The future ain't so bad

 

 

Topps released its design for 2023 flagship bright and early this morning. You're looking at it right here.

The announcement was a switch from Topps' progressively earlier announcements of the design -- last year's was in mid-July. And plenty of folks on Twitter were ready to pounce with their opinion (including me). Not so much on the blogs, though, it doesn't appear to be the place for reacting to hobby announcements anymore.

But I prefer the depth that blogs give. Twitter sucks in that way. The Twitter reactions offer nothing more than "I like it" or "it's dumb." Nothing thought-provoking. Nothing to chew on. This is why I still blog.

In the simplest terms, I do like the design. I am happy that Topps is aware that collectors are aware of its history and has continued to replicate the inset photo every 20 years, in tribute to the 1963 design, as it did in 1983 and 2003.

This is pushing it, but you could make a case for Topps riffing on that design with the 1973 and 2013 flagship sets as well:

I've got nothing for 1993 though.

Overall, the "3's" have been pretty good for Topps over the years, starting with 1953. Let's take a look at the 2023 design again.

First, what I like, which is the majority of it.

1. The inset head shot gives me floating head vibes, which I always enjoy. It's an unusual look for the front of a card, but it's also maybe an unintentional nod to the 1963 Topps leaders cards and rookie parade cards, which were full of floating heads.

2. The large, cropped team logos are fun. It's very 2014, 2015 as the top-and-bottom cropped team logo was everywhere then. I recall using those in our NFL game capsules each week in the newspaper.

3. The obscured team name is fun. There have been complaints about this on Twitter (people will pick apart anything) but I like it. It goes along with the partially obscured team logo and you simply don't need the "whole name," people will get it. Topps just has to avoid any potential embarrassing word formations when cropping out letters.

4. The white borders. It makes color parallels so much easier and more appealing. I'm cool with Topps making a flagship design a different color border (as in 2003), I just don't need to see full-bleed flagship again.

5. The home plate position logo. Fun.

 

6. The team color border edge. 

7. I can read the player names, I'll mention this yearly. I'm still scarred by 2021.

8. This set already seems like the "Parallelogram Design" to me.

Next, what I don't like:

1. The phantom stars on either side. I don't know why those are there.

2. The gray bar at the bottom and where it ends, and where the team name bar ends. Both bars don't end evenly and they don't even up with the floating triangle in the middle either, which leaves a bunch of jagged white space off to the right that seems to have no purpose. I know this is minor stuff, but if I stare at it a lot it's gonna bug me.

3. Much like 1985 Topps, there is a lot going on down at the bottom of the card. I call it "bunching." It doesn't bother me as much as '85 Topps does though.

The Rutschman photo is a little boring and makes me a bit nervous. For the last few years, Topps flagship has had this feeling of "we can't make the photos TOO interesting, we need to save that for Stadium Club." I mean when are we going to get a Clayton Kershaw flagship card like 2010 or 2015 again?

Also, I immediately noticed we're back to the slashes that dominated Topps design between 2015-2021, which Topps got away from in 2022. 

However, the look is so much better than those very slashy sets from 2016 and 2017. I remember thinking back then "damn, flagship is looking worse and worse, is it going to be miserable from here on out?" It was a concern.

I'm here from the future, 2017 night owl, to say that the future ain't so bad -- card-wise anyway. No, I won't be trying to complete 2023 Topps, but I won't be recoiling from picking up packs like I was six years ago either.

Now, please Topps, make sure all the backs are oriented in the same way this time.