2011 Playoff Prime Cut Phillies or The Hats Are On a Search

There's a bevy of MLB-unlicensed products out there with Panini and Leaf leading the way. We don't have Ames or Woolworth's releasing cards anymore. These are companies that just can't seem to get in the logo game at this point and time.

 Both have seen to gone the high-end route with multiple autos and patches of pros, prospects, and legends dotting their product release landscape. With these products come inherent risk for the collector. Why would one bother with a product that's not officially recognized? Do we care about logos that much? If there was a card without a photo or name, but just a signature or jersey piece, would it be worthwhile? (That last question has already been answered by 2010 Famous Fabrics and 2012 SP Signature Series...so not as rhetorical as the first two)

 I recently acquired a couple Phillies reps from the 2011 Panini Prime Cuts brand; this was originally released as a $250/box product. With the chance for some great pulls including the only place for "Shoeless" Joe Jackson cards; it seems like there should be enough quality to go around.  Unfortunately, there were not enough legend cards to offset the unknown prospect auto cards with the terrible design and broad checklist.

Also, there seemed to be a lot of single grey or white swatch jersey cards for modern players with numbering around /199 per card.   I picked up two Roy Halladay and Cliff Lee to continually build towards that impossible mission: connecting enough Phillies cards to spell out Philadelphia around the circumference of the Earth.

The best part about these cards is actually the Detroit Tigers-style font and sepia tone.  It actually feels like an old-time card displaced to the present day.  Unfortunately, the worst part of the card is the inherent part of being unlicensed, the player picture with the blank shirts and hats and the city name in lieu of the team name.

After looking at these cards awhile, I have visions of the hats conspiring together to steal other hats' logos, and then I feel like I have to wear all my hats at once to protect them from the rampaging imposters.  The end result is that I have a stack of hats on my head all murmuring to each other about how ridiculous they feel about not being the primary hat and having to share the head spotlight.

So, I guess the message is unlicensed cards make other hats become paranoid.  Paranoid hats only breed paranoid people. In other words, unlicensed cards cause unnecessary paranoia due to attacking logoless hats.  Remember that when you're thinking about buying this year's Prime Cuts release.