I Know Everyone's Moved on to Opening Day...But I've Just Gotten Heritage

Yeah, all the cool kids already have pored over the Topps Heritage cards and cracked their packs.  I'm a little behind.  I put my eBay money toward getting two unopened Hobby boxes from a vendor there.  The boxes arrived today, so like a kid on Christmas morning, I ripped all the packs open.

Hobby boxes come with a blue package included inside which usually is a three-card strip:

Ugh.  This three-card strip is as exciting as serving as the designated grass-growing watcher.  I mean, Frederick Alfred Porcello is still young and showed some very nice growth in his peripherals -- and he has the distinction of being born on my 17th birthday -- while Prado was an all-star one year and appears to be the reincarnation of the not-dead-yet Placido Polanco.  But Asche -- he's young and, um, he hit .235 and had an OBP of .302 and SLG of .389 last  year...at third base and, um, he hit for a high average in the minor leagues, I guess.  But this is pretty uninspiring.

Just for kicks and comparison, here's the strip I got in my recent 2008 Topps Heritage box:

Much nicer.

Okay, enough complaining about Cody Asche.

In my second box of the 2014 Heritage, I got a nice little surprise -- a 1965 buyback of a guy that Baseball-Reference.com ranks as being between Dmitri Young and Billy Butler all-time among hitters...and with a nickname of "EZ" or "The Poet", I like this guy already:

Ladies and gentlemen, Ed Charles.  

Each box had its own insert, of course, and I received two relics:

Chicago Crime Dog

You again?

Nothing against Troy Tulowitzki, but I seem to get relics from him more often than any non-Rockie-loving human being should.  Also, nothing against Fred McGriff either, but I was kind of hoping for a little "better".  

Okay, on to the other stuff, and I'll be briefer, using my best eBay over-enthusiasm, excessive font highlighting and bolding, and at least two more exclamation points per item than is necessary.

SHORT PRINTS!!

The Wacha Action Variation

The Goldschmidt Logo Variation

 CHROME (numbered to 999)!!!

Carlos Beltran...but they didn't update
 him to be on the Yankees?

Jordan Zimmermann, Wisconsin Native

Stephen Strasburg, who is SOOO 2012.

SILVER REFRACTOR (SN/565)!!!!

You can't tell, but this is silver, not white.

Mini!!! SN/100!!

I left this small to highlight its Mini-ness

And, Finally, BLACK REFRACTOR SN/65!!

Comes complete with a coupon for 20% off your first visit to Dr. James Andrews' office in Birmingham

In all seriousness, the Heritage set this year isn't a bad set.  It sticks to the tried-and-true formula from past Heritage sets.  I never really collected the 1965 set before, so the coolness factor of seeing today's players in a set design from yesteryear that I loved just wasn't there for me.  I guess I should go back to the first few sets of Heritage from the early 2000s through 2009 and perhaps to the 2012 set as well -- I had cards in my collection from those sets as a kid and still do.  I may sit out next year's release and the subsequent releases (assuming Topps sticks with the path of releasing cards with the 39-years-ago design) until about 2018 or so.  

It's not bad, but I'm just going to spend my money elsewhere next year.