Topps Heritage's Cousin That No One Talks About

For as much as I have enjoyed Topps Heritage through the years, I've been drawn to the Bowman version for the same reasons. I like the thick, old-school cardboard stock, the lack of UV coating and the sometimes interesting player selection. That being said, some of the designs that Topps paid tribute to with the Bowman line were pretty lacking. The 2006 set is such an example. Based somewhat loosely on the 1949 Bowman baseball design, the wrapper is actually probably my favorite part. That being said, it's still a lot better than the base Bowman set.

Here are the results of a couple of packs I bought last month.

Pack 1:

29 - Kevin Millwood Mini (One nice thing about these packs: each one has a mini. Minis are always good, right? Blogger likes to make minis larger than regular sized cards on me for some reason. You'll just have to pretend that I made them bigger because I like them more.)

BHP1 - Justin Upton Prospects (Each pack also comes with two Prospects cards as is the usual M.O. of Bowman products. The design, however, is exactly the same as the regular base set as far as I can tell.)

BHP20 - Mark Holliman Prospects

269 - Lance Berkman Foil (Each pack contains one extra thick foil card. I would show you what they look like, but it's Lance Berkman and we can't have any of that around here.)

242 - Tony Pena

43 - Carl Crawford

156 - Kerry Wood (Wood finally got his first save of the season the other day.)

267 - Randy Johnson

Pack 2:

298 - Matt Cain Mini (It's miniature, I swear!)

BHP79 - Andrew Carpenter Prospects

BHP54 - Steve Kelly Prospects (No, I haven't heard of him, either.)

292 - Hong-Chih Kuo Foil (Here's the long-awaited foil scan. It's really not much to look at. The 2007 set decided to make these shinier and rainbowy.)

72 - John Smoltz (The Cardinals have hit their first pair of injuries with the rotation. I wonder if someone in the front office has Smoltz on their "friends and family" plan.)

149 - Francisco Rodriguez (I'm not wild about those shades. Batters need to see the crazy eyed look of the closer to feel truly intimidated.)

191 - Chad Tracy

243 - Josh Sharpless

- Checklist 1 of 3

I'm not collecting these, exactly, but I'm not getting rid of them. This set joins a number of others (2004 Bowman Heritage, 2000 Upper Deck, etc.) in limbo in my collection.