The 2015 Diamond King set (manufactured by Panini) had an interesting checklist because they could freely mix retired players and current players without the MLB license. The checklist has 200 cards (the last 50 are rookies) with some interesting, not oft-used names like Bobby Murcer, Bobby Thomson, Bobby McGee (ok, that one's not real), Elston Howard, Roger Maris, Jim Gilliam, Carl Furillo.....and all other non-HOF players who ever played for the New York Giants, New York Yankees, or Brooklyn Dodgers.
The best part about the product (first world perspective alert) is that there are no SPs in the base set, making it easily collectible. The worst part about the product is that there are only 12 packs per box, making it virtually uncollectible.
In terms of presentation, each card has a quasi-impressionist background with a brush stroked enhanced player superimposed. The feeling of rifling through the cards took me back to a time when I used to play with the easel canvas in 7th grade art class. Seriously, these cards would be works of art if they had the full trappings of licensed cards.
Let's go through the highlights, lowlights, and other types of illumination possibilities that came from the box.
The game for this card is what makes this a parallel? The answer is the shiny logo in the middle. There are so much better parallels in the product than this.
These minis only fall twice per box, which means they're more like afterthoughts in the product, though I do appreciate a good mini with a large crown.
These framed parallels are what all the parallels should be (reminiscent of 2007-2008 UD Masterpieces). I was happy to pull the O'Doul as both a Bay Area resident and Phillies collector.
Here are examples of the standard inserts that each fall 2 per box. Some are better than others. My favorite is the "Also Known As" as represented by Lou Gehrig.
There were two "hits" per box. One is a relic only, and one is an auto. I pulled this Aaron Sanchez dual relic. There are opportunities to pull HOF relics, though they are much rarer (usually #d to 99 or less).
This was my auto pull of
Javier Baez, the newly minted co-MVP of the NLCS. It's also a rookie card.
From the box, I received all the required cards that were promised and 82/200 cards of the base set. Overall, I would recommend it at a lower price point (~$50-60 if you can find it) than originally offered (which was $90 per box) because of the variety of the base set and of the possibility of getting a HOF relic exists within the realm of possibility. Plus, I like paintings.
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