[Baseball Nut]

About a month ago Topps announced that the autographchecklist for 2011 Bowman Sterling Baseball would be significantly enhancedfrom what was originally provided. After busting a box, it is clear to see what they meant. At 13 auto and 7 relic cards thisproduct is loaded with enough goodness to make any prospecting collectorshappy.


Bowman Sterling Basetball comes in at the high end of ourpremium cards category. Each hobbybox contains 6 mini-boxes with 5 cards each. Each mini-box should yield 1 Relic and2 Autograph Cards for a hobby box total of 12 Autographs and 6 Relics. In addition to that you get a box topper dual relic and one dual autograph card.


Here are some of the cards we pulled.

Base Set

Eric Hosmer, front and back


Yankees Prospect Manny Banuelos, Indians Rookie Jason Kipnis

Base Parallels

Mike Moustakas Refractor #/199, Javier Baez Gold Refractor #/50

Box Topper

Justin Verlander - Roy Halladay Duel Game Used Memorabilia #/196

USA Baseball Relics

Dominic Ficociello



Nolan Fontana, Brady Rodgers

Rookie Relics

Zach Britton



Brandon Beachy, Michael Pineda


Rookie Autographs

Maikel Cleto, Nathan Eovaldi

Minor League Prospects

Chris Wallace, Mychal Givens, Aaron Hicks

2011 Major League Baseball Draft First Round Picks

Brandon Martin (#38 overall), Blake Swihart (#26 overall), Taylor Guerrieri (#24 overall)

Jose Fernandez (#14 overall), Brandon Nimmo (#13 overall), George Springer (#11 overall)

Taylor Jungmann (#12 overall) Gold Refractor Auto #/50


Dual Auto

Minnesota Twins Ben Revere and Liam Hendriks #/225


Overall Look

This is solid design along the lines of Premium and Finestbut feels very Bowman. Not a lotof variation besides color parallel and refractors, but that is fine.

Quality and Variety of Players

This is a tight base set at 50 cards and that is OK. The Autographs and relics checklist istop notch.

Do the Hits satisfy?

How can you go wrong when the autographs are made up ofcurrent rookie, farm system stars and first round picks from the 2011 BaseballDraft? The dual Memorabilia boxtoppers are great as are the dual Rookie/Prospect Team Auto cards. Additional hits from USA Baseball are abonus. In our box 6 of the autos were of current first round draft picks, 1from the supplemental first round, 1 former first rounder and 3 rookies. This seems to be in line with expectations,which should satisfy plenty of prospectors.

Will you keep coming back for more?

This is a “High Risk, High Reward” product but the risk isgreatly decreased by the caliber of prospects/rookies and the volume ofautographs contained in a full hobby box. This is definitely a multiple box purchase if you can swing it.

Rating

4 1/2 out of 5

2011 Bowman Sterling Baseball is perfect for prospecting currentrising stars.



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[ocanseco55]

Nice haul and review!!