Thursday, December 18, 2008

2008 Bowman Draft Picks

I bought two blaster boxes of the Bowman Draft Picks at Target. The $20 box has 8 packs of 7 cards each. Each pack has 2 base cards, 2 Prospects cards, 2 Chrome cards (either Chrome base or Chrome Prospects) and 1 gold card. The gold cards are parallels of just the base cards. This is pretty much what you got with 2008 Bowman and the design is exactly the same as the regular Bowman. I'm going to feature the cards from a single pack as it was, by far, the best pack.
All of the base cards feature the Rookie Card logo and feature green borders, just like the Rookie Cards in the regular set. I don't recognize any of the players I got on the base cards. Christian was a free agent draft by the Yankees in 2004. He played 24 games this season and hit .250. He also stole 7 bases in 40 at bats.
I don't know any of the players on the Prospects cards either. Just like in the regular Bowman set these card's numbers are prefixed with PP. Green was the Tigers #3 draft pick this past June. Who knows?
I only got 3 Astros cards and no Phillies cards. This pack yielded a Chrome Astros Prospects card. Trinidad was a free agent sign by the Astros in 2002 and hasn't made it out of AA ball. I'm not holding my breath. Chrome cards have a tendency to warp, and these Chrome cards are badly warped.
The other Chrome card was an X-Fractor! At least, that's what I think it is as there is no indication on the back. It's got the funny X-Fractor patterns in the finish. The card is numbered to 199. White was the D-Backs #4 pick last June and I can't find him in Baseball-Reference.com
This pack had 8 cards. The extra card was this Future's Game Jersey of Jamie D'Antona. He was the D-Backs #2 draft pick in 2003 and just made it to the majors this year where he hit .176 in 17 at bats (spread over 18 games). He also hit .365 with 21 home runs in AAA Tuscon as well so maybe I've got something here.
The Bowman Gold card parallel used to be a thick card but these cards are no thicker than the base. Van Every was the 29th round draft pick of the Indians in 2000 and finally made it to the bigs this year for 17 at bats. Looking him up on Beckett.com I see his first cards were as a Bowman Draft Prospect in 2007. Really, a prospect after 7 years in the minors? Topps couldn't find a better guy than this to feature in this set?

No comments: