Topps Update releases this week, and when I first saw the checklist, I lapsed into a series of frustrations and concerns that basically funneled themselves into a single question - what the hell is Topps doing??
Longtime readers may know that I've been somewhat of a Topps Update fanboy over the years. I've been willing to overlook many of its glaring problems, still bought pack after pack after pack. But even I can't turn on the blinders anymore, because if you're anything like me and have seen the 2021 Update checklist, you might've noticed just how many things are painfully wrong this year. Sure, 2020 Update was weird and dull and just not great - but at least Topps had somewhat of a viable excuse with the pandemic and everything.
Topps was thrown a softball with Albert Pujols's early-season release and subsequent signing with the Dodgers, and he rightfully has a spot in this year's Update - though he's already had at least one other Dodger card in a (somewhat) mainstream set with Topps Fire.
Apart from that, however, almost no other 2021 transactions are documented in the madness that is 2021 Topps Update.
None of the deals from the Cubs trade-deadline fire sale are shown in this year's set (my first painful Rizzo Yankees card had to come from Topps 206, of all sets). No Max Scherzer, no Joey Gallo, no Jorge Soler. Nothing from any of the guys who switched teams and, you know, needed updating. This has been a problem for a couple years now, and for the life of me I can't understand it. My only guess is Topps has an early-season deadline to get these to the presses. And if that's the case...then just push the deadline back. I don't mind if Update comes out in November rather than October, and I don't think anyone else would, either.
I've said this before, and it seems obvious enough to not need repeating, but here goes - the set is called Topps Update! SO UPDATE US!
There's even a good amount of guys in 2021 Update who aren't even on the teams they're "updated" with in this year's set.
I had false hope that Jake Arrieta's return to the Cubs might actually work out, but he had a dumpster fire of a season and was DFA'ed in August. He caught on with the Padres, was somehow even worse for them, and was DFA'ed again. Yet there he is in the 2021 Update checklist as a Cub(?).
This kind of thing is fine for earlier-season sets like Gypsy Queen or whatever, but there's no excuse for it by the time Update comes around.
I can't help but fawn over the glory days when my high-school self was marveling over my first Brewers card of CC Sabathia in, you guessed it, Topps Update!
I don't know whether this is good or bad, but a trade doesn't really feel like a trade to me until I get a card of a player on a new team - some physical, nine-pocket evidence that Javier Baez played for the Mets, Kris Bryant for the Giants, etc., etc., and 2021 Update completely fails me in that regard.
But that's not all, because there aren't any All-Star cards in 2021 Update, either.
Listen, you and I both know that Update's All-Stars have been horribly bloated over the years, with an unnecessarily large fraction of the set being taken over by dudes who may or may not have even played in the Midsummer Classic. But to go completely the other way and get rid of the All-Star cards all together? NO! The All-Star game, like the trade deadline, is an important day of the season that deserves recognition in the final big set of the year. And if you believe 2021 Update, it didn't happen at all.
Another failure.
And oh by the way, Nick Madrigal has a "Rookie Debut" card in 2021 Update.
Problem there is he debuted in 2020, more than a year before this set ever existed. He even has a rookie card way back in Series 1, right there for the world and everybody to see. So not only is Topps refusing to update anything that happened in 2021, but they're still insisting on telling us about the 2020 baseball season.
This I really can't explain - an oversight at best, pure laziness at worst.
I used to buy a hobby box of Update every year for right around $60, a sum that usually fit nicely within my card budget.
Here in 2021, you can't touch a box for under $100, flaws and all. Why? ROOKIES, of course! What I'm fearing with Update (and I know I've been saying this a lot lately) is that Topps is siphoning all the personality of this set in favor of cramming as many rookies as possible into it. If rookie cards of Trout, Betts, Soto & Co. are any indication, Update is seen by a lot of people as an investment chip to hoard. And I wouldn't mind that if it didn't cause the quality of the product to suffer, while also pricing me out of the fun at the same time.
Will I buy any Update if a miracle happens and I actually see some at Target? Perhaps, more for novelty's sake than anything, and not out of the excitement I once had for this brand. It's stuff like this that steers the hobby into dangerous waters, while at the same time making me wonder if the impending Fanatics takeover might, just might, not be the worst thing in the world.
And so after all that, I...still don't have any answers, and the question remains - what the hell is Topps doing??
16 comments:
dude, I agree completely, I too am usually an update fanboy and this sucks. however, there might be "legit" reasons, if you can call them that: https://cardchat.substack.com/p/a-deeper-look-at-the-2021-topps-update
I feel Update has been crap for 3-4 years now. I've thrown no $$$ at it since 2017. Topps sealed their fate, paying more attention to their coffers than quality. We can only hope that Fanatics holds to their name and gives the fans what they want in a sports card. For me, that's collation, variety, limited parallels and affordability. Give me my "money's worth".
I'm with Jules.
Yeah, zero interest in the 2021 Update base set.. but a couple intriguing inserts this year with old Topps designs.. there are 1993 Black Gold inserts, as well as some Topps "cards that never were" (mostly fantasy rookies, unfortunately.. Would have liked to see some "sunset" cards that should have been, but nope). I'm hoping prices on those inserts settle down into a reasonable level for going after them. If they're case hits or something, forget it.
I ordered a box before I saw some of the things you mentioned. What’s worse is that there are all star cards with the asg logo but do not seaters cards from the actual all star game. Call them all star cards if you want but don’t use the game logo - put a banner or shield on it. I am hoping for the best with my box because that is all I can do at this point.
I'll make sure to grab you some if I see them on the vendor gigs,haha!
As a Rockies fan, I'm into Update this year, a lot of first Rockies cards, and a few more with a major release (non-online) debut. I also love the All-Star cards being moved out of the set and turned into inserts, more room for weird players in the base set.
I don't know why Topps doesn't just make this product Series 3, and then do a later, possibly smaller Update set which has all the guys who changed uniforms near the deadline in their new uniforms.
Sooz had a nice post about Update seeming to have a super-early lead time this year. The rookie cutoff has been the first week of June for a while but it looks like this was also the trade cutoff as well (and explains why the All Stars are inserts). Really frustrating though in that it's been headed in increasingly the wrong direction from where it needs to be. It *should* be able to reflect anyone who debuted or changed teams up to the trade deadline. Now it's increasingly just a weaksauce series 3 filled with guys Topps didn't want to fit into flagship plus a rookie crapshoot.
I don't mind the All Stars being inserts but doing so really broke the team set purchasing. I really hope they drop consistently in breaks. I did join a break with the hopes of getting all the inserts I want but I have a bad feeling that I wasted my money.
My biggest rant though as a Giants fan is how shit the checklist is this year. 6 Giants cards for the best team of the season. One of which is a 2020 Rookie Debut. Another of which is a guy who picked up a season-long PED ban in late June and only played 3 games this season. Topps managed to not make cards of a bunch of the most exciting Giants plauyers this season and that's a huge miss.
If I were kind of Topps? Make Update Traded and only feature guys who changed teams up through the trade deadline. Then in January make a Rookie Debut set for ALL the guys who debuted in the previous season. It gets to be a next-year set so it doesn't blow the year-long RC extravaganza but leaving it in the previous year's design like the old MLB debut sets did allows it to function as part of the larger flagship collecion.
I agree with you completely on the need to have an update of players who have changed teams. However, I'll be the first to admit I like the bloated amount of All-Star cards they have put out. As a Red Sox fan I wanted that first of hopefully many Raffy Devers ASG cards. I wanted to celebrate Nate Eovaldi making the team after years of injury riddled seasons. I even wanted a Matt friggin Barnes ASG card just to give me another reminder of that Boston's 2011 draft class was possibly one of the best ever. But at least I'll get a Red Sox card of Stalwarts like Frenchy Cordero and Marwin Gonzalez! I may buy a pack if I see one in the wild, but I'm not putting any serious money into it.
"Topps is siphoning all the personality of this set in favor of cramming as many rookies as possible into it."
Haven't they been doing that to almost every set since Ichiro and Pujols showed up?
Didn't know about the deficiency of Update this year, that's depressing.
Topps really does seem to be losing sight of the nuts and bolts of what makes a product collectable in favor of the "quick flip" crowd. I always liked buying a blaster/blister pack of Update (and Holiday, when I could find it) but that's lost its luster for a lot of the reasons you mentioned.
Thanks for saving me $20+ and a trip to Target.
A wise old blogger once coined the phrase "That's just Topps being Topps".
;)
I am kind of excited about it this year. Sure, it would be nice to get Kyle Schwarber and Hansel Robles, but there are a lot of cards for the Red Sox that are showing up for the first time. Guys like Hirokazu Sawamura, Franchy Cordero, Garrett Whitlock and Adam Ottavino are getting their first Red Sox cards.
I was surprised by the lack of All Star cards as well, but I am not that bothered by it.
Would like to see an Online Exclusive Traded/XRC Box Set, throw in 5 "Tiffany" Parallels with a few Pre-Production cards featuring a Handful of the following years designs.
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