What Time Is It?

It's Chrome Time! @CrackinWax #crackinwaxmailday 

We've reached the time of the baseball season where Topps rolls out the shiny stuff. Enter Topps Chrome, for (by my count) the 24th season. Thanks to a year-long subscription, I was in on a case break of the stuff, which means I probably won't have to touch so much as a blaster of the stuff, at least until Update comes out. In the break, I managed to snag the team set several times over, plus a parallel of each player, and insert and a special prize. Money... heh. Who needs it, right?

As we all know, the base cards don't always scan so well, so I mostly stuck to the shiny stuff. Here's a regular refractor version of the Cardinals current closer. I would love to see him get right and back into the rotation next season, but who actually knows what is going on with him.

Dakota Hudson has shown some promise in his rookie season as he's been a starter since the opening week and hasn't relented. He has some questionable peripherals, or so they tell me, but he's still mostly pitched like a middle of the rotation guy -- pretty impressive for a rook.

Paul Goldschmidt makes his Cardinals Chrome debut on a prism (NOT PRIZM HAHA PANINI) refractor. I really, really wish they had chosen a new photo for his Chrome card, something they've done in the past, but instead we're still stuck with this Photoshopped wreck.

Here's the promised insert. I'm not sure Miles Mikolas is a future star, but he was the de facto ace last season and has turned in a pretty good second half to date after being bludgeoned by the new-and-improved(?) baseballs in the first half of 2019.

Ponce de Leon's turn in the rotation didn't last long, as he was roughly as effective as his predecessor Wacha, which is to say... not very.

Yadi! Shiny Yadi! I believe Yadi is due back in the lineup soon.

Here's that promised special prize. Yes! I like that Chrome autographs are signed on the card after a long period of time in which they weren't, and I really like that Topps opted for a different photo on this one. Let's hope that Dakota is making this gesture a lot when he takes the mound against Pittsburgh tomorrow night.