Box Break : 2002 Topps

See how I kept the blog post title simple ?
That's because I knew people would come flocking together, spreading wings and feathers at the mere name of 2002 Topps.

And just as the title suggests : prepare to be bored.

This box is part of the 7 box-package I received a couple of weeks ago, courtesy of Steel City collectibles. I usually shop at Dave & Adams, but SC had some 90s boxes I was interested in, and the shipping prices were the same as D&A. Difference is that they only use UPS (and not USPS) which means that custom fees will automatically be high and customs never cleared without paying anything. Ah well. Basically, this means that there were $130 worth of products, and I paid $80 shipping (those 90s boxes are heavy) plus $50 customs ($30 VAT + $20 processing fee for UPS).

And yes, thank you, I'm aware that 2002 wasn't, technically, part of the 90s...

I didn't exactly strike gold (haha I'm so funny sometimes) with my couple of gold parallels, to say the least. Though an Expos manager is pretty cool. Because of the base design, they don't differ that much, though, which kind of makes the whole parallel thing pointless.


Ok, let's have a look at the inserts :

 Card stock is thicker on those. But the design....God, the design...at least, it's a couple of players I like.

More inserts ugliness. It's unfair in that if they were from the 90s, I'd look at them smiling, saying ok, they're ugly, but they're typical of the 90's and lovable because of that. Except this is 2002. Yeah, unfair, I know.

Those are actually nice.

Subsets :

Wow, with all that foil, it definitely belongs in the 90s.

Yup, 2002 is the set that follows 9/11. I actually was in Seattle when it happened, and I'm not going to make any jokes about it, of course. More foil, though. Lots and lots of foil.

Remember when baseball was saved by PED ? Good times...

And finally, some base cards. There's something inherently wrong about that set, and I just don't know why. Maybe it's the simple fact that it's really not attractive. There isn't enough room for interesting photos (and I wasn't able to find a single one) and the gold/yellowish borders are a very bad idea. The one huge quality of the box, though, is that there wasn't a single duplicate in there. Not one. 350 different cards, just like that. Proof that this isn't the 90s...