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Another week goes by, and another Topps baseball product hits the shelves!
This week we have 2018 Topps Gypsy Queen. This year's design continues the basic Gypsy Queen theme in that there are really only slight modifications each year. The 2018 set features a 300 card base set with an additional 20 short printed base cards featuring retired veterans. These base short prints are not an easy pull(at least in retail) as they only fall in 1 of 48 packs!
Another Gypsy Queen trademark is the variations, and this year's product keeps that tradition going. Box breakers will be searching for Capless, Team Swap, Missing Team, Logo Swap, Jackie Robinson Day, and Bazooka Back versions. There are also several parallels at varying levels of scarcity.
A variety of Autographs and Relics can be found in both hobby and retail packs. The Pull Up Sock Auto Relics, Fortune Teller Mini Autos, and Auto Garments seem to be the targets of this group.
In addition to the base set, there are couple different insert sets which in my opinion are the highlight of this product. The Gypsy Queen inserts seem to be unique in comparison to some of the other Topps releases. This year we find the "tall boy" Fortune Teller set which features a 2018 player prediction on the back of each of the 20 cards. There is also a 22 card "Tarot of the Diamond" set which is intended to look like a fortune teller's tarot card set. I pulled a Bryce Harper out of my Blaster box, and it might be my favorite card in the break!
I found some blasters at my local Target and I just couldn't pass up the chance to open a box a day before the official release! Overall, I enjoyed it, but as far as the retro products go, Heritage is still my favorite.
You can see my full blaster box break here!
The highlights of my break were the Ohtani rookie, the two inserts above, and a Rickey Henderson short print. Actually, the Henderson is probably my biggest hit in that they only fall in 1 of 48 packs. That's only one SP in 7 blaster boxes! Interestingly enough, I also hit a missing team name variation and a Gypsy Queen logo swap variation, but according to the pack odds, those are actually easier to hit than the Henderson. The retail exclusive parallels look ok, but I didn't end up with anyone notable from that pack.
All in all this was a fun little break, but unless the hobby box prices come down, I don't think I'll be opening any more. If the opportunity arises to pick up a decent sized lot from a breaker, I may take advantage of that to get a set put together, but otherwise I'll probably focus on trading and buying some singles of my Cubbies and other PC guys.
Thanks for reading(and watching) and I'd appreciate you sharing the blog with your friends!
If you want to see more of the boxes I've opened this year, check out my YouTube channel.