by Chris Harris
Perhaps it’s not a coincidence. Perhaps not, but less than a week after Topps unveiled their plans for the 2013 edition of Finest Baseball, Panini America struck back with their rendition of a chromium-stock baseball card set: 2012 Panini Prizm Baseball.
No, do not adjust your sets. Despite the fact that 2013 is one-sixth over and will be almost a third over by its April street date, Panini is labeling Prizm as a “2012” set. Calendar issues aside, “2012” (ahem) Panini Prizm Baseball will consist of 200 chromium-stock cards, all utilizing the same design of the wildly popular Prizm Basketball and Prizm Football sets released last year.
Each card will be available in six different Prizm parallels, with three exclusive to Hobby packs and the other three limited to retail. The Red Prizm and Blue Prizm parallels will come in packs sold at Target and Wal-Mart stores, respectively, while the Green Prizms will be in all retail pack-types. The Hobby-only Gold Prizms will be serial-numbered to ten copies and Finite Black Prizms, also exclusive to Hobby, are ones-of-one.
The product will also feature seven insert sets, which like the base cards will also come in the Prizm, Green Prizm, and Gold Prizm flavors. Highlights include a one-per-team “Team MVPs,” “Rookie Relevance,” and a ten-card set of USA Baseball alumni.
Each 20-pack Hobby box of 2012 Panini Prism Baseball should be expected to yield three Prizm parallels, 12 inserts, and two autographs. 24-pack retail boxes will yield three Green Prizms and six inserts.
