First Look at New Donruss

What 2018 Donruss Baseball would look like if it actually existed. 

Before I dive right in to talkin' basketball cards, I want to ask a baseball question. Did Panini lose their MLBPA license? Does anyone know? There are no future release dates to be found, no sell sheets and scarcely a trace of a mention of baseball over at the Panini America website. As much as I dislike logo-less cards, I would only be okay with Panini getting out of the baseball game if I thought Topps was doing a good job. (Spoiler alert: I don't think Topps is doing a good job.)

I'm really here to talk hoops cards (but not Hoops cards), in case you didn't know. Fresh on the heels of the season's first release (NBA Hoops, naturally) comes Panini's version of Donruss. These look very similar in color and feel to last year's release, but trade the quasi-1990 baseball look for something a little more generic. I picked up a blaster recently "for research purposes" and here are some cards from said blaster.

This Retro Series design is a little queasy looking, but you don't see Dave Bing cards every day. Actually, you pretty much never see Dave Bing cards. I am always a fan of throwback NBA cards.

You can tell this is a late career David Robinson photo because the uniform has the championship trophy patch on it, something that I associate with the NBA on ABC era. Robinson won the second of his two rings in 2003, so let's go with that.

Another year, another Sixers #1 draft pick. And like many of those who came before him, Fultz has injury issues. He also was an incredibly suspicious choice for a #1 pick in my book, the best player on an awful Pac-12 team for just a single season. Of course, you could also say the same about Lonzo Ball, though his team was pretty solid.

More Retro! The Ice Man! I love it.

Gordon Hayward's first All-Star appearance probably came at the expense of Damian Lillard not making the team again. He was famously dealt to Boston, played 5 minutes and suffered a gruesome injury.

My promised one-per-blaster guaranteed memorabilia or auto. It's always memorabilia, isn't it? Harry Giles is someone who I keep having to remind myself is a (theoretical) NBA player, and not Harry Stiles, or Prince Harry -- who sounds like he could be a Harry Giles -- for that matter.

Buddy Hield once slaughtered the Ducks while he was playing at Oklahoma, and I'll never forgive him for that. Or, at least, I'll never forget. One of those two.

This reminds me of something SkyBox would have done back in the day.

Gordon Hayward wasn't the only All-Star to change teams this season, as Kyrie is now in Boston.

I expected more parallels for some reason, but this "orange laser" Doug McDermott ended up being my only parallel pull of the box. It is not numbered.

I find it really obnoxious that the Lakers wear MPLS throwback uniforms at times. Of course, I find everything the Lakers to do to be pretty obnoxious. I do love the look and feel of all of the Court/Hall/Rookie Kings cards, though.

Finally, a Blazer makes an appearance. Here's my first card of Jusuf Nurkic in a Blazers uniform.

Biggie Swanigan got a taste of the NBA life when he got a few starts last month, but he seems to have been exiled to the end of the bench ever since. Yes, Panini is still hanging on to the classic Rated Rookie logo.

Here's Swanigan on one of those Kings inserts that I like.

Hassan Whiteside, rebounding machine.

And finally, here's the Rated Rookie card of the Blazers other draft pick. Portland moved up to get Collins, a lottery pick at #10, and he's now getting his turn at center with Nurkic temporarily on the shelf.