First Impressions: 2026 Topps

Almost 2 weeks after it's release, it's time for me to stretch out an over-saturated topic and give my first impressions of the base set. Tired of reading people's opinions yet? Oh well, here's 1 more!

 

#185 Tomoyuki Sugano

 

The honor of the first card goes to Mr. Sugano. Let talk about that design. For the most part I like it. I appreciate the attempt to use jersey fabric as a theme, and I appreciate that Topps is actually trying to design sets that will be memorable. I think the execution on the theme fails by not having the fabric design throughout the border. Fading away to white takes away from it. I like a lot of the design elements too. The 75th Anniversary stamp isn't too gaudy, the team color stripes are cool, and the font is easy to read. The 3-letter team designations are redundant with the logos, but not awful on their own. As for this card in particular, that Baltimore City Connect jersey is uninspiring. Someone got paid to come up with that...

 

#17 Nick Castellanos

#18 Ryan Ritter (RC)

#44 Shane Smith

#216 Gavin Sheets

#232 Chad Stevens (RC)

#338 TJ Friedl

#75 Camilo Doval

#286 Anthony Seigler (RC)

 

The Topps base set was officially released on February 11th. Seigler was traded to the Red Sox on February 9th. For a set that routinely features players no longer with their pictured team, that has to be some sort of record... 

 

#137 Sean Burke

#208 Jack Leiter

#155 Drew Gilbert (RC)

#209 Riley Greene

#254 Gavin Williams

#235 Logan Gilbert

#74 Alex Freeland (RC)

#219 Rafael Devers

#58 Kris Bubic

#175 Eric Lauer

#15 Payton Tolle (RC) 

 

Speaking of the Red Sox, my first 2026 Red Sox card is of up and coming starter Payton Tolle. He is quickly becoming a fan favorite with his unicorn fastball, humorous interviews, and glorious mustache. Also, I looked at all the Red Sox cards in this set, and out of 17 cards featuring Red Sox players, 5 different jerseys are being displayed. (In addition to the traditional white and grays, Boston now has a traffic light of options - red, yellow, and green!) It kind of took away from the team cohesiveness if you know what I mean...

 

#278 Jose Altuve

#22 Clayton Kershaw

 

A proper sunset card for an all-time great. You love to see it!

 

#40 Sonny Gray

#198 Boston Red Sox (TC)

#65 Masataka Yoshida

 

Back to back Red Sox cards! Nice, this might be the most Red Sox cards I've ever pulled in my first pack of the year.

 

#336 Kumar Rocker (FS)

 

If you include the Texas "T", then Topps has hit all four corners on this card! Just something I noticed...

 

#182 Grant Holmes

#341 Giancarlo Stanton

#116 Yanquiel Fernandez (RC)

#329 Miguel Vargas

#9 Nick Privetta

#102 Juan Burgos (RC)

#136 Ezequiel Tovar

#156 Dominic Canzone

#164 Brenton Doyle

#35 CJ Kayfus (RC)

#110 Evan Carter

#70 Bob Seymour (RC)

#261 Zack Wheeler

 This looks like a good spot to talk about the back. First of all, see what I meant by having the jersey encompass the whole border? This looks much better and they should have done the same to the front. The card number is easy to read, thank you Topps. The stats though? Are my eyes getting worse or did they get even smaller? I swear the font size got smaller...

 

#111 Cam Schlittler (RC)

#345 Andrew Benintendi

#94 Yu Darvish 

#112 Carson Seymour (RC)

#81 Matt McLain

#267 Willy Adames

#163 Brandyn Garcia (RC)

#274 Hunter Goodman

#331 Bryce Miller

#259 Luis Morales (RC)

#106 Kyle Freeland

 

#48 Stephen Kolek

 

Topps moved the inserts to the back of the pack rather than putting them in the middle, which is fine by me. These Holo Foil parallels do nothing for me.

 

#FP-4 Kevin Negandhi

 

I have no idea who this guy is. I haven't watched ESPN since I ditched cable and went with streaming services. He does not look happy.

 

#322 Trea Turner

#128 Felix Bautista

 

Granted, I do think these Diamante Foil look nicer than the Holo Foil parallels, but as 1 of 71 parallel sets available it's still unnecessary. 

 

#T91-17 Jeff Bagwell

I do enjoy these inserts, only because the past few years have been paying tribute to the sets I grew up with and collected in my youth. Seeing the 1991 set reminds me however that this nostalgia period is coming to a close soon. 

 

#TOG-18 Bryce Harper

#TOG-13 Pete Crow-Armstrong 

 

I' going to be nit-picky here. Titans of the Game makes me think of the absolute legends in the history of the game. The Hall of Famers and the eventual no doubters. Is PCA a titan? Maybe some day, but not yet. And what's with the black baseballs?

 

#SMLB-18 Jose Ramirez

#SMLB-10 Francisco Lindor

 

Stars of MLB is back again. The design is OK, but outside of also being team colored I'm not excited by it. 

 

It's been well documented that Topps/Fanatics has decreased the amount of cards in the boxes, so I really don't know how much product I'll buy this year. That being said, one of the "hot" rookies in the set happens to be a red Sox player, so if I don't open a pack and find a Roman Anthony, he may just be a bit overpriced on the buy/trade front by the time the season is over. Still, for the set itself, I like the design on the whole, but all the extra inserts and parallels haven't piqued my interest. 

 

 

Payday Pack - Flipping Out!

I got paid, so it's time to play! I picked up another hanger pack of the new base set last week. As I was flipping through the cards to find the best ones, I couldn't help but notice a theme...

 

Honorable Mention

2025 Topps #217 Rece Hinds (RC)

Who doesn't enjoy a good bat flip card? This young Reds player did something right, because he's all smiles as he discards his bat. Not a bad bat flip card, but...

 

3rd Place

2025 Topps #350 Francisco Lindor

Mr. Lindor's bat flip is better. You get the whole bat in the shot, and Lindor is following that ball off to parts unknown. Not a bad bat flip card, but...

 

2nd Place

2024 Topps #322 Josh Naylor

Mr. Naylor's bat flip is better. We need a little attitude with our bat flips! Naylor nailed it, and he doesn't want you to forget it. Not a bad bat flip card, but...

 

1st Place

2025 Topps #24 Jhonkkensy Noel (RC)

Mr. Noel's bat flip is better. You look at this card of "Big Christmas", and you can practically hear the thunderclap of the fans' collective roar. Break through that shiny card border, Jhonkkensy, because you just ruined some pitcher's night.

 

Other contestants not appearing on stage:

#21 Nolan Schanuel (FS)

#295 It Takes Two (CL)

#224 Reese Olson

#242 Logan Webb

#246 Sean Reynolds (RC)

#301 Cal Quantrill

#215 Manny Machado

#140 Andrew Abbott

#32 Chase McDermott (RC)

#244 Yordan Alvarez

#105 Dylan Moore

#97 Will Warren (RC)

#261 Mike Tauchman 

#185 Jazz Chisholm Jr.

#220 Jackson Holliday (FS)

#38 Nico Hoerner

#286 Edwin Diaz

#216 Hunter Greene

#108 Mitch Keller

#251 Ryan Bliss (RC)

#78 Corbin Carroll

#63 Jake Bloss (RC)

#GH-3 Bryce Harper (2024 Greatest Hits insert) 

#SMLB-25 Luis Robert Jr. (Stars of MLB insert)

#SMLB-28 Carlos Correa (Stars of MLB insert)

#44 Brenton Doyle

#287 DJ Herz (RC)

#138 Isaac Paredes

#35 Anthony Rizzo

#290 Pete Crow-Armstrong (FS)

#312 Dub & Drench (CL)

#37 Spencer Steer 

 

 

OK, I gotta be honest. If this pack didn't have a natural bat flip theme going for it, this Steer card would have won 1st Place easily. As far as slides into home plate go, this is dang near perfect!

First Impressions: 2025 Topps

New year, new baseball cards! Sure, I know that these cards have been all over the internet now, and opinions have been given en masse, but you still haven't heard my thought on them have you? That is why you're here, right? So as I opened up my first tantalizing pack of 2025 Topps, I made a note of my first impressions, which I'm happy to share with you now

 

#209 Taylor Ward

 

 

The honor of the first card goes to Mr. Taylor. Right off the bat, I noticed the bat! Swing that giant pencil Taylor! Unfortunately, the next thing I noticed was the LAA team abbreviation on the side (or in this case "AA" since the bat almost perfectly wipes out the "L"). Turns out this is how Topps decided to notate teams on horizontal cards. One could argue that this was done because of the smaller amount of space on the ribbon, but then again for the city-less Athletics, they didn't have any trouble squeezing the whole team name on there. It doesn't look good to be honest, and the design team could have easily made the set look  a whole lot more cohesive with just a bit more effort.
 

#135 Maikel Garcia

#101 Nolan Arenado

#67 Trey Sweeney (RC)

#257 Korey Lee

 

Another design fail comes with a player's last name in black. It doesn't show up well, especially on scans/photos. Other than that, the design itself is OK. It's not as exciting as last year's design, but a solid design nonetheless. I do like the attempt to do something new with the positional dots on the baseball diamond. It works and makes this set unique.

#56 Ranger Suarez

#217 Rece Hinds (RC)

#216 Hunter Greene

#108 Mitch Keller

#183 Taj Bradley

#99 Cincinati Reds (TC)

#21 Nick Lodolo

#147 Bryson Stott

#270 Andres Gimenez

#337 Ben Rice (RC)

#175 Ha-Seong Kim 

 

 

As far as the backs go, the 2025 design is pretty straightforward and bland. The card numbers are nice and readable, so kudos for that.

 

#161 Bradley Blalock (RC)

#190 Miguel Vargas

#7 Alec Bohm

#320 Drew Thorpe (RC)

#227 Ty France

#113 Marco Gonzales

#36 Greg Jones (RC)

#139 Jordan Beck

#125 Jackson Merrill (ASR)

 

As long as MLB is going to shove the City Connect jerseys down our throats, the cards are going to do likewise. Part of the allure this year's card set design is that the colors match the team's traditional colors. The City Connect uniforms take away from that.

 

#T90-68 Albert Pujols (1990 Topps 35th Anniversary insert)

 

In keeping with the numerous ways Topps rehashes their old designs, we once again have the completely arbitrary 35th Anniversary set. Personally, I have always liked the 1990 set design, so I don't mind this too much, but now that Topps has reached the 90's, we are rapidly approaching the time I stepped away from the hobby and thusly will no longer care about this yearly insert...

#SMLB-7 Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (Stars of MLB insert)

#SMLB-28 Carlos Correa (Stars of MLB insert)

 

Another returning insert series is the Stars of MLB. This is probably the best design they've come up with since they started doing this insert in 2022.

#324 Masataka Yoshida

 

The "Macho Man" gets the honor of being my first 2025 Red Sox card! Not a bad card at all, and despite his struggles last year, I still think we haven't seen the best of him yet. I will point out that Yoshida gets the LF designation, despite only appearing in the field for 1 game last year. He should be listed as a DH.

 

#225 Tyrone Taylor

#288 Evan Carter (FS)

 

 

I've always had a soft spot for Future Stars cards, especially when they use a script reminiscent of the original 1987 ones.

#81 Minnesota Twins (TC)

 

This is an early contender for best card of the year. Such a fun card!

 

#114 Ryan O'Hearn#279 Trevor Larnach

#342 Davis Schneider

#151 AL Wins Leaders (Skubal/Berrios/Lugo) 

We end the pack with a League Leaders subset card. I'm glad they're actually showing the players who led the league, but once again Topps would rather stick to a trifecta of players rather than give proper due to Skubal and all three players who finished second with 16 wins (Poor Carlos Rondon...)

 

Overall I like the set, even though in some cases it seems to get in it's own way. I think some minor tweaks could have made this set even better.

 

 

First Impressions: 2024 Topps

 

It's a miracle! For the first time that I can ever remember, my local Wally World had the latest base set out on the shelves, and on the day of release! I actually got to open cards on Valentine's Day, and it was happiness. The set design has been getting a lot of positive buzz, so I'm happy to bring you my first impressions of 2024 Topps Series 1!

 

#203 Chas McCormick 

The honor of the first card goes to Astros outfielder Chas McCormick, and what a great way to kick things off! gravity-defying catch? Check. Dirty uniform? Check. Interesting background? Check!

Like I said, the design has been getting a lot of good reviews, and I agree. Now that I see the cards in hand, they're great. The neon has some slight foiling to it, which gives it a shiny quality. I feel these cards would have been better if the border was all black, but I don't hate the two-tone look. I love the neon diamond behind the team logo too.

 

#287 Miles Mikolas

#83 Keaton Winn (RC)

#255 Andrew Vaughn

#266 Alec Bohm

#315 New York Power (CL)

#114 Jose Ramirez

 

Topps continues to include a fair amount of horizontal cards, which is perfect for a great slide like this one!

 

#90 Oneil Cruz

#127 Ha-Seong Kim

#66 Jordan Westburg (RC)

#131 Eduardo Rodriguez

#342 Maikel Garcia

#244 Tyler Soderstrom (RC)

#320 Daniel Bard

#157 Trent Grisham

 

I'll be glad when these City Connect uniforms are a thing of the past. Some are OK, but some just don't look good to me (Sorry Padres fans). At least Grisham has a sweet mustache!

 

#295 Henry Davis (RC)

#36 Prelander Berroa (RC)

#267 Kenley Jansen 

 

My first Red Sox card of 2024 goes to their All-Star closer. I always enjoy it when the player pushes past the border, giving the card more dimension. One thing I have noticed is that not every card does this when their is ample opportunity to do so. (The above McCormick and Ramirez cards, for example).

 

#120 Edwin Diaz

#179 AL Home Run Leaders (LL)

#165 Chicago Cubs (TC)

#129 Adbert Alzolay

#79 Seth Brown

#167 Blue Jays Unite! (CL)

#HRC-12 Freddie Freeman - Home Run Challenge insert

 

Home Run Challenge cards are back again. I've never played the game in all the years Topps has done these.

 

#ATT-2 Julio Rodriguez - All Topps Team insert

An interesting insert to say the least. I'm not sure how I feel about Rodriguez being shaded the Mariners' colors, and is that supposed to be an "OF" behind him? If so, that is the weirdest "F" font I've ever seen.

 

#SMLB-21 Shohei Ohtani - Stars Of MLB insert

#SMLB-24 Pete Alonso - Stars Of MLB insert

Ugh, these again... The epitome of bland uninspired inserts...

 

#334 Ryne Nelson

#4 Logan Webb

#209 Johan Rojas (RC)

#302 Jake Rogers

 

Compared to the fronts, the backs are surprisingly plain. No black to pair with the white, no neon element, nothing that ties to the design on the front. It's weird. Points to Topps for the readable card numbers, but the stats seem harder to read than ever. (Maybe I'm just getting that old...)There seems to be a fair amount of open unused space on these cards as well.

 

#49 J.P. Crawford

#207 Luken Baker (RC)

#328 Patrick Wisdom

#210 Gleyber Torres 

That's the pack, the first of what I hope will be many many more! What are your first impressions?

First Impressions - 2023 Topps Series 1

 

I'm fairly certain my local Wal-Mart isn't carrying baseball cards anymore. It seems like they haven't had any of the latest releases in almost a year. I had an opportunity to check the card section at Target, and wouldn't you know it, success! Target may end up being my local source for cards. For now, I'm happy to open a hanger box of 2023 Topps and give my initial review:

 

#173 San Francisco Giants (TC)

 

The first official card of 2023 is a team card. I can almost convince myself the guy on the left has three arms and three legs...

 

#178 NL Home Run Leaders (LL)

#303 Wild West (CC, CL)

 

What in the Multiverse of Madness? Is it me or is this guy hugging himself?

#211 NL ERA Leaders (LL)

#191 Caleb Smith

#49 Mitch Hanger

#276 David McKinnon (RC)

#125 Marcell Ozuna

#233 Taylor Rogers

#41 Brian Serven (RC)

#17 Shohei Ohtani

 

OK, let's talk about the design. I like the Jumbotron head shot, the team colored borders and the home plate positional element. What I don't like: the small player name and even smaller team name, plus the sharp angles not going the full width of the card area. Minor stuff, really. All in all a nice looking set.

 

#278 Aaron Nola

#90 Korey Lee (RC)

#290 Max Fried

#179 Carlos Rondon

#286 Ezequiel Duran (RC)

#47 Ryan Mountcastle

#98 Mike Yastrzemski

 

Maybe it's me and it's just this particular pack, but it seems the photos themselves aren't as interesting as in past years. Yaz's grandson is one of the better photos in this pack, but even it suffers from a weird cropping that makes him knee himself in the head.

#264 Steele Walker (RC)

#197 Andrew Benintendi

#55 Cristian Javier

#266 Tommy Pham 

 

My first official Red Sox card of 2023, and it's a mid-season pickup who isn't on the team anymore! It's a good opportunity to talk about the backs. Yay for readable card numbers! Not horrible design-wise, but nothing outstanding either. I need my glasses to read anything else on the back, but at least we get full career stats!

 

#325 German Marquez

#327 Patrick Sandoval

#298 Shane Bieber

#153 Kevin Gausman

#107 Sandy Alcantara

#184 Beau Brieske

#312 Pavin Smith (Gold parallel)

 

Now we get to the bonus portion of our pack. Kicking things off is this gold parallel of Pavin Smith, who I'm almost positive I saw play while he was with the University of Virginia (Go Cavaliers!) The Diamondbacks colors compliment the gold border really well.

 

#SMLBC-2 Mike Trout (Stars of MLB Chrome insert)

So yeah, Topps is doing this generic insert set again, in regular and Chrome versions. Yawn..

 

#280 Julio Urias (Rainbow Foil parallel)

The Rainbow Foils look nice. The stars in the lower corners really stand out with these parallels.

 

#SMLB-14 Bryce Harper (Stars of MLB insert)

#SMLB-7 Jose Ramirez (Stars of MLB insert)

#SMLB-27 Freddie Freeman (Stars of MLB insert)

#SMLB-24 Pete Alonso (Stars of MLB insert)

#T88-78 Robin Yount (1988 Topps Baseball 35th Anniversary insert)

 

Topps shows it can in fact move on from the 1987 design with this years 1988 tribute. I will say I'm torn with showing players who were actually in the 1988 set. I think I'd appreciate more if Topps only did this for the Hall of Famers who appeared in the set (and not to Hall of Famers who weren't).
 

#22GH-20 Mike Yastrzemski (2022 Greatest Hits insert)

 

It's a Mike Yastrzemski hot pack! I like the concept of this insert set, but the design is so-so. And what's with the demonic shadow hovering around the red area? 

 

#313 Cal Mitchell (RC)

#74 Tarik Skubal

#171 Mychal Givens

#132 Gavin Sheets

#204 Manuel Margot

#210 Not Bad, Rook! (CL)

 

After all these years later, and Miggy still has that childlike smile he had when he was a young Marlin. His love for the game is going to one of the things I'll miss most about him once he retires after this season.

 

#54 Marcus Stroman

#5 Albert Pujols

 

Speaking of retirement, kudos to Topps for giving an all-time great a proper sunset card. (They even gave him card #5!)

 

#320 Cade Cavalli (RC)

#151 Tyler Wells

#261 Martin Perez

#183 Seiya Suzuki

#269 Steven Matz

#182 Nick Pratto (RC)

#68 William Contreras

#66 Brandon Crawford

#154 Jonathan Aranda (RC)

#60 Josh Rojas

#279 Yu Darvis

 

Am I the only one who is over the City Connect Uniforms? They were fun little money grabs at first, but I'm getting tired of seeing so many alternate uniforms on baseball cards. The Negro League throwbacks never got this much exposure.

 

#259 Mark Appel (RC)

#326 Walk-Off Waterfall (CC, CL)

#190 Bro Time (CL)

#226 Michael Harris II (ASR, RC)

#194 Josh Staumont

#220 Chicago Cubs (TC)

#292 Texas Rangers (TC)

#113 Star Power (CC, CL)

#174 Celebration In Seattle (CC, CL)

#70 Darin Ruf

#168 Atlanta Braves (TC)

 

So there you have it. This is likely the last "pure" Topps base set before we start seeing the Fanatics trademark, right?