Everything You Need To Know About 2012 Bowman Baseball Cards

2012 Bowman Baseball has just hit the shelves and this year’s release is looking awesome.  Bowman is loaded with great autographs, sick looking ICE cards and special bonus perks.   Add to that cards of future stars like Dylan Bundy, Gerrit Cole, Trevor Bauer, Bubba Starling, Danny Hultzen and Anthony Rendon in this year’s release should make it one of the best Bowman sets to collect.

So here are some of the things to look for when opening boxes of Bowman Baseball this year.

You Have A Chance To Be On A Future Bowman Card

Topps has randomly inserted 10 Bowman Debut Golden Contracts in hobby boxes of 2012 Bowman Baseball.  Each Golden contract guarantees you an autographed Yu Darvish baseball.  One lucky winner be selected out of the group and will receive their own Bowman Baseball Card in a 2013 Bowman release, a $500 signing bonus and a Bowman jersey.  I don’t know about you, but being on a baseball card has long been a dream of mine.  This is so cool that someone will wind up with their own card.

2012 Bowman Baseball Wrapper Redemption Program

Collectors who send in 24 hobby or 7 HTA wrappers from 2012 Bowman Baseball will have a chance to receive a free 5-card pack of exclusive Blue Wave Refractor Parallel cards. In addition, bonus autographed cards featuring hot prospects such as Josh Bell, Dante Bichette, Jr., Gerrit Cole, Matt Purke and many more have been randomly inserted into these packs.  But you will have to act quickly because there are only 10,000 of these exclusive packs and they will be given out on a first come, first served basis while supplies last. 

Collectors are encouraged to group their wrappers and send them in one package.  Wrappers should be sent to:

Bowman Blue

P.O. Box 2008

Duryea, PA 18642

All New Bowman Black Makes its Debut 

2012 Bowman Baseball includes an all-new autographed card insert called Bowman Black.  This is an extremely exclusive set of autographed cards featuring some of the top players and prospects including Bryce Harper, Gerrit Cole, Dante Bichette, Jr., and Anthony Rendon.  Their signatures will be featured on all-black cards complete with an on-card auto in silver ink. Bowman Black will be a continuity program that will feature 25 new autographed subjects (sequentially numbered to 25) in every 2012 Bowman product.

Lucky Redemption Cards Good For Exclusive Auto Cards

When you are ripping packs of 2012 Bowman Baseball you could hit a randomly inserted lucky redemption card. There are 3 different Lucky Redemption Cards in all, each of which will entitle you to one autographed card.

Lucky Redemption Card #1 can be exchanged for an autographed Yoenis Cespedes Rookie Card.  Lucky Redemption Card #2 can be exchanged for an autographed Bryce Harper Rookie Card.  Lucky Redemption #3 has yet to be announced.  There are only100 of each Lucky Redemption Card.

Autographed AFLAC All American Cards

2012 Bowman Baseball is about prospecting, collecting stars of tomorrow early.  Bowman Baseball will feature autographed AFLAC All American cards randomly inserted into hobby boxes.  You will be able to collect the very first autographed cards from 11 promising stars, Sonny Gray, Andrew Susac, Jordan Swaggerty, Dillon Howard, Gerrit Cole, Stetson Allie, Mathew Purke, Dillon Maples, Austin Hedges, Jose Fernandez and Daniel Norris.

2012 Bowman Baseball Cards Look Cool On Ice

Bowman Baseball is offering another cool parallel of the base set with Ice Parallels.  Silver Ice cards can be found at a rate of 1 in every 24 packs and Red Ice cards are limited to 25.

And, of course, 2012 Bowman Baseball offers the cards collectors crave like the various color refractors and superfractors that go for big money in the aftermarket.  HTA Jumbo boxes of 2012 Bowman Baseball come with 12 packs per box at 32 cards per pack and feature 3 Autographs per box.  Hobby boxes of 2012 Bowman Baseball come with 24 packs at 10 cards per pack and feature 1 Autograph per box.  2012 Bowman Baseball cards are also available in various configurations including single packs and rack packs in retail stores near you.

Topps Announces Bryce Harper 2012 Rookie And Autograph Card Plans

One of the advantages of living in Southern California is that you are close to so many different sports franchises, the Lakers, Clippers, Kings, Ducks, various teams from UCLA and USC, Angels and Dodgers to name a few.  With that many different sporting options you are bound to encounter some historical moments.  One of those happened Saturday Night.  For those of us that thought we were just going to see a great pitching duel between Billingsley and Strasburg, we got the added bonus of seeing an amazing extra innings walk-off home run by Matt Kemp and perhaps the most significant, Bryce Harper’s MLB debut.  Harper did well in front of a sold out Dodger Stadium crowd, hitting the ball hard, getting his first hit, a double into deep center, on his third at bat and throwing a strike from shallow left field to home that beat Jerry Hariston Jr. to the plate and would have been an easy out if Wilson Ramos had held onto the ball.

Harpermania has been hot in the collecting world and today Topps announced their future plans for his cards including his exclusive autograph cards and to get these cards in collector’s hands ASAP.

Here’s what card collectors can look forward to:

Bowman Baseball – In addition to having an Autographed Prospect Card in retail and a Bowman Black Autograph in hobby, Bryce will be Lucky Redemption # 2!  The card, which will be limited to 100, will feature Harper in the RC design and will include his Autograph.

Topps Series 2 – Harper will be card # 661, but because of limited timing the card will be short printed.  In addition, there will be an autographed variation of this Rookie Card in both hobby and retail.

Topps Archives – Collectors will find redemptions in both hobby and retail for Bryce’s Fan Favorites autograph (on-card) and the young star will be included as a short printed base card (# 241).

Topps Tier One – 25 redemption cards will be inserted into packs for his “On the Rise” Autographed Rookie Card (on-card).

Allen & Ginter – A&G will include both Harper’s standard and mini base Rookie Cards at the regular rate.  The product will also include Harper’s autograph.  And for his Red Autograph limited to 10…those can be had by tearing open Rip Cards and finding the “Mystery Redemption” mini!

Complete Sets – Find Bryce’s 661 card, but with an all-new image.

In addition Harper will have Autographed Rookie Cards in the remainder of all Topps 2012 MLB products.

2012 NFL Draft First Round Picks In Autographed Football Cards, The Complete Results List

Here are the 1st round picks of the 2012 NFL Draft in Autographed Football Cards.  All cards are live.  Pictures of the draft picks at the NFL Scouting Combine are used when no cards are available.

# 1 Indianapolis Colts - Andrew Luck -  QB - Stanford

# 2 Washington Redskins - Robert Griffin III - QB           

# 3 Cleveland Browns - Trent Richardson - RB – Alabama

# 4 Minnesota Vikings -  Matt Kalil - OT – USC

# 5 Jacksonville Jaguars - Justin Blackmon - WR - Oklahoma State

# 6 Dallas Cowboys - Morris Claiborne – CB - LSU           

# 7 Tampa Bay Buccaneers  - Mark Barron - S - Alabama - SEC

# 8 Miami Dolphins - Ryan Tannehill - QB - Texas A&M           

# 9 Carolina Panthers - Luke Kuechly - LB - Boston College           

# 10 Buffalo Bills - Stephon Gilmore - CB - South Carolina                       

# 11 Kansas City Chiefs - Dontari Poe - DT - Memphis           

# 12 Philadelphia Eagles - Fletcher Cox - DT - Mississippi State

# 13 Arizona Cardinals - Michael Floyd - WR - Notre Dame           

# 14 St. Louis Rams - Michael Brockers - DT – LSU

# 15 Seattle Seahawks - Bruce Irvin - DE - West Virginia

# 16 New York Jets - Quinton Coples - DE - North Carolina           

# 17 Cincinnati Bengals - Dre Kirkpatrick - CB - Alabama

# 18 San Diego Chargers - Melvin Ingram - OLB - South Carolina           

# 19 Chicago Bears - Shea McClellin - DE - Boise State

# 20 Tennessee Titans - Kendall Wright - WR - Baylor           

# 21 New England Patriots - Chandler Jones - DE - Syracuse

# 22 Cleveland Browns - Brandon Weeden - QB - Oklahoma State

# 23 Detroit Lions - Riley Reiff - OT - Iowa

# 24 Pittsburgh Steelers - David DeCastro - G - Stanford

# 25 New England Patriots - Dont'a Hightower - LB - Alabama

# 26 Houston Texans - Whitney Mercilus - DE - Illinois           

# 27 Cincinnati Bengals - Kevin Zeitler - G - Wisconsin

# 28 Green Bay Packers - Nick Perry - LB - USC           

# 29 Minnesota Vikings - Harrison Smith - S - Notre Dame

# 30 San Francisco 49ers - A. J. Jenkins - WR - Illinois           

# 31 Tampa Bay Buccaneers - Doug Martin - RB - Boise State

# 32 New York Giants - David Wilson - RB - Virginia Tech

2012 Topps Gypsy Queen Baseball Mini SP Photo Variation Complete Visual Checklist

We have already released the Complete Visual Checklist for 2012 Topps Gypsy Queen Baseball Cards SP Photo Variations of the base set.  That list was 50 cards long, 51 if you include the Yu Darvish SP.  So one would expect the same for the minis in the set, but the structure of the mini set is very different.  There are 50 additional minis, numbered 301 to 350, that are parallels of players included in the 300 card mini base set and not found in the regular base set.  There are also 91 mini SP Photo Variations, 41 more than found in the regular base set.  The vast majority of them are clearly different photographs like the last card in the set, Number 296.

On the left is card #296 from the base mini set, Tom Seaver.  On the right is the Mini SP Photo variation. There were some tricky cards to spot in the base set photo variations like the uniform changes with CC Sabathia and Reggie Jackson.  Those images are identical in the Mini set so if you want to see a side by side comparison, head over to our base set SP Photo Variation page.  The three other cards that were hard to see differences in even side by side were Joe DiMaggio, Wade Boggs and Tony Gwynn.  In the mini set, 2 of those 3 still require close inspection.

On the left is card #232 from the base mini set, Joe DiMaggio.  On the right is the Mini SP Photo variation.  For the minis, Topps decided to go with a true alternate photo instead of adjusting the sizing.

On the left is card #248 from the base mini set, Wade Boggs.  On the right is the mini SP Photo variation.  For the base set, the looser sizing was the SP, with the minis the tighter sizing is the SP.  As a rule, if you can't see Boggs' shoe, you have the mini SP.

Just like with the base set, the differences between Tony Gwynn's cards are the most difficult to spot.  Both cards are number 252.  The Mini on the left is the base mini, and the mini on the right is the SP Photo variation.  The only way to spot the SP variation is to look at the bottom of the card.  You start to lose the player in the dugout on the lower right and the border cuts Gwynn's back leg off at the knee instead of being cut off at the calf with the regular base set mini. 


All the other mini SP Photo variations have greater differences so just like with our Complete Visual Checklists of 2012 Topps Heritage Baseball Color Swap cards and 2012 Gypsy Queen Base Set SP Photo Variations, I will only post the SP Photo variations for the rest of the mini short prints.  So if a card you have matches one you find here, you are the lucky owner of a mini short print variation.

 #1 Jesus Montero, #2 Hunter Pence, #6 Matt Moore

#10 Roy Halladay, #16 Eric Hosmer, #22 Kevin Youkilis

 #26 Brian Wilson, #30 Cole Hamels, #34 Mark Trumbo

 #35 Jon Lester, #39 Jaime Garcia, #40 Ichiro

 #41 Yadier Molina, #42 Tommy Hanson, #44 Matt Kemp

 #45 Madison Bumgarner, #48 Jay Bruce, #50 Miguel Cabrera

 #54 Mariano Rivera, #55 Matt Holliday, #60 Jacoby Ellsbury

 #65 Alex Avila, #67 Josh Hamilton, #68 Alex Rodriguez

 #71 Ian Kennedy, #76 Mike Napoli, #80 Ryan Braun

 #82 David Wright, #83 Ryan Howard, #84 Freddie Freeman

 #85 Adam Jones, #90 Mark Teixeira, #98 Jason Heyward

#100 Derek Jeter, #101 Paul Konerko, #105 Pablo Sandoval

 #110 Jose Bautista, #120 Mickey Mantle, #135 Clayton Kershaw

 #138 Chris Carpenter, #139 James Shields, #140 Joe Mauer

 #141 Roy Oswalt, #142 Carlos Gonzalez, #143 Dustin Pedroia

 #144 Andrew McCutchen, #145 Ian Kinsler, #147 Mike Stanton

 #149 Ryan Zimmerman, #150 CC Sabathia, #152 Dan Uggla

 #153 Alex Gordon, #154 Victor Martinez, #155 Yovani Gallardo

 #157 Nelson Cruz, #170 Cliff Lee, #171 Jimmy Rollins

 #173 David Ortiz, #179 Paul Goldschmidt, #181 Jeremy Hellickson

 #182 Buster Posey, #184 Stephen Strasburg, #185 Lance Berkman

 #186 Josh Johnson, #187 Brandon Beachy, #190 Robinson Cano

 #197 David Freese, #200 Felix Hernandez, #210 Justin Upton           

 #220 Joey Votto, #226 Johnny Bench, #229 Ty Cobb

 #230 Evan Longoria, #236 Lou Gehrig, #240 Tim Lincecum

 #250 Ken Griffey, Jr., #258 Mike Schmidt, #260 Curtis Granderson

 #270 Roberto Clemente, #271 Jered Weaver, #272 Craig Kimbrel

 #273 Starlin Castro, #285 Carlos Santana, #286 Chase Utley

 #287 Daniel Hudson, #289 Gio Gonzalez, #294 Reggie Jackson