2013 Topps, Topps better hope the Mayans were wrong!

I'm late. I know it. I saw JayBee's post over at his blog about the 2013 Topps Sell Sheets being live and  the first images came out over 2 weeks ago.  Of course I love when the sell sheets come out.  Our first look at next years design.  Over all the reviews I've read are ecstatic for the stuff.  You can see the sell sheets here at JB's Blog.

Well get ready for one not so ecstatic. This years theme is the Chase. 'Cuz you gotta have a theme I guess.

Let's take a look at the base.

I like the base design. Simple, unique to baseball.  There's no way they are going to carry over this design to it's flagship football, ah but that's another rant and post for later. Seems like a lot of wasted space on the bottom, but whatever. I'll assume the name, home plate, and the Topps logo will all be foiled.  It would be kinda neat if the swoops and baseball diamond were color foil, but that might be too much foil and I'm sorry I mentioned it because Topps loves to use foil.  It's so shiny.  No preview of the backs of the cards.  Probably nothing too exciting there but I'm a completist and I believe while the moneys in the front of the card the substance is on the back.  That's why I try to include scans of the backs of my cards. And I did a whole post a while back about the beauty of the backs of Topps cards through the years.

Of course there will be parallels.  Lots of parallels!  Back this year are the Gold, Black and Platinum parallels. Numbered to 2012, 62, and 1 respectfully.

And new for Baseball are the Pink, Emerald foil and Desert Camo foil parallels. Emerald are not numbered, Pinks are numbered to 50 and Desert Camo to 99.

It'll be interesting to see this in person.
There will also be silk parallel cards and printing plates and I'm sure variants and other goodies to look for.
And of course this year there will be more Manurelics to look for.
Here's where my review gets a little negative.  While I like the looks of the cards and even the concept.  It's been done, to death by Topps. But if there is one thing Topps likes to do is beat a dead horse.

Proven Mettle player coin cards.  There will be 3 levels of Mettle cards, at least on the sell sheets. Copper #d to 99, Wrought Iron #d to 50 and Steel #d to 10.

MVP Award winners with a mini replica MVP trophy embedded in the card.

And Cy Young Award winners with mini replica Cy Young awards embedded in them.  It wasn't stated if either one of these will be numbered or have different tiers like the Mettle cards.

There will be 6 insert sets in this offering and of course those 6 inserts will have relic, auto and auto relic parallels as well.

Since Topps is on a Mini kick again we get 72 mini's! I'll be honest I love mini's and I've been batting around the idea of putting together a 70's set and 72 is right at the top of my list to try. Mainly because out of all the 70's sets it's the most unique.  It just reminds me of 70's kids TV shows.

we also get 72 relics...

And of course autos.  All low numbered and on card which is a big plus.

Next up Cut to the Chase.

Seems these chrome die cuts are just too good to keep in Topps Chrome.  I like die cuts and I love the chrome cards, but it just seems to be that Topps is recycling again.

There will also be relics and auto relics.

Next we have Calling Cards. A set dedicated to showing off unique things players do when they're awesome I guess.  There will be relic and auto parallels of this cards as well, although none were shown on the sell sheet.  Autos number to 10, relics to 25 and auto relics numbered to 5

Next the Greats.  I love inserts featuring great historical players, but again Topps does this every year and it seem like they keep choosing the same players over and over.

The Greats autos will also be on card. And don't forget the auto relic here too!

Chasing History is next.  No scan of the base, but we do have the auto and relic.

And the last insert is the Chasing the Dream.

And we only get the auto example from the sell sheet. I wonder if these cards will be chromed out?  Probably not but they would look super sweet if they did.

And of course lets not forget the 1 of 1 super rare cards I will never see except on eBay auctions. Topps is calling these cards the Ultimate Chase.  Did Tristar already do that?

I do think these Ultimate Chase cards look amazing.

Over all it looks to be another decent set.  I won't be jumping over grandmothers to get to the card counter, but I'll be picking up at least one jumbo.  There's also the possibility that Topps might do another wrapper redemption and no word if they are finally giving up on there online redemption contest.

One insert I noticed was missing and I'm thrilled that it is, is some kind of duo match up card.  Topps has been kicking that around for what seems like forever and I won't miss it.  Of course Topps tends to throw stuff in at the last minute and unannounced, so there might be a few surprises in here.

At least Topps isn't touting this as a game changer.  Nope just 2013 Topps. Come and get it. Well come and get it in January. hmm this wasn't nearly as negative as I thought it would be.