Set Appreciation Post #20 - 2012 Topps Pro Debut

No special guests or Aaron Boone memes for this set appreciation post, just baseball cards of players wearing Minor League uniforms. As a person who follows and watches Minor League baseball, these are always fun sets to flip through. This was the third Pro Debut set, so it was still a relatively new product at this point. More than a decade removed from its release, there are plenty of players on the checklist who are in the prime of their carer or beyond.  

Let's get it.  

The 2012 Topps design has always been fairly low on my list, easily the bottom quartile of all their base sets. It's just uninspired and looks like they did not put much thought or effort into this design. Someone came up with this five minutes before pitching it to some higher-up. The photography is fine, it's not Stadium Club or anything. You better believe I am going to count the bad design towards the final rating at the end of the post.  

It gets worse.  

There are no statistics on the back of the card. I almost want to stop the post here and just tell you to avoid ever touching this set. Add in that Topps is calling Dante Bichette a "dynamic offensive" player. That is only making things worse. He couldn't hit a beach ball outside of Denver.  

This set is really a hit or miss product. The good names are great, but there are a lot of former highly regarded prospects who never panned out or lived up to the hype. As a fan of the Minor Leagues, I am going to try to stick to the success stories for the cards I show off. The percentage of players who did not make it is really high, even for a Pro Debut product.  

The best three cards in the set are no-brainers. Like decade into their careers and they are Hall of Fame trajectory type players.  

First, we have Syracuse SkyChiefs outfielder Bryce Harper.  

Bryce Harper was in Triple A less than a month during the 2012 season before the Nationals called him up to the Majors. I usually make a point to see players like Harper when they roll through Durham, but he did not make it that far into the schedule. Despite the miss on my part, this is a cool card. I miss the SkyChiefs, who had a train as a mascot. You can see it on his batting helmet. There is story there, but I am not going to tell it on my blog. Cool card and a cheap Harper rookie if you don't own one. 

One of the other really good cards belongs to Cardinals third baseman Nolan Arenado.  

Arenado is shown here with the Modesto Nuts of the California League. That's A Ball and Arenado is 20 years old in this picture. Arenado was actually on Modesto in 2011, his 2012 season was spent with Tulsa in the Double A Texas League. Who would have guessed this guy would go on to hit 300 home runs and win 10 Gold Gloves? 

Baseball America rated him the 42nd best prospect right along side fellow third baseman Mike Olt and Will Middlebrooks in their 2012 Prospect Guide.  

Oops, missed out on that one.  

Last up of the really good cards is Manny Machado of the Fredrick Keys.  

I will not listen to your Manny Machado slander about him not being a future Hall of Famer.  

A few other really good players in this set......

We've got Jose Ramirez. Probably also a Hall of Famer, or getting really close. The card shows him with the Indians entry into the 2011 Arizona League team. Ramirez is an 18 year old on this card, one the youngest players featured in this Pro Debut set. This card is why this set is fun to look at years later.  

We've also got what feels like an air brushed Gerrit Cole.  

Cole was actually in college in 2011. He went to UCLA and was selected by the Pirates with the first overall pick in the MLB Draft. Cole did end up playing with the Bradenton Marauders during the 2012 season, but he was only there for a few starts before the Pirates promoted him all the way up to their Triple A team.  

Locally, we've got Christian Yelich playing for the Greensboro Grasshoppers.  

Yelich is another really young player in this set, only 19 in this picture. Turned out to be a pretty good player. Why do the Greensboro cards never have the players posing with the bat dogs?  

Many teams have bat dogs these days, Greensboro was the originator.  

Let me move on to the Cardinals and Durham Bulls portion of the post. 

There are a lot of Durham Bulls in this set. There are not many Cardinals players in this set. At least not many who made it to the Majors.  It was a toss up between Shelby Miller and Matt Adams. 

I am going with Matt Adams, because you can see his uniform.  

I have always liked the Springfield Cardinals uniforms. The Cardinals should do this with all their Minor League affiliates. Two birds on the bat with the city name in the Cardinals script. 

My best memories of Matt Adams on the Cardinals include his home run off of Clayton Kershaw in the 2014 NLDS.......

There was also that time FanGraphs wrote an article about how bad Matt Adams was playing left field and fellow Cardinals outfielder Tommy Pham liked the article post on Twitter.  

On to the Durham Bulls portion of the post. There are a lot of them.    

Some former Bulls are in the base set, but were on the Royals at the time this product was released......

You can't read the names, because it's 2012 Topps, but this is Wil Myers and Mike Montgomery.  

Montgomery recorded the final out in Game 7 for the Chicago Cubs in 2016 World Series, so I should probably ignore all his cards, but he also threw a no-hitter for the Durham Bulls at a game I attended. Seeing a no-hitter is pretty cool, so I just try to ignore his Cubs cards. 

I have also sacrificed a Durham Bulls card from this set for an in-person autograph for my son.  

Never replaced it, not sure I ever will.  

There is also a card of Taylor Motter in the set, but he is on the Princeton Rays and not the Durham Bulls. He looks weird with short hair.  Motter does not have any certified autographs, but I have an in-person autograph copy of the card that I prefer to the unsigned copy.  

There are also two Tim Beckham cards, which both show him on the Durham Bulls.  The first is a relic card.  

There are parallels of this card with patch pieces, but they've always been really expensive when they've shown up and the patch pieces are just the blue trim from the middle and sleeve areas of Beckham's jersey.  If I ever saw a patch piece from the Bulls logo, I would be all over it.  

Last Tim Beckham card......

Easily my favorite Durham Bulls card, as well as my favorite card overall in this entire set.  

Let's make one more stop with this set and then I will assign it a rating.  

Pro Debut products usually come with a few autographs per box. The 2012 Pro Debut set was no different, but the autograph checklist is terrible. I have autographs of Drew Hutchinson, Charlie Tilson, and Matt Adams, and they are three of the better names available.  

So, how does the 2012 Pro Debut set rate?  

I had been ranking the sets featured in my Set Appreciation posts, but I am going to stop that today.  Instead, I am going to rate the set on a 1-5 scale based on its design, quality of checklist, insets, value and price, and also an overall. 

Today's rating scale is using the Durham Bulls beloved mascot, Wool E. Bull.  

The design is really bad and the lack of stats on the back of the cards is really hard to get past for me. I gave the set 1 Wool E. Bull for design and I felt like that might be generous. The checklist has some strong names, but it is really top heavy. There are a few other solid names in this set that I did not bring up in the post, my time is limited, but there are a lot of failed prospects here. More than other Pro Debut sets. 

My two highest ratings were for inserts and value. While the autograph checklist is terrible, I am a sucker for those manufactured patch cards with the Minor League logos. I know that there are few Minor League card collectors floating around on Blogger, but those are universally loved and were a great concept. The value offered here is good too. There are really cheap boxes and packs of cards that you can find on the discount table at shops and shows.  

Overall, I give this set two Wool E. Bulls.  There are better Pro Debut sets out there. 

and finally....here's Gypsy Queen (Part 1)

When did Gypsy Queen come out again?  It was several weeks ago, but I am just writing a post about the two boxes I opened up now.  What happened to cause this delay?  The statistics of page views do not support what I am about to say, so I will first thank you for continuing to visit my page in spite of the fact that I did not post as regularly as a normally do in terms of both quantity and quality.  The beginning of April started with a vacation.  By the time the vacation ended and returned to work my schedule of writing and posting cards and the whatnot was completely in taters.  I managed to get to the end of April and have worked my way back into shape in terms of posts. 

So, to actually answer the question at the top of the post the product arrived on April 15th.  I attended the Durham Bulls home opener that evening and left my boxes of Gypsy Queen in my car.  The next day, after work, I opened them live on Periscope.  Something I am playing with, but I need to use an Ipad instead of my phone.  I also need to have the camera set up so that it is somewhat still.  If you are on Periscope my user is the Snorting Bull. 

After the Periscope broadcast these cards just sat on my desk.  So, between a post this evening and tomorrow I am planning on catching everyone up on my Gypsy Queen cards including my two cents on the set and design this year. 

Lets start off with the good stuff.....


Autographs 

I opened two boxes of Gypsy Queen so I was supposed to receive a total of four autographs.  I kind of made it there.  I have not run into a redemption this year, but after last year I have decided to sell/trade all of my code cards this year.  Probably next year and the year after that too...... Yes, I got three autographs and a redemption card.

Obviously I really like the Matt Adams autograph.  It's always cool to pull an autograph from your favorite team out of a box that you open.  Adams is not my favorite Cardinal, but I probably would have ended up with this card at some point, so it's all good.  Someone asked me on Twitter whether Pompey was one of those guys I liked because I saw him in Triple A, but he actually was never in Buffalo before the Jays sent him down there this season.  Gausman and Johnson are nice autographs too.  I will let you know what the Gausman brings me when it is traded/sold. 

Relics 

Last year I did really well with the relics in this product pulling a button card from Greinke.  I was hoping for a similar card this year, but I guess that would have been beating some pretty long odds.  Here's what I did ended up landing......

Gypsy Queen can have some rather ordinary relics, so I was happy to draw out the Kolten Wong, again a Cardinal, and the low print run Miggy with the nice frame border.  Honestly, as much as I was hoping for something cool, like a button card, I also feared drawing four relic cards with names like Adrian Gonzalez.  Nothing against Adrian, but he's not my favorite player and that's a rather ordinary looking relic.  Back me up Dodgers people....

Plates-

and here is where my box was made.  I have heard different collectors say that there seemed to be a lot of plates being pulled out of Gypsy Queen this year and I have to agree.  I have seen numerous box breaks and different collectors on social media open boxes/cases and post their hits.  Lots of plates.  My two were pretty nice, so I cannot complain. 

This one was kind of a surprise to me.  I am not a huge plate person and I do not actively seek them out to buy or trade.  If one happens into my collection at the right price, so be it.  I am not sure how many of these I have pulled over the years, but I do not think that I have ever landed a printing plate of an insert card.  This seems to be a first as far as I can remember.  It's a nice card. 

Lastly, a Liriano plate.  I like the frame around the plate.  Really nice card and made for a nice finishing touch for my two boxes of Gypsy Queen. 

A Trip Into Big D's Part 2- Cardinals (Mizzou too)

In the first part of my A Trip Into Big D's I highlighted the Rays cards that I picked up at my favorite local card shop.  Besides picking up a handful of sweet Rays cards I also picked up some really nice Cardinals pieces too.  Again, the card shop owner Jimmy found all of these cards for me.  Always awesome to have an extra set of eyes looking out for cool cards.  Let's start simple:

This is a game jersey card out of this year's Gypsy Queen set.  Nice looking card of the Cardinals young first baseman.  I am not quite done with completing the Cardinals autographs and relics from this set, but I am close.  Adams was a need.  Along with the Adams card I picked up a copy of an autograph from a former Mizzou player Martin Rucker.  

Mizzou had a bunch of good tight ends starting somewhere in the mid 2000s.  Rucker was an All-American and was one of the primary offensive weapons on the 2007 team that was a Big 12 Championship game away from the BCS Championship Game.  They still beat KU.  

More good stuff.  Back to baseball.  

Topps puts out a ton of parallels.  I swear collectors could go crazy trying to put all of these things together, or at least I would.  I know people who love these.  I really slowed down on parallels a few years back when Topps went wild with camo, pink, sparkles, pies in the face, etc.  Overwhelmed.  I think I have a pink card or two, but none of them are Cardinals and they are whatever I happened to wander into out of the box or packs I opened.  This Freese is numbered out of 50.  

Yes, he's no longer a Cardinal, but Game 6 of the 2011 World Series means I collect him.  He probably does not pay for many of his own beverages around St. Louis.  

I have not done a lot with Rob Kaminsky yet, but he's 19, was a first round pick, and has some really good minor league numbers in A ball.  I've heard good things.  His cards are inexpensive.  Why not?  Two more really good Cardinals.  

Love this card with the green background and the red on the Cardinals jersey.  Not a commonly seen combination, but it works here.  Throw in a nice autograph from the Cardinals top prospect and this a beautiful card.  It's a high number for an Oscar autograph, but it's also an on card autograph.  Last, but not least.....

  

One of the other customers at Big D's pulled this card and already had a Piscotty autograph from his appearance at the Triple A All-Star game from earlier this summer.  Jimmy picked it up for me and I was happy to give this card a new home.  The Cardinals have a crowded outfield, so who knows what the team will do with Piscotty, but this card is a keeper.  Well done Topps. 

Allen & Ginter Cardinals Relics

I am going to catch up with things this week.  I will be posting the second half of my 1991 Topps favorite cards this evening, but in the meantime, here are a few Allen & Ginter cards from this year to look at.  Both cards are Cardinals with the Adams being bat relic and the Molina a jersey relic.  

The Molina relic is slightly dirty, which is always cool to see on a relic card.  I've seen and owned dirtier cards, but still always cool to know that your relic saw a little bit of game action.  

A Blogger Walks Into A Card Store....

I am prepping for school to start back up in the next two weeks which is always a little bit stressful, but I found a little bit of down town this week to stop by Big D's Card Shop in Raleigh.  I will have another post about my favorite local card shop again at some point tomorrow.  My post this evening is going to focus a bunch of cards that the owner of Big D's, Jimmy, has found and set aside for me over the past month or so.  

Three of the cards I picked up today are really nice autographs from one of my favorite former Durham Bulls Evan Longoria.  Each card is a pretty low print run and not the easiest of finds.  Let's start with a Topps Unique autograph.  

I do not recall ever seeing this card before Jimmy showed it to me and I am a pretty big Longoria fan.    I also really like the Topps Unique set.  It's numbered to just 25 copies and there has not been a copy of this card sold on Ebay recently.  In fact, there is not one of COMC, Collector Revolution, or Amazon.  Nowhere.  I had to pick up this card.  With none around and a print run of just 25, it's likely not around because the other copies of this card are in collections and they are not going anywhere.  

Next up is a nice copy of a Tribute Longoria autograph which is just serial numbered to 20.  I have seen plenty of Longoria autographs from the Tribute sets, but I have never seen this gold card.  I love the gold color, the two bat pieces, and the Longo autograph.  Next...

The highest numbered card here, but still just 99 copies and a rookie card to boot.  This is the blue edition of the Rays third baseman's rookie card.  The scan is a little blurry and scratchy because it's in a screw down holder.  This might be my favorite card out of the lot.  Yes, I know Longoria is wearing the old style Rays uniform, but I used to love these old Bowman's Best set.  This is a great card.  I might have to take it out of the screw down and rescan it.  

While I was at Big D's I also picked up a few other items.  I had two other cards that Jimmy had set aside for me at the store.  The first was a Matt Adams Jumbo Bat/Autograph card from the 2012 Topps Finest Set.  

I have a copy of this card, but it has a jersey relic instead of a bat relic.  I think I bought the jersey relic version of this card the first week the set was out and gave up on even looking for the bat relic or just did not look for it at all.  Either way, this card has found a happy home in my collection.  

Lastly, I picked up this nice in-person autograph of Cardinals prospect Stephen Piscotty.  He played here this week during the Triple A All-Star game.  The Durham Bulls had an autograph meet and greet on Tuesday, but I did not get to attend.  This Piscotty was in the shop and too hard for me to pass on.  Really cool picture and a nice autograph.  

Bonus items?  Yes.  

I picked up a card from a customer in the store.  Sent over a little bit of Paypal and landed this cool looking Longoria autograph.  You can't have too many.....

Jimmy also had a cool Jeremy Hellickson Durham Bulls program he had in the back of his shop.  Pretty sweet item.  

2012 Topps Debut Side By Side Matt Adams/Jordan Swagerty Autographs

There are slightly less than two million people living in the Raleigh-Durham metropolitan area.  There are advertised card shops in the area, but the few around the area are overwhelmingly loaded with cool basketball cards and memorabilia, but lack baseball cards outside of the token Josh Hamilton (local guy) shrine located inside of one display case.  The Hamilton cards are often surrounded by a few Jeter cards and maybe a few Chipper Jones cards.  Always a little disappointing.

In fact, a few months ago when my blog first started I took a road trip to St. Louis and visited several of my old baseball card haunts.  A week later, a fellow collector told me about an upcoming business trip to Durham.  He asked about the card shops and I asked him which ACC basketball team was his favorite.  Nothing here worth seeing.  Now, a few weeks ago I was driving on a major thoroughfare through Raleigh when I spotted a sign for a baseball card shop.  I was intrigued.

I had a little bit of time this weekend, so I ventured down that same street and stopped by the card shop.  I almost didn't go in when I saw the outside of the store was covered in a window painting of a Jeff Gordon car and had NASCAR number decals across the top of the window.  I stopped in the parking lot and contemplated getting back in my car, but went ahead and entered the shop.

Not much happening here.  There were boxes of commons.  Wax packs of 1990 Score.  There were a few display cases of single cards.  The highlight of the baseball section was a Mo Vaughn jersey card.  I thought about buying it and putting it on this page as my Raleigh baseball card shop trophy, but I kept looking.  Finally, I found some newer wax.  Selection limited.  Mixed into the middle of the "new" wax packs was a box of Upper Deck Power Deck.  CD ROM baseball cards.  Hmmm.

I finally settled on the "new" release of Topps Debut.  Not really encouraged and doubtful of ever returning I took my box of cards and returned home to open packs.  My first hit was a Drew Hutchison autograph.  Not great.

2012 Topps Pro Debut Drew Hutchison

I kept opening packs and enjoyed seeing some of the minor leaguers I get to watch during the summer. My favorite base card I pulled was a Chris Archer.  The Durham Bulls pitcher will likely be in Tampa next year and is worth checking out.  He has several autographs and a few relic cards too which can all be found for less than $10. 

2012 Topps Pro Debut Chris Archer

My best card I pulled out of my box was particularly exciting.  I have a lot of cool Cardinals cards from 2012 releases, but I haven't pulled anything great out of packs myself.  One of the downfalls of not having a cool local card shop.  So, here's my pull:

2012 Topps Pro Debut Side by Side Matt Adams/Jordan Swagerty Autograph 

I was really happy to see this card and am happy that I picked up a box of this "new" release.  I am still not going back to my new card shop. 

Trade with Los Angeles Inspiration

I worked out a trade last weekend with a new partner over at the blog Los Angeles Inspiration.  If you haven't checked it out yet, it does a really great job of covering all things sports around Los Angeles.  Baseball, Basketball, Hockey, and College Sports too.  Jesse, the writer of the blog, also does a lot with card collecting and autographs.  Last week he was asking about a Mike Stanton autograph I had picked up a week ago and we were able to iron out a trade.

Jesse had a huge trade list to work from and I was able to fill out some holes in my Cardinals autographs for the year, as well as picking up a few extra cards.  My favorite two Cardinals cards I picked up were a Bowman Platinum Matt Adams autographed jersey card and an Allen & Ginter Allen Craig autograph.

2012 Bowman Platinum Matt Adams Jersey/Autograph

2012 Topps Allen & Ginter Allen Craig Autograph

I also picked up a 2010 Allen & Ginter B.J. Upton autograph I needed for my Rays collection.  While I am aware that there is little to no chance Upton returns to the Rays next season, he is still one of my all-time favorite Durham Bulls players.  

2010 Topps Allen & Ginter B.J. Upton Autograph

I also picked up a Jon Jay autograph from the Gypsy Queen set, a Topps Chrome Darwin Darney autograph, and a Brandon Phillips jersey relic from this years Allen & Ginter.  Jesse also threw in a stack of Cardinals cards with some nice cards in the mix including a cool looking Scott Rolen insert from the 2005 Zenith set and a couple Jason Motte's.  

2012 Topps Gypsy Queen Jon Jay Autograph

2010 Topps Chrome Darwin Barney Autograph

2012 Topps Allen & Ginter Brandon Phillips Jersey

A few Mottes and a cool Rolen