Trader's Retreat - Box Break and Review!

2015 Bowman Baseball

By Jim Van Nest

June 10, 2015

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Hello, good people, and welcome back into the Trader's Retreat. We are back with a review of the 2015 edition of Bowman Baseball. Many thanks to Topps for the Review Box and to BOP and Trader's Retreat for sending the box to me! Let's roll...

2015 Bowman Baseball – Your home for the best Prospects in baseball!!

Configuration: 24 packs per box, 10 cards per pack - 240 cards total

Highlights: 1 Prospect Autograph per box! Huge Checklist of Chrome prospects!

Set Breakdown

  • 150 Card Base set
    • Paper Parallels: Silver #/499, Purple #/250, Blue #/150, Green #/99, Gold #/50, Orange #/25, Red #/5, Black 1/1, Printing Plates 1/1
    • FOIL PARALLEL CARDS: Silver Ice - 1 per hobby box, Red Ice #/5, White Ice 1/1

  • 150 Prospect Base set
    • Paper Parallels: Yellow, Black-Red, Silver #/499, Purple #/250, Blue #/150, Green #/99, Gold #/50, Orange #/25, Red #/5, Black 1/1, Printing Plates 1/1
    • FOIL PARALLEL CARDS: Silver Ice, Red Ice #/5, White Ice 1/1
    • CHROME PARALLEL CARDS (#BCP): Orange Wave Refractor, Blue Wave Refractor, Black Refractor, Black Wave Refractor, Refractor #/499, Purple Refractor #/250, Blue Refractor #/150, Green Refractor #/99, Gold Refractor #/50, Orange Refractor #/25 (Hobby), Red Refractor #/5, SuperFractor 1/1, Printing Plates 1/1

  • 50 Card Chrome Prospect Autograph Set
    • Parallels: Refractor #/499, Purple Refractor #/250, Blue Refractor #/150, Green Refractor #/99, Gold Refractor #/50, Orange Refractor #/25, Red Refractor #/5, SuperFractor 1/1, Printing Plates 1/1

  • 25 Card Paper Prospect Autograph Set
    • Parallels: Silver #/499, Purple #/250, Blue #/150, Green #/99

  • 22 Card Chrome Rookie Autograph Set
    • Parallels: Refractor #/499, Blue Refractor #/150, Green Refractor #/99, Gold Refractor #/50, Orange Refractor #/25, Red Refractor #/5, SuperFractor 1/1, Printing Plates 1/1

  • 10 Card AFLAC/Under Armour All-American Game Autographs Set #/200
  • 21 Card Bowman Black Autograph Set #/25
  • 100 Card Bowman Scouts Top 100 Set
  • 46 Bowman Scouts' Top 100 Orange Die-Cut Autograph Set #/25
  • 9 Card Dual Autograph Set
  • 7 Card Rookie Recollections Set
  • 7 Card Rookie Recollections Refractor Autograph Set #/99
  • 20 Card SiriusXM All-Star Futures Game Relic Set #/25
  • 15 Card Sophomore Standouts Autographs Set #/99
  • 150 Card The Farm's Finest Minis Set
    • Chrome Parallels: Purple Shimmer Refractor #/250, Blue Shimmer Refractor #/150, Green Shimmer Refractor #/99, Gold Shimmer Refractor #/50, Orange Shimmer Refractor #/25, Red Shimmer Refractor #/5, SuperFractor 1/1

  • 56 The Farm's Finest Minis Autographs Set
    • Parallels: Gold Shimmer Autograph #/50, Orange Shimmer Refractor Autograph #/25 (Hobby), Red Shimmer Refractor Autograph #/5, SuperFractor Autograph 1/1

  • 24 Pages of the History Book Autographed Booklet Set
  • 1 2014 Golden Debut Contract Winner Short Print Set


Paper Veteran, Rookies and Prospects

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Welcome back, Bowman Baseball! Every year, prospect collectors look forward to the release of Bowman Baseball. The base set is broken into 2, with the first 150 cards featuring veterans and rookies while the next 150 cards (#'d with BP) all Prospects. Many of these prospects are being featured on their first ever Bowman card. One of the nice things about having both of these types of players in the same set is that you can count on the prospects and first timers getting nice quality cards. The photos are top-notch and the backs of the cards feature a resume, skills and an up-close section as well as last year's stat line. Since there are also Chrome versions of the Prospects in this set, these base cards are now being called "Paper" cards. In our box we pulled 70/150 of the Paper Base cards (47% of the set). We also pulled 107/150 of the Prospect Base cards (71.3% of this base set). All of this, with no duplicates. And when you can pull 240 cards with no dups, you're having a pretty good break.

Chromes

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As I mentioned above, one of the highlights of the Bowman set is the Chrome set. The second half of the base set gets the Chrome treatment and in our box, we pulled 48/150 (32%) of that set. Topps really has mastered this technique for their cards and these are beautiful. They are parallels, so exact copies of the base, but with that mirrored chrome finish. As always, these cards look fantastic. They don't scan or video very well, but in person, they are quite nice.




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Parallels and Inserts



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2015 Bowman Baseball is chock full of parallels. There are paper parallels, chrome parallels and even mini parallels. In our box, we pulled four paper parallels. The first two are Silver Ice parallels. One is from the base set and is Kansas City's Lorenzo Cain. The other is first Bowman Card of Astros prospect Teoscar Hernandez. These cards have a prism foil background going on and are real sharp looking parallels. The other two paper parallels we pulled are a Purple version of Giovanny Urshela #143/250 and an Orange version of Jedd Gyorko #21/25!! That's right, #/25 - can't beat that. We also pulled one Chrome parallel, a Purple version of Reds Prospect Nick Travieso. I'm a huge fan of the colored border chrome cards and these are no exception.

There are also a few insert sets in Bowman Baseball. The most frequent is the Farm's Finest minis. As you can see above, we pulled five of them in our box, including a Blue parallel of Rockies Outfield prospect Raimel Tapia, #115/150. All of these cards are chromed with a silver foil technique that looks like rain in the background. They are really sharp looking and are about 3/4 the size of the regular cards. Next up in the box is the chromed insert set Top 100. This is pretty simple, it's 100 cards of the top 100 prospects in baseball. In our box, we pulled three of them; #71 Matt Olson, #86 Albert Almora and #98 Matt Wisler. These black bordered cards feature a blurb on the back about what makes these guys one of the top prospects in the game. Our final insert is the Rookie Recollection chromed insert set. In our box, we pulled a chromed reprint of the Moises Alou rookie card from 1989 with the Pittsburgh Pirates. It's a very sharp-looking chrome version of the 36-year-old card.


Autographs

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The last card in our box is the one guaranteed autograph. In our box, we pulled the first Bowman Card auto of Brewers prospect, Jorge Lopez. As you can see in the scan, this is an on-card auto that is very well centered and very clear. The bottom part of the base card has been whited out to allow for a better signing area and he signed right on the mark. This is a base auto, no parallel or numbering, but it is a very nice card of a young up and comer. If Lopez makes it to the bigs, this will be the card people will be looking for.

Final Thoughts on 2015 Bowman Baseball

Priced around $54 per hobby box, 2015 Bowman Baseball is an outstanding buy for those who like to collect tomorrow's stars today. Also, if you live in a minor league town and get to see these guys play, the opportunity for in-person autographs on a quality card make this set even more fun. Despite the lack of big named superstars, the quality of the cards never diminishes and the chromes and chrome parallels are sweet looking cards. I'd like to see more than one hit per box, but at least the hit is a guaranteed auto and for that price point, you really can't expect more. If you're only looking for hits - this might not be the product for you, but for everyone else, especially at this price, you need to go grab a box of 2015 Bowman Baseball.

If you'd like to see the live break of the box that accompanies this review, well, just click Right Here!

Ratings

Innovation: 4
Fun: 4
Value: 5
Rebuy: 4
Total: 17/20 - I'd rate 2015 Bowman Baseball a B!

NPN Information

NPN 2015 Bowman BB
PO BOX 2230
Duryea, PA 18642


Limit – 1 Request Per Household

Postmarked by: July 29, 2015
Received by: August 5, 2015

For our Canadian collectors, your entry will need to be accompanied by the answer to this skill question: 11 x 6 + 6 - 16 = ?

Once again, thanks so much to our sponsors at Topps for giving us the opportunity to review this great new product. For more information on all of their products, you can check them out at www.Topps.com. You can also follow them on Twitter: @toppscards. For all the great new trading card updates coming to BOP, be sure to give me a follow as well: @vannestjc.


**PROGRAMMING NOTE****

Gonna try a little something later this week. I have in my possession a brand new box of 2015 Topps Pro Debut Baseball to break and review. I will be Periscoping my break on Thursday night at 9 p.m. Central. My Periscope ID is the same as my Twitter handle: @vannestjc. So, give me a follow and then punch in at 9 p.m. on Thursday and you can catch the live break of this great Topps product!

'Til next time, take care!


     


 
 

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