2018 Topps Series 1 Baseball Cards

Massive rookie class

How are autos of hofers like Ripken, Ryan, Aaron, ect. or rookie and current star possible future hof autos like Trout, Harper, Bellinger, ect.. considered garbage? Not saying anything about the 1/1 cut autos of names like Williams, Cobb, Robinson, ect.. Sure they are long odds and you could spend thousands on cases and not get any one of these. But thats why they are not garbage, because they are rare!!! U also could buy one box and get a big hit. Someone has to pull them.. My point is that sure most people will get a cheap relic or the dreaded manufactured fake plastic relic, but some lucky people will pull a cut auto or a platinum rookie auto or that Nolan Ryan patch auto pictured above. Thats the way I look at it anyway. Im buying a long shot chance at getting a nice hit and even if i get the usual cheap relic and base cards I will still hang on to them and let my grandkids decide if they are garbage or not.

Topps has single-handedly destroyed what little long-term value for every card made after around 2005 or so. And the worst part is they simply don’t care. Because they’re focused on profits instead of the sustainability of the hobby. Every set they release on the market now is nothing but over-priced, over-produced garbage.

BTW, the purple parallel in my area is marketed as exclusive to Meijer stores, not Toys R Us.

Anybody ever try to figure out how many cards are printed from a typical topps set. I feel like it could be estimated by using the odds per pack on a serial number card and multiplying by the amount of cards in the set. I just want to know a ballpark figure. I would hope that topps never gives us the late 80s early 90s numbers again. I am thinking without doing any math it would be less than 1 million base topps cards per player on series one baseball.

Anybody notice difference on Salute cards. On two ‘glove works’ cards the text rises on one in an arch as well as across the base. One just horizontally.

It doesn’t pay to be an OCD completist.
Excessive inserts and now parallels of inserts. I know that it’s been this way for years now, but it’d sure be nice to be able to complete a base set without shelling out $300. I guess I’m old school when the only “inserts” were All Stars and 3-headed Leader or rookie cards. The point is, you open a pack and 25% of the cards aren’t base cards it makes it pretty hard to get the whole base set. A hobby box still leaves you 30-40 cards short (though mercifully they don’t have duplicates).
I don’t trouble myself with trying to get all the variations and short prints and parallels. That would be nearly impossible without completely emptying your wallet. And I don’t need 20 different cards of the same player each year. I mean, congrats to Stanton for a fine season, but he gets a base card, several League Leaders, a bunch of different color parallels, short print variations, 8 different inserts, and parallels of all those too??
Also annoying is that there’s too much predictability to opening a retail pack. For example: You get a Chad Kuhl and immediately know that the next 4 cards are going to be. Is there no way to randomize the cards in production? I swear I’ve got 8 Whit Merrifields, but still haven’t unwrapped a single Judge.
Also annoyed with the social media handle and/or empty space rather than complete career stats. Ugh, who cares? Also, why do the rookie cards have one combined stat line for the last season and nothing more? Show me some minor league stats.
Also, is it just me or does Topps love back-up catchers and washed up pitchers. Doug Fister, Ubaldo Jimenez, Scott Kazmir? Do they really need more cards when some lowly teams only get 18 or 19 total players?
Re-reading this I realize I sound like a grumpy old man (Get off my lawn!). But having revisited this hobby after a 25 year lay off, it’s been a steep learning curve trying to understand the Topps product these days. (And that’s just one set!)
Photography, printing and card stock is generally excellent though!

A surprisingly nice set, Topps have made the no border cards finally work (though I predict we will have borders returning next year.)

I agree, the cards are nice, but doesn’t anyone think there are way too many chase/insert cards. hobby/retail , jumbo packs, hangers, Target/Wal-Mart. Red, Blue, Black etc. Where, and when will it stop or slow down? I like the hobby I have amassed a nice collection of cards over the years, but I pick and choose carefully.

Trey, thank you very much for clearing up the matter with the Ian Happ 2018 Topps series 1 card having the RC MLB logo. I appreciate it very much and as always keep up the good work. Thanks again, Jim

I rated this years product as average because it is not a set that is terrible nor will it go down as a classic. It’s just bland. Admittedly I am a fan of borders on cards so that is a point off for me right away. It just feels too much like Stadium Club to me. If you like stadium club ( Topps version of upper deck) then this is the set for you.
Topps why spend the time designing one set to look like another -?
Insert overkill and way too many variations.

Let me make a suggestion for next year
Bring back borders
Make borders darker than card (ex: 1971,1987, 2003) this will give graders something to search for and will add value to the cards at same time. Retail and Hobby collectors will both be looking to pull great condition cards to sell to graders and will drive secondary sales ( thus giving value without driving up box prices ( and lower your production costs Topps- borders are cheaper than autos ( even cheaper than manufactured patch cards).

Hey Trey, thanks for replying about the RC MLB logo on the Happ card. I’m still kind of confused as to what the mistake is because the Bellinger and judge card do not have an MLB RC logo on either the 35th Anniversary insert paper card or the Chrome card and the only MLB RC logo is on the 35th Anniversary insert Ian Happ card. So is that specific Ian Happ card the mistake? Please reply whenever you have spare time, I’d greatly appreciate it. Keep up the good work. Jim

I really like this set and all the subsets. I especially like the 1983 design insert cards. I noticed that some cards carry the RC MLB logo like Ian Happ, yet the Aaron judge and the Cody Bellinger don’t. I was wondering if the Ian Happ insert 1983 design non Chrome is technically really an RC card? I noticed that when it changes to the same card but the silver pack Chrome version the MLB logo disappears on the Ian Happ card. Does anyone out there or you Trey have any comments or ideas about why this is? Iwould appreciate any feedback at all on this matter.

I did not buy last years set or this years. Not having each years stats for each player on the back of the card was a deal breaker for me. Since I have been collecting (1973) that has not been done. Topps, you blew it.

Not a bad looking product, but not my favorite design from Topps, although I do like the design better than last year. WAY too many inserts and variations again. I do like the ’83 Topps design, but 100 cards? I’m hoping to complete the base set with the Jumbo box I bought, but the Jeter inserts might have me buy a couple of blasters at Target. Just like last year, I think I will concentrate on Heritage.

Thumbs up

The design is not horrendous, but its on the south side of average for sure. A few subjective negatives about it and finding it very hard to saying anything positive.

Of course the design is actually the highlight of the set! I mean, seriously, to name the major faults:
— EVERY insert this year is not only an ugly design, but also worthless (I suppose an argument can be made for the Awards inserts)
“Opening Day” – Really? Isn’t there already an Opening Day set that could print the ‘fun/insightful’ stat on the back of the player’s card?
“1983 design” – see ‘Opening Day’ comment. Pretty sure Topps Archives is still being made (Aug release this yr fyi) not to mention the ’83 design was used for insert sets in ’12, ’13, ’17 & a main design in ’15 (4 of 6 yrs…Topps realizes they have a unique design every yr they’ve made cards right? I understand some are better than others & recent yrs shouldn’t be used for awhile (or used sparingly for inserts), but just 21 yrs have been used in Archives sets leaving ~40+ designs available. Sure they’ll eventually all be used, but why not start repeating then instead of 4x in 6yrs now?
“Topps Now” – heh…given 7 of the 10 cards are of Judge, this is simply an exclusive retailer insert set which K-Mart & ToysRUs not falling for a lame exclusive insert set.
“Legends in the Making” – let me sum this up w/ Darvish’s card…Darvish is a LTM due to similar K’s in his 1st two starts to Karl Spooner…for Yu’s sake, I sure hope he doesn’t follow Spooner’s “stellar” MLB career where he pitched a total of 116 innings over two seasons…that’s possibly worse than the O’s logo on Posey’s card…that was careless; in the LTM inserts someone put quite a bit of time and thought to pull that Spooner = Darvish tidbit together.
— Really? A individual card for the top 3 league leaders rather than the 3 players on each card? A waste of 10 spots for players who fail to receive a card each year while giving a few players ~3-4 cards each series if they place in all 5 cat’s (yes! more K Davis for every one!). Ok, not a major arguement against, but here’s one: it seems that everyone who posts in comments/forums last year spoke out against the format last year. Why does Topps continue to ignore the most important voices of their company? I guess that guy in product mgmt didn’t care about ‘stupid ol’ customer opinions’. Why would Topps listen to people who actually buy their products? That’s soooo ’00s. Social media & customer voice/satisfaction is going the way of the Electric car any…day…now. Such a simple simple simple thing they could have done at no cost to Topps.
— RC cards not being actual RC cards – siiiigh…more of Topps being Topps by BLATANTLY (ie – error cards in the 80s/90s anyone?) changing it to fit their own needs to sell more cards in their 3 sets (S1/2/update). Pretty obvious just like the creation of error cards was back then and steroids were in MLB.
— Insert parallels – wtf!?!?! the same amt as the regular cards too. I can understand 1 or 2, but its the SAME as the main cards and absolutely unnecessary. What problem was solved or benefit added prior to having this that made Topps think this was a good idea?
— Hobby “Hits” – admittedly, I’m a retail guy (those Bryant & Jeter inserts sets are just too darn AWESOME to pass up…heh), but can ya blame me when, if you are lucky enough to get the promoted # of hits promised to you, you either
a) Get the ‘letdown’ hit (relic) as opposed to the ‘99.5% favored’ hit (auto) advertised. Topps really shouldn’t even have such a difference in the type of hit you can get in a pack (would it kill them to have 1 of each?) because….
b) even if you end up getting the preferred type of hit, you spent an extra $25-40 to get that ever so ‘popular’ Jedd Gyrko auto (as written about above…poor soul). Obv not all hits are going to be great hits, but there are so many stinkers w/ no upside its not a very good idea to even try for something good (in S1/S2 anyhow).
— Judge autos – given I don’t look for hits in the Topps flagship, I haven’t looked into the reason why Judge has no autos. Is it a contract thing? I mean one whole insert set is 70% Judge cards. No autos? He’s in every insert set available (except he somehow didn’t make the Jeter and Bryant exclusive insert sets) and ’cause of the ‘3 player LL cards are frowned upon by Topps product mgrs’, he also has 3 regular cards…as well as the SPs of course and those pesky parallels for all 3.

See what I mean? Not all of these are the end of the world and not everyone will look at some of these as negatives, BUT its pretty hard to look at them as positive either OR find other things that are a plus. Maybe the photos? Has Topps stopped using generic stock/recycled player photos? if so, I COMMEND Topps on doing so (…given that this is basically the product they sell, it certainly would make sense…I guess it could be worse…I guess they could go out and use stock WordPress type webpage designs for their card designs OR keep using their older designs for future yea….wait scratch that second one…yeah so at least they don’t use generic webpage designs for cards…).

Can’t wait till 2019 or at least football season…

I like the 2018 design better than the last few years, which have all been vast improvements over the 2011-2014 designs. The inclusion of the Jeter set and Legends in the Making seems to favor the retail product over the hobby offering.
The other insert sets are disappointing. I liked last year’s ’87 tribute more than the ’83s, but 100 per series is too much for either. And Topps Salute just feels lazy. Take a bunch of insert set ideas and throw them all into one bloated set. At least the design this year is an improvement over last year, but both are less interesting than the base cards.
And now even the inserts have parallels? I’d rather see some new ideas for inserts than the same cards with 5 or more different color accents. I really enjoyed the First Pitch cards, and generally prefer insert sets that are more than just an excuse to make more cards of the hobby darlings.
But for me, it’s always been about the base set. And this design is probably my favorite since 2010.
4-star design, 2-star insert selection, 3-star overall rating.

The quality of the ‘base’ cards took a serious step backward this year. I’d say about 5% were mis-cut, many showing a white line down the side. At least 5% off center with wide color quality variation, and the ‘off center’ ones had the best color. I’m old school, still enjoy building ‘base’ sets from packs. I always buy three boxes, past two years I got two complete sets, this year- 5 cards short. Last, is it me who is always unlucky getting high grade inserts? You should call me Mr. Woodbat Cards. With these 3 hobby boxes I was unusually unlucky, very few nice pulls. No Black Border, no Clear, No short print “Holiday Cards’, No press plates….

I agree with the one stars raters. What was wrong with having the total stats on the back of the cards. There should be the top 3 players on League Leader cards. And bring back the borders, loved the 2013 set with the diamond and all, this year we got a tongue. Maybe next year we’ll get the ears. This set, like last year’s set, sucks.

Product pretty much the norm for Topps.

Anyone know anything about the 1983
Silver/Chrome cards? I see on the checklist they are not listed but see them
for sale on different sites. What product
are they included in? I’ve bought Jumbo
and retail boxes and have not pulled any.
Thanks for any help!

Pretty much the same old product line that Topps has been shelling out. Well time to move on over to Football.

Just realized this. Are there no first pitch inserts? They are usually in the series 1 and 2. Maybe I just missed them.

I love the “83’s. That was my first year collecting as a kid. That said, I agree that the set is meh. I get a case of jumbos. The hits were blah. The card designs are decent. Inserts of salute are junk. Putting so many salutes in the 3 releases per year is getting boring and difficult to complete the set of them. It seems most of the good autos are in limited run relics more than anywhere else. There have been really bad rookie autos the last couple years, which is mostly what I have been hitting. The spring training relics are crappy but to do it 2 years in a row is lazy. At least I got a Bellinger home run challenge card. A few good hits but nothing that made me jump out of my seat. My fave things are the “83 refractors.

My recommendation to collectors is to order the boxes way ahead of time. The price I paid by ordering early saved me $100. I paid $524 with a coupon on my dealer’s site. Saw that a jumbo 6 box case was selling for $624. And I guarantee that Series 2 will be as costly just because of the hype around Otani who is going to be a bust. He is hurt already. But that won’t stop the price hike that will come with Series 2. Really hope that next year the inserts are better. But this year is the same ol’ thing. And it’s too late for any changes too happen. I wish Topps could prepare for something different besides base card designs? 2 years in a row of the same concepts are boring. But I guess that is why these cards are considered cheap comapred to the super high end stuff that only dealers buy.

I bought a Jumbo Box from a seller on Ebay and did not get the autographed card. I don’t know who is at fault but I am very disappointed. Called Topps but the seller has to be the one to fill out the Hit Missing Form and do this and that and then it could take up to 4-6 weeks to get nothing!!!!

Opened my first Topps pack in 1956. 1957 my father kept buying me penny packs until I got a Paul Foytack card to complete the first series checklist . While it’s still a thrill to see my first Topps card of the year (this year Matt Adams), not a great difference from 2016 and 2017. Would like to see some old fashioned eye contact posed cards. Prefer Heritage for that reason, but I’ve never come close to putting together a full Heritage set (usually end up with about 200 of the 495 cards).

As a new collector, can you please explain to me the basic differences between the retail and hobby versions of these cards? Love your website and info it provides by the way. Thanks!

Lets’ get back to simple designs like the late 1950’s and 1960’s cards. Logos, players, and team names only.

Bought a Hobby box and got nothing – David Price Jersey (never seem to get an autograph) and my one “hit” was Jedd Gyrko #d 25 -ugh. Cards are cheap looking – decent photography ruined by ugly logo/name plate and background. No SP even though there is a huge list of them. A waste of $60. Agree with those who say buy the factory set instead.

Love the base set. Great photography! Not particularly “wowed” by any of the subsets. One question: The checklist only shows a blue parallel for the Kris Bryant Highlights, but I am finding black parallels as well. Any ideas on the print run?

I bought a jumbo hobby box and other than the crap spring training medallion, I was happy enough. I did put together a complete set (1-350) with some decent dupes, just wondering if this is expected now or just a pleasant surprise. I haven’t actually bought a box of cards since the 90s…

Great set

Purchased Hobby Box – positives for me were the design and the 83 retro inserts. Managed to get all the key rookies, including 1 of the 83s. Negatives for me were the other inserts. Salutes were okay, but the reproduction of Topps Now cards and the superstar sensations were not my thing.

On the Bryant & Jeter inserts there appear to also be black parallels. In the Bryant I got 2 blue & 1 black and for Jeter I got 7 blue & 4 black.

Absolute GARBAGE!! 115 for a Jumbo box.. one khris davis auto ,one ichiro bat piece and one manufactured spring training patch!!
Wheres the second relic!!!?
Just like when i bought a case of heritage and not one auto.
Topps hasnt changed and isnt ever going to as long as anyone buys any of their products.

I like the cards. Great photography.

Save money,but the factory set. These inserts are 95% junk.Many of the so called rookies are not rookies,if anyone can read the auto’s please let me know how you do it.Topp’s why do you not get some QUALITY CONTROL.Some of the complaints I see from other SET BUILDERS is true.Get back to the way you made such a great product in past years.

In 1975, George Brett and Robin Yount were not rookies but had rookie cards, but I understand what you mean A. I think it is Topps more manipulating its update set. The update set should just be called a Third Series and guys like Devers and Hoskins would naturally have their rookie cards the year after their debut. I don’t mind cards would that have a rookie card log, rookie cup, and future star banner on them.

The good – another great looking design. Love the new look of Topps and the 1983 design.

The Bad – rookies who aren’t rookies. Frazier, Devers, Hoskins, Dom Smith, Rosario, etc. None are eligible for ROY award because they are not rookies. These guys should have all had rookie cards in the update set last year. Topps is intentionally holding them back to put them in all of their products for the year. That shouldn’t be allowed and it continues to make the definition of a rookie card more and more confusing.

Only because I had store credit, I opened one jumbo. One gold card, two rainbow foils, two junk relics, including the fake one, and a $5 autograph and a $4 Short Print; and only five RCs, no Judge and no Hoskins. Worst dilution ever. Topps, you ought to be ashamed for marketing such trash. I would never have spent $105 on this garbage. Avoid!

Where are all the cards of the greatest hitter of all time? Only one 1/1 auto card of Ted Williams?

as before, the jumbo box notes “2 relics”–but a plastic “commemorative patch” isn’t a relic anywhere in the world but ToppsLand…by definition, a relic is old…a plastic commemorative patch is just plain junk. Once again, little effort from Topps on products that are marketed to collectors instead of the big money breakers crowd

Excited to see Target had out single packs, blaster boxes, jumbo packs (36 cards) and hanger boxes (72 cards). Sometimes it takes them awhile to get it out on display. Bought one 72-card hanger box and pulled a Buster Posey #’d to 99, Major League Material and a Camo Memorial Day Eric Thames. Also had some other #’d card like a gold Yoenis Cespedes. Don’t like the “wave” design on the front of the cards. Looks nice on the back of the cards, though.

These cards are absolute crap! I opened a Jumbo case and lost 20% due to damage. Topps should be ashamed to market such poor quality cards. It seems they are getting worse instead of better. I guess that is because nobody else complains.

Why bring back the 1983 design? They are hideous. They were then, they are now.

Thank Trey! I pulled all 4 in the silver packs and a gold parallel Devers. And if I may ask, and I know this question may seem weird, to which NHL rookies from this season would you compare them? I’m trying to an have an approximate idea about their value.

Hi guys,

I’m new with baseball. I’ve only opened hockey up to now. I was wondering if you guys can give me some good rookies’ names. I don’t want an exhaustive list, just the main rookies of the season.

Cheers!

Opened my first blaster today. I like the base design, but once again too many meaningless inserts and subsets. Easy to identify the foils, but not so much the gold. I actually went right by it. Players weekend patch, yea ok please!

I agree on having too many photo variations. It just becomes a nuisance on the regular sp’s. I don’t mind the SSP’s though.

Any idea on the initial prize for the Home Run Heros cards? I love the player performance contests! Hoping the prize is something cool and worth while.

Too many pointless insert sets, again, and equally pointless photo variations. Most conspicuous by their absence, however, is that there appear to be no Aaron Judge autographs in this product, according to your checklist. That should certainly de-incentivize pack searching, breaks, etc., and that is a good thing. No, thanks. I’ll just buy the factory set. There is nothing here, folks. Move on.

Seeing The Pictures.

Looks great but don’t see any Judge auto’s in checklist. What gives?

Just went to the set checklist and see Toys R Us there. Is that a guess or has it been verified.

Any word if Toys R Us will be carrying purple variations again? With the financial troubles they have been having, I wonder.

Wonder who will be portrayed on the usual photo variation cards that people love to chase. Usually you can pick out which member of your favorite team will have a variation, ie Miguel Cabrera for the Tigers, etc. I’m wondering if the A’s variation this year will be Khris Davis or maybe Bruce Maxwell taking a knee, eh? That would sure fire a lot of people up!

Finally I found a Eric Davis auto and in a 1983 style with other great eighty’s players!!!

I’ll get the usual base team sets of the A’s and Tigers, but it would have been nice if Topps had included at least HOF’rs from both the A’s and Tigers like Rickey Henderson, Alan Trammell and Jack Morris who actually played in 1983 unlike some of the players listed in the ’83 tribute set who weren’t even born yet or playing in the minors!

I agree with you david d….always liked the 3 player leader cards. This change for Topps is horrible. Plus the card style shows no creativity. Colorful, but no real change from the last couple of years.

Is it only me…..or are other lifelong collectors bothering that Topps, once again, has changed the concept of MULTIPLE PLAYERS on its League LeaderS cards, in place of a single player.
I have collected the League Leaders since 1961, and this radical change, which started last year, cheapens the concept of it!

I don’t like border-less look either. I would like to see topps start over with minor changes to each set, don’t do 1962 or 1968 designs or crazy color combos on backs of cards. Would like to see return of team photos & sub sets of league leaders & playoffs like they did in the 1970’s on back. Also do it in 3 series including trades.

BRING BACK BORDERS! Please

So… Topps is NEVER going back to having borders? Not lovin’ that. I also agree with above posters in that having the “swoosh” cover up part of the player’s name seems like a design mistake.

Remind anyone of a bowman design??

Not lovin’ the design. Getting major Colgate toothpaste vibes. The 83 inserts look cool, probably cool enough for me to buy a hobby box, but not enough to stick to only Topps products next year. Here’s hoping the MLB lets other companies use logos when Topps’ license runs out in 2020.

Looks like a big tongue is showing the players team logo

I sincerely hope that if anyone is reading this that works for Topps, that they will resume the THREE player League LeaderS card, instead of the single League LeadeR card that they wasted on us last year. I have collected League Leaders since 1961, and I hope they resume!!

I also do not like the way the swish covers part of the players name.

Does anyone know if topps will be inserting buyback cards again.

Love the Independence Day parallel

Now that it has been a few days I can add another thing I do not like. I do not like the sparkle or flash of light on the team logo as it makes it hard to see it.

I know the MLPA would not allow it but it would be cool to have an insert or variation of Mike Trout photoshop cards into the other 29 teams.

Maybe they could do it with Jeter – have in a Red Sox uniform, Phillies, Pirates, Mets…. that would be a cool insert set.

Topps Baseball 2018 series 1 has a mistake Buster Posey has the wrong baseball logo he has a orioles logo instead of the giants logo.

The design is an improvement over the last 2 years but one part I do not like since we can not see the back is how the player name and team name become pixelated at the end. I would like it more if it was a solid bar. The swish sort of reminds me of 2014 topps.

Posey with a orioles logo but the giants name. HAHAHAHAHAHA. I had a laugh.

I just hope Topps includes complete player career statistics again.

Posey with an Orioles logo :)

1992 Fleer Ultra anyone?

Topps Baseball 2018 series 1 are a fantastic design they are really awesome cards.

so much better.

Thumbs up – like design