, they have some damn stats on the backside, the bright, faux-vintage stock backsides…

…and a nice mix of current and retired players.

There are 100 cards in the series one set, which one can extrapolate to a 300-card year-long series (1, 2, and Update). I might challenge myself and try to put this one together. Right now, I’ve got #s 1, 5, 7, 13, 16, 34, 40, 56, 67, 83, 95, 100… so if anyone can add to that and wants anything I’ve listed above, HIT ME UP.

And I have some base set needs: 2 23 51 157 204 205 268 304 313. Willing and ready to swap for these as well.

So that’s my 2018 Topps adventure. I’m glad I got through it without saying anything negative!