USA Baseball was founded in 1978 to oversee amateur baseball andorganize our country's national teams. Topps was there in the beginning to cover USA Baseball. Here is an example.
Most of you know this is Mark McGwire’s 1985 Topps card, acard that played a significant role during the hobby’s boom in the late 80’s and is still sought after today.
While you can find USA Baseball cards in products like
Bowman Draft Picks & Prospects, to really delve into the differentteam's players you must turn to the sets specifically dedicated to USABaseball. This year the hobbyedition of 2011 Topps USA Baseball Box Set is excellent, fully covering threeof USA Baseball’s National teams, Collegiate, 18U and 16U.
It’s obvious that this set falls under our boxed setclassification for the purposes of this review. Besides the 61 card base set,the box promises to deliver 7 Autographs and 3 Relic cards but we did a littlebetter than that.
Here are some of the cards from our box.
From The Collegiate National Team
Deven Marrero, front and back
Josh Elander, Michael Lorenzen
Marcus Stroman, Michael Wacha
From the 18U National Team
Albert Almora, Gavin Cecchini
Walker Weickel, Addison Russell
From the 16U National Team
Keegan Thompson, Bryson Brigman
Austin Meadows, Zach Collins
The Hits
Zach Collins Triple Relic #/240, Carson Kelly Triple Relic #/240
Corey Knebel Red Triple Relic #/25
Clate Schmidt Triple Auto Relic #/214, Brady Rodgers Triple Auto Relic #/214
Jeremy Martinez Auto, Mark Appel Auto
Troy Conyers Auto, Tyler Naquin Auto
Cole Irvin Red Auto #/99, Matt Vogel Gold Auto #/25
Overall look
The design here is straightforward and attractive. No stats here. Just write-ups on the back but thatmakes sense considering the amount of games these teams play. Regular card autos are on-card done inblue, red & green ink and gold paint. While I am not a fan of paint pens on regular cards, the gold auto Ireceived was very clean. Doing these with a thin pen helps a lot.
Does the checklist of players feel complete?
Pretty much the full rosters for all three teams are here so that isas complete as one could expect.
Are there any bonus cards included?
Yes, the hits. Very nicely done with a good distribution of players from the threeteams. Anyone who makes a USA Baseball team has to be a top player, but a nice percentage of the hits here were of the standouts amongst them.
Boxed Set vs. Set Building
No set building option here.
Rating
5 out of 5
2011 Topps USA Baseball Hobby Edition Box Set should be a part of youryearly Baseball card purchases, especially if you are into prospecting.
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2011 Topps USA Baseball Hobby Edition Complete Set Box Break Recap and Review
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