The Topps Heritage High Number release adds an update to the original Heritage release from earlier in the year. The base set continues on after the first 500 cards from the first series, with cards 501-700, plus 701-725 as SPs. A number of the insert sets from earlier in the year also have the numbering continue with the High Number release.
This release mirrors the first release of the year, with 24 packs of 9 cards per pack. Each box guarantees either one autograph or relic. The hits are not really the focus of this product, however. It is more geared toward set collecting, so the boxes are generally not being driven up in price by breaker culture.
We see the arrival of the second wave for 2022 Topps 206 Star Wars. There doesn’t seem to be as much variation as the baseball releases have. This release has the same border and back variations as wave one, but does add an insert set featuring ten different planets, as well as including the chance at a few autographs this time.
This wave boasts a print run of 14,009 boxes, down more than ten thousand from wave one. There are once again fifty cards in this wave. A box is advertised to contain ten cards, eight of which are base, along with two parallels. It seems that special variation inserts are including as an additional card.
This box contained:
8 Base 1 Base Blue Starfield Parallel 1 Base Star Wars Back Parallel
Once again, a normal summer release finds itself coming out well after the season has ended. There isn’t really much difference year to year in this product. Even the base design is very similar, due to the nature of it all being based on the original set from the late 1800s.
The base set features 300 cards, with an additional 50 SPs, although they’re not particularly rare compared to other releases. There is one full size parallel, but the bulk of the parallels come in tobacco sized cards, with differing fronts or backs. A box contains 24 packs of 8 cards, featuring three advertised hits.
This box contained:
125 Base (41.7% of 300 card set) 12 Base SP (24% of 50 card SP set) 10 Base Mini Parallels 5 Base Mini Allen & Ginter Back Parallels 2 Base Mini Black Border Parallels 11 Banner Season 2 Famous Rivals 2 Get That Bread 3 It’s Your Special Day 4 Pitching a Gem 2 What’s Cookin’? 1 Baseball Lexicon 1 Inside the Park 1 Mini Ducks 1 2006 A&G Rookie Design Variation 1 Time Out! 1 What a Steal! 1 Cabinet Boxloader Francisco Lindor 1 Full Sized Relics A Jarren Duran 1 Full Sized Relics B Gerrit Cole 1 Rip Card Eloy Jimenez
This release sort of came out of nowhere. After a few years of successful 206 Baseball releases, Topps has expanded this branding to include Star Wars. At a time when the enthusiasm for 206 Baseball seems to be dropping, this wave of Star Wars sold 25,102 packs. That notable in part because the first wave of baseball this year saw roughly half that print run, but also contained twice as many cards in the wave (100 Baseball to 50 Star Wars). It will be interesting to see if that enthusiasm continues with a set that doesn’t seem to have a clear public plan, yet.
This release also sees a major departure from what the original T206 set was. In the original, the main parallels for the set are tobacco advertisements on the backs of the cards, with the fronts not changing. Topps replicated these parallels for Baseball, but has avoided them for Star Wars. Instead, we see the familiar “star field” parallels return once again. Perhaps Disney did not want their property associated with tobacco? There is one parallel with the back changed, to a plain Star Wars logo.
A box advertises ten cards, including two parallels. This box contained:
Wave 3 of 2022 Topps 206 hits with the League Championship Series wrapping up and the World Series about to start. This wave does away with the All Star Background parallels, and replaces Carolina Brights with Drum. There is also a small short print subset this time, featuring players from the Cubs and Reds in throw back uniforms for the Field of Dreams event. The print run for this wave is just barely down from wave two, with 8530 packs released.
The rest of the release is fairly basic. There are once again a few possible autographs, but these seem exceedingly rare. The wave features 100 base cards. Each box contains one pack featuring ten cards, including two parallels. Sometimes special cards show up as extra cards in the packs.
