I know plenty of blogs and other online card resources have already shared their 2024 Heritage cards, but I figured that I spent so much time looking forward to it that I should say something about the cards now that I’ve found a blaster in the wild.
Plus, I get into at least one detail that I haven’t seen mentioned elsewhere, and I’ve also gathered some information I’ve seen elsewhere that you might find of interest.
(As things normally go with me, I started out with a quick post but then added this image and that bit of information, and the next thing you know…)
The packaging is based on the wax pack boxes from 1975 Topps. Here’s the horizontal side of the blaster box which features Gerritt Cole:
…and here’s the original wax box. Using an online inflation calculator, that 15 cent pack would be the equivalent of 89 cents today.
The Mets pitcher on the box was rookie Hank Webb. My guesses as to why Topps used Webb: The Mets were popular, Webb was local (He lived on Long Island, which would’ve been a plus if there was an offseason photo session involved) and he was probably willing to do it for cheap.
Here’s Webb on his 1975 Topps card, which is not his rookie card (he was also on a 1973 Rookie Pitchers card). He’d also appear in 1976 Topps, and is the father of former reliever Ryan Webb.
Here’s the wrapper, which disappointingly features Cole artwork rather than the original 1975 wax wrapper artwork.
The original wrapper (OK, technically this is a 1975 Topps mini wrapper, but it’s not like most people can tell from a scanned image)
I’ll run through my first pack, and then touch on the inserts I got (and didn’t get) in my blaster.
The first card I pulled features Sparky Anderson. I’m not happy about including 1975 managers as part of the base set. In recent years I’ve become more about collecting cards which reflect a given season than I am about collecting sets, and Sparky Anderson, Earl Weaver and the like don’t represent the 2024 MLB season (nor do they necessarily represent the 1975 MLB season, as the card of Yogi Berra shows him with the Yankees even though Yogi managed the Mets in 1975).
The purple on Sparky’s card bothers me a bit, because it’s pretty dissimilar from the original purple… but I kinda expected some kind of color shenanigans.
To paraphrase Crocodile Dundee, “That’s not purple…”
“…THAT’S purple.”
I don’t pay much attention to card backs myself, which is just as well with this set because they turned out kinda murky. I’m telling you from experience that the card numbers are not easy on the eyes.
Something I noticed… These cards have the team name in tiny letters near the bottom of the back of each card (just above the Topps logo); Below is a detail of a card back where I’ve highlighted the name:
The last time we saw this was on 2021 Heritage (1972 design).
There’s probably a licensing requirement that the full team name appears on the card somewhere. If that’s the case, an addition like this wasn’t necessary on the past two years of Heritage because the 1973 and 1974 designs both have the full team name on the front of the card.
Moving on to the second card, featuring Paul Goldschmidt. One thing I’ve noticed is that the background on all of the photos has been adjusted to a lower contrast. It’s kind of interesting that they’re introducing that this year when the original had nothing like it going on.
Eury Perez is out for the year after undergoing Tommy John (not that Topps is to blame for that). This was the first card I saw where the team in question didn’t exist in 1975, and they did a decent job on this particular team. Some of them are less good, but I won’t get caught up in pointing those out.
I’m not wild about head shots where the player is wearing sunglasses, but maybe that’s just me.
Mark Canha is photoshopped into a Tigers uniform. It looks less fake-y on the card than it does in my scan.
Robbie Grossman is currently with the White Sox, one of 24 (by my count) cards which were out-of-date by opening day (and naturally 12 of those cards are SPs)
1975 Topps Zoo’s Who stick-ons is a set that I don’t remember at all but that didn’t stop Topps from making an insert based on it. At least I pulled one I would’ve wanted anyway.
These look very similar to the originals (although, being stickers, they have a blank back)… Here’s an image which I commandeered from TCDB.
Luis Severino, photoshopped into a Mets uniform, is one of three short prints which came out of my blaster.
Last card from the pack, a league leaders card which is nice-enough take on things. I somehow missed that Esteury Ruiz lead the AL with 67 steals (way ahead of Bobby Witt Jr.’s 49)
Moving on to some of the other cards of note in my blaster…
Back in the 1970s there was a band called the Bay City Rollers who were very popular for a time. They were hyped as “the biggest thing since The Beatles”… Sort of a Scottish BTS. They had a #1 hit in the US (but not the UK!) with “Saturday Night” (S! A! T-U-R! D-A-Y! NIGHT!).
They also had a 1975 card set put out by Topps (Another set I don’t remember from 1975)
![1975 Topps Bay City Rollers - [Base] #57 - Camera Catcher! [Good to VG‑EX] - Courtesy of COMC.com](https://img.comc.com/i/Non-Sports/1975/Topps-Bay-City-Rollers---Base/57/Camera-Catcher.jpg?id=dc9f19d3-007f-4599-b80a-86334fe7f4b1&size=original)
This year’s Heritage borrows that set’s design, but they call it “Baseball Sensations”… at least they do on the checklist. The card itself doesn’t say anything about “Sensations” on it, and the only on-card reference to the insert name is the card number prefix (75BS).
Among other inserts I got…
New Age Performers
Then And Now (which looks more like a leftover 2021 Heritage insert design than anything to do with 1975)
Baseball Flashbacks (and now that they’re getting into players and moments I remember first-hand I might have to make something of an effort on these inserts)
I didn’t get any parallels, variations, relics or autographs.
Another mild disappointment… Any kid from 1975 could’ve told you that the All-Star cards were all yellow and red. If the kid from 1975 in question were particularly observant, they would’ve added that the player’s name is yellow, unlike the non-All-Star yellow and red cards).
I was honestly disappointed that 21st Century Topps didn’t pick up on that dedicated color combination (and I was also disappointed that I got two Braves All-Stars in my blaster).
Some additional errors and the like, all of which I found out about on other blogs or on the socials…
Rangers pitchers Jon Gray and Chris Stratton each appear TWICE in the base set, once as a short print and once as a ‘regular’ card. As a kick in the butt for Rangers fans, Stratton isn’t even with the team anymore, last December he signed with the Royals as a free agent.
The card of Red Schoendienst (who was the Cardinals manager in 1975) features an image of Whitey Herzog (who was hired as the Royals manager during the ’75 season).
The card of Blue Jays rookie pitcher Hagen Danner features a photo of pitcher Bradin Hagens (who’s pitched in Taiwan the past few years).
After Lance Lynn signed with the Cardinals, Topps used an old photo from his first stint with St. Louis rather than photoshopping a recent photo… not exactly an error but an interesting choice given that it’s been seven years since Lynn pitched for the Cards.
There are suspicions that some of the cards in the base set are double-printed.
The Shlabotnik Report 