2017 PENNANT BOX BREAK - PACK 11

202. Giancarlo Stanton

257. Adrian Gonzalez

221. Mike Trout

259. Archie Bradley

287. Ender Inciarte

238. Nomar Mazara

152. Paul Goldschmidt

262. Jaime Garcia

263. Adam Duvall

TI27. Evan Longoria - The Incumbents

This is a pretty solid pack as far as base cards go with three legitimate MVP candidates. Lots of red and blue, too.

2017 SPIRIT BOX BREAK - PACK 3

217. Kevin Pillar

283. Adrian Gonzalez

195. Michael Tonkin

267. Max Kepler

78. Yangervis Solarte

254. Randall Delgado

75. Martin Perez

159. Ryan Flaherty

93. Jose Leclerc (RC)

20. Collin McHugh (Gold Parallel)

ART1. Gary Sanchez - All Rookie Team

The All Rookie Team insert set features 2007′s top-performing rookies at every position. Here’s the full checklist:

ART1. Gary Sanchez - C

ART2. Tommy Joseph - 1B
ART3. Ryan Schimpf - 2B
ART4. Ryon Healy - 3B
ART5. Corey Seager - SS
ART6. Trea Turner - OF
ART7. Tyler Naquin - OF
ART8. Nomar Mazara - OF
ART9. Steven Matz - LHP
ART10. Michael Fulmer - RHP
ART11. Seung Hwan Oh - RP

2014 Spirit Base Series 1: 101-110

#101 - Jonathan Villar
On MLB: The Show 13, I played a franchise as the Astros for a few years and got really frustrated by Villar. He kept teetering on the edge of potential but could never really make an impact, even on a crappy team with lots of playing time. We'll see if he can do better in real life.

#102 - Alex Gordon
Anytime I can use a semi-close up of something "unusual" happening, I'm gonna. I'm already struggling to keep things from getting stale and redundant. So here's a goofy shot of Gordon tossing his plate armor off.

#103 - Garrett Richards
This image would be perfect for a Panini release. Shouldn't be too hard to airbrush the sleeve and cap logos off.

#104 - Adrian Gonzalez
I always thought Gonzalez was kind of bland and mild-mannered. But going through the photo options, there seems to be a lot of images where he's pointing or gesticulating or something. I guess it's the Dodger Way.

#105 - Adeiny Hechavarria
I'm starting to realize I should have switched the blue and orange colors for the Marlins template. There's basically zero blue represented on their uniforms and it really clashes with the design.

#106 - Scooter Gennett
SCOOTER!

#107 - Chris Parmelee
The Twins roster is filled with guys of which I have absolutely no knowledge. Sorry, Twins fans.

#108 - Travis d'Arnaud
Too bad this name font doesn't have any lowercase characters for the stencil style. It's really bugging me to see that capital D there.

#109 - C.C. Sabathia
Sabahtia's pretzel limbs are just too weird not to share with the world. Cropping his lower body probably adds to the confusion as well. Awesome.

#110 - Eric Sogard
Is this Sogard? Or Orel Hershiser wearing a crappy disguise out on the diamond?

Diamond Market - Part 2

Yesterday I introduced Spirit's answer to Topps' annual web-code-giveaway-thing, called the Diamond Market. Basically, you pull code cards that look like credit cards and redeem the codes on the back for credits, which can be used to 'buy' exclusive cards of players you might actually collect. Fairly simple. Today, we're unveiling the actual 'buying' structure along with the kind of cards you can get your hands on.

Like I mentioned yesterday, the credit values you unlock with a code are 25, 50 and 100. There are 4 tiers of cards:

• Base cards: 100-player checklist, numbered of 249, purchased for 10 credits
• Relic cards: same 100-player checklist, numbered of 149, purchased for 40 credits
• Jumbo Relic cards: same 100-player checklist, numbered to 99, purchased for 80 credits
• Autograph cards: same 100-player checklist, numbered to 49, purchased for 150 credits

As you may have noticed, the code credit values don't correspond to the card purchase values. Here's where the Diamond Market gets fun. Say you get a 25 credit code. Do you use it up immediately buying 2 base cards of players you like? Or do you let that balance sit while you try to find another code to add in hopes of getting enough for a jumbo relic or auto? Or say you're later into the collecting season and a lot of the cards are no longer available. Do you take the last auto of guy you're not too crazy about or do you snatch up 15 different base cards?

Maybe at the end of it, if you have unused credits and you can't really find anything left of interest, you can turn those credits into packs of other Spirit products. Or maybe they could partially carry over to next year's contest.

I'm not sure if the numbers for the print runs or checklists are right. Right now they add up to just under 55,000 total cards. But those could be manipulated to fit logistically. We could add another tier with a refractor or something, number it at 149. For now, this is a good start.

So what do you think of this concept? Anywhere you could see improvements? How does it stack up to Topps' apparatus? More fun than collecting virtual rings?