Mom Won't Be Able To Throw These Out - My Initial Thoughts On 2010 Topps Baseball

This year my New Years Resolution was to make twelve individual resolutions: one for each month. January's resolution was to get my taxes filed. DONE! So I'm getting a jump start on February's resolution, though I know I won't be able to complete the task in February.

I bought my first pack of baseball cards in 1976 or 1977. I'm thinking it was 1977 as I had several 1977 cards in my baseball card collection when I was a kid. I had a few from 1976 but I think I picked those up in trades. My baseball card collecting peaked in 1980. I nearly put together a full set of all 726 cards. This was back before factory-issued sets. And baseball card shops were few and far between. To put a set together involved buying pack-after-pack anywhere you could find them. I can't even begin to guesstimate how many packs I bought. But I know there were many times I bought a pack and opened it up only to find that I already had the cards. One of these days I plan on putting together a proper set of 1980 Topps Baseball Cards by buying lots, individual cards, and/or wax/vending boxes. I refuse to buy a set that's already been put together by somebody else.

Now it's thirty years later. I've decided to relive a bit of my childhood. Sort of. My February resolution is to put together a set of 2010 Topps Baseball cards.

Series One was released last week. Series Two will follow in a few months and Series Three will appear sometime around the World Series. I picked up a few packs to get a sampling of the cards. I'll pick up a full box sometime in February and hopefully knock-out most of Series One with that purchase.

So without further ado...here's some of the cards that were in the packs I bought:

The design reminds me of 1989 Topps Baseball crossed with a Fleer Ultra release. The cards feature photos of the player in-action during a game. This is a far cry from the cards of my youth which featured photos that the player posed for during spring training. Action photos were mostly relegated to "In Review" cards that featured highlights from the previous year.

Topps gets points for using each teams logo along with an arc along the left-hand side in one of the team's colors. The photos are well-centered for the most part, something that's not always easy when you're dealing with game-action photos.

As with nearly every card release these days there are parallels of the base set in addition to a few variant cards scattered throughout. Several insert sets add to what will become a mammoth set over the course of the season. Fortunately the collation seems to favor one or two insert cards per pack so hopefully this will make putting those insert sets together much easier. I'll post updates on how the quest is progressing.