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It’s that time of year again. No, not the pennant races, but, the release of Bowman Chrome’s baseball product. Each year this product becomes more and more anticipated, and pack busters are constantly looking for their next pot-of-gold prospect.
This year product follows on the footsteps of the 2008 Bowman releases that was packed with an all-star line-up of future talent. The Chrome release features the rookie card of Kosuke Fukudome, as well as autographs of some great prospects. Engel Beltre, Austin Jackson, Andrew Lambo, Lars Anderson, Angel Villalona, and Ryan Kalish (just to mention a few) each are featured on Prospect Autograph cards that come in base, refractor, xfractor, blue refractor, gold refractor, orange refractor, red refractor, superfractor, and printing plat variations. Each of the refractor versions are number stamped on the rear of the card. I have seen some preliminary pricing for the autographs on eBay, and the Beltre and Jackson are selling for around $50 each.
A disappointing find from the autographs is that Angel Villalona is a redemption card. From what I hear, he is nearly impossible to obtain an autograph from, and has been called the Barry Bond of the minor leagues, because of his stingy habits. On the bright side, if you do get one, you can be on of the first to try out Topps’ new online redemption program.
The base set carries some of the same characteristics as the prospect set, offering a variety of refractors, but without the autographs. Each hobby pack contains 4 cards, 2 of which are prospect cards.
As always, Bowman Chrome does not disappoint this year. Plenty of people will stock piling up on the prospect autographs hoping to land their needle-in-the-haystack.
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Checklist coming soon.
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