by Rich Klein
The holiday season came early this week as we received a nice package from Topps of three new products. This review covers Topps Triple Threads football.
The Triple Threads product line has been out for a few years now and is one of the products that seems to resonate with collectors.
Triple Threads comes in two mini-boxes which gives dealers the option of either selling a “full box” or the “mini-box”. Thus this product has some versatility to dealers who are able to sell either these “packs” or a full box, depending on their customers’ preferences.
Each promises one auto Triple Relic numbered to 99 or less and one Triple Relic numbered to 36 or less. In addition, each of the base cards are serial numbered and there are parallel versions (two base parallels numbered to 525 and three base cards numbered to 1350 are in each pack along with one Triple Relic).
Currently, the on-line price for an full unopened box of this product is $135-160 delivered. For that price; the two “hits” become the key for those willing to gamble on what they pull from the box.
I asked the toughest critic I know about cards (my beloved wife, Dena) for her opinion as she enjoyed seeing the hits from the boxes. Her comment was that the design was “different” in a good way and she enjoyed learning more about the players with the “triple take” information on the back.
Of course for us, the biggest question is what do you get for your somewhat sizable investment?
We’ll break this down into the two mini-boxes:
The first box produced an Emerald Hakeem Nicks #d to 299 and a Relic Double Combos Sepia #d to 27 of Marcus Allen and Reggie Bush. This was one of those fold out cards that are featured in many high end products. They’re a favorite among a lot of collectors.
That left the second mini-box as the one that would have to contain whatever autograph Topps had inserted.
First, we pulled base cards #d to 1350 of Philip Rivers, Kyle Orton and Chad Henne, then a sepia parallel # to 450 of Jared Allen, an Emerald Parallel #d to 299 of Hall of Famer Ronnie Lott and finally, a Signed Rookie Card of Colt McCoy #d to 99.
So, even though we didn’t score a big hit, we did pretty well with box thanks to the nice booklet type card of a pair of former USC backs and then a signed RC of former Texas star McCoy, currently the starting QB for the Cleveland Browns. Trojan and Longhorn fans would be jealous.
At least with Triple Threads you know you’re getting some very nice looking cards and it’s a rush to see what your best one will be…even if it doesn’t last long!
Rich Klein can be reached at [email protected]m
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