Topps to Produce 2013 Bowman Chrome Mini Factory Set; 2014 Cards Hitting Stores

The first 2014 baseball product is coming out but 2013 isn’t quite done for Topps, which will produce a 2013 Bowman Chrome mini factory set that will release on February 19.  Featuring prospects and rookies from this year’s Bowman, Bowman Chrome and Draft Picks & Prospects set, it will be a higher end product with dealers paying $165-170.

Seemingly devoted to the mini line it has brought to baseball issues, Topps is labeling the set a ‘limited test product’.

The set will contain 330 cards, including the top rookies and prospects such as Yasiel Puig, Jose Fernandez, Byron Buxton, and Carlos Correa. There will also be at least 30 additional refractor parallels in each set.  The breakdown goes like this:

Refractor: Sequentially numbered to 125.

Blue Refractor: Sequentially numbered to 99.

Green Refractor: Sequentially numbered to 75.

Gold Refractor: Sequentially numbered to 50.

Black Refractor: Sequentially numbered to 25.

Orange Refractor: Sequentially numbered to 15.

Red Refractor: Sequentially numbered to 10.

Purple Refractor: Sequentially numbered to 5.

Printing Plates: Sequentially numbered 1/1.

Super-Fractor: Sequentially numbered 1/1.

X-fractor Hot boxes: The entire set will be an X-fractor Parallel. #’d to 100.

2013 Bowman Chrome Mini Set Checklist

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The “official” release date is Wednesday, but as is often the case, 2014 Topps Baseball cards reached Target and Walmart first.  Boxes were reported in some stores as early as last Friday and more arrived over the weekend.

Again, $19.99 ‘blaster’ boxes and $4.99 rack packs were among the packaging options available to collectors who wanted to be the first in line to see the new cards.

We’ve been previewing some of what’s inside this year’s product and you can read more about it here.

You can see what’s already been listed on eBay here.

One thing’s for certain:  Coco Crisp’s hair deserves its own card and Oscar Gamble is smiling somewhere.

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About Rich Mueller

Rich is the editor and founder of Sports Collectors Daily. A broadcaster and writer for more than 30 years and a collector for even longer than that, he's usually typing something somewhere. Type him back at [email protected]