Hello and welcome to the Talking Cards podcast with Grand Salami and the Juice. I am your host, the Juice here today, and it is actually going to be just me today. Grand Salami will be back with an episode later this week, and we're hoping to have another great guest on for you. So today, what I'm going to be talking about is just a little June preview of some of the top space ball products coming out. There are a few different things coming out. We're going to do a deep dive on most, if not all of these. But before we do that, this is kind of just a surface-level intro to these products in case you're new to the hobby or you know, it's been a while for a couple of them. So just to reintroduce you to it, see if it's worth getting excited about. Before we do that, I do want to mention that we are now partnered with CarPurchaser. Make sure to follow him on Twitter or X if you aren't already. He is, I've mentioned him before, uh, but yeah, you can find him at R at CarPurchaser. He always has the latest info on product drops and releases. If you want the quickest updates in real time, though, I do recommend going to his Discord and following that. There is a link in the episode notes. So you can find that there if you do want to join the discard. So you can also find way more than just product drop info. You'll get all the notifications. You could set it up for what notification do you want? And it's not just for baseball cards, it's for all categories of sports cards and trading cards. It's great also if you like those retail chases, trying to get them at trying to just get them at the retail prices instead of the resale prices. So yeah, definitely a great Discord. I've been a part of it for way longer than I've been doing this podcast for. And I could say firsthand that a lot of the stuff that I've learned from the hobby has been from there. So definitely check that out. All right. The so with that being said, let's get into our episode. The first product that I want to talk about, this has been a favorite product of mine. I believe this is the third time they are doing it. They did skip a year. This is 2025 Topps Chrome Platinum Basketball. Not basketball, 2025 Topps Chrome Platinum Baseball. The pre-order for this was at 140. I wouldn't be surprised if the retail price ends up being 150. This is set to drop and release on June 5th. It is a 2025 release. So you did hear that right. So look for last year's rookies, and this has a huge monster checklist. This is a 500-card checklist, as per usual with this release, because it's got players, current old vets, it's got legends, it's got people from all over. It is based on the 1955 set. So this is what they do with platinum baseball. They go back, I believe, what are we looking at, 70 years for base it off of that design, of course, with a chrome finish. And these cards, they always end up looking spectacular in person. This year's set, because it is based on those 1955 cards, they are horizontal. So if you are someone who is very much against horizontal cards, I do recommend staying away from this one. But overall, this is a fun rip because there is a ton of color. Even in retail, you can usually hit some nice color. That's why you usually find the retail on this sell out so fast. It is printed pretty high. We're not gonna know that until we have the odds and everything. But along with the 500 base card checklist, there are 178 different autos, and it is just one auto per hobby box. So $150 for one auto, and a lot of the autos are not people that you're really gonna care about too much. And I'm sure the best names are gonna be short printed. Tiny does have autos, and all the cards, all the autos are on card autos, so that is definitely something that sets this apart and makes this such a fun set to collect. It is also a really fun set to go rainbow chasing in this. There's a few different parallels. See what the names of them are. Yeah, I'm looking at some of the pictures right now. Ken Griffey Jr. has an awesome, awesome auto. It's listed as five out on the website. Ichro has an auto here of Tani, Jeter, the, and they all just look fantastic. So yeah, there are a ton of different parallels. So they are the toil parallels, you know, outside of the true color. Um, you'll find, of course, the regular colors like blue, gold, red. And they have things like vibration that I remember from past years. They do have mini diamonds. Toil we found before. That's the one where it's got like the little images of the I don't even know what the images are, never really taking that close of a look at them. But yeah, it's got little images as part of the variation in the color. But yeah, you do have super fractors in this as well. Always a fun trace, always a fun chase. And yeah, I don't know what these vibration cards are. I'm interested to see it. But the checklist goes all the way from unnumbered refractors, the highest numbered is vibrations refractor at a 499, all the way down to the one of one, of course. So yeah, a lot of fun stuff in here. And the cards do look beautiful, even though I'm not the biggest fan of horizontal cards, especially because I like having my stuff graded. But just looking at these cards, the the colors are always just so sharp on these two, the different parallels. It's hard to deny that this is gonna be a great looking set. So definitely one to look forward to. That's gonna be the first release that's coming out out of this preview. That is June 5th. And what day of the week is that? I believe it's a Wednesday. It is a Friday. So June 5th, Friday. Look out for that. That one's gonna be a fast sellout. Well, next up, we have our most, I don't know if mainstream is the right word, but our most mainstream release of the month is Top Series 2 Baseball 2026 Top Series 2. That has already been up for pre-order. The pre-order was for 118 for a hobby, 240 jumbo. I expect release day to be 125, 130 hobby, 250, 260 jumbo. Price is up, of course, as with everything. And where's our release date on that? Let's see. June 10th. Yep, that will be releasing June 10th. This has a 350 card checklist, standard for tops uh flagship to see that the Chase Parallel, I think, will continue to be HFA. That just keeps getting more and more popular, even with Topps Chrome Black and it appearing in other product. They are short printing it more, they are short printing it more and more. It seems it's becoming a rarer and rare hit. And yeah, it's moving in the right direction. Uh, some of those HFAs are really going up in value. So something to really keep an eye on. The thing that I really like the best that they're doing, and they're bringing it back. They don't do this every year. They are doing the short print rookie cards for a few of the guys that came up at the beginning of the season. We're talking about Kevin McGonagall for the Tigers, JJ, Weatherholt for the Cardinals, Carson Benge for the Mets, Justin Crawford for the Phillies. Uh, so yeah, they all came up either opening day or very close to it, all those guys. I know the first three. And and I love it when they do this. Yeah, they did this a couple years back with uh Jackson Holiday and a few of the others. I think they might have done it with Julio and Witt. That might have just been for Chrome. Can't remember, but I love it when they do it. It's such a fun chase. I don't know how short printed they'll be. We'll have to wait for the odds to come out. They will be a tough hit. Usually you're gonna see if you're on like a 10k, so you can usually hit the guy that you're chasing. If you're doing like a player break or a team break, you can usually hit one of those, but who knows how it's gonna be this year. And I don't know if there's other short prints or golden mirror variations for those guys. I remember back with the Jackson Holiday, they did the fun face variation. That was the one where it was a take on the F-face very I'm gonna just keep it family friendly, the F-base variation, error car, the infamous one. So yeah, they had that with the different scribble outs too, going from just normal one all the way to the rarest. That was such a cool card. And I would love to see if they would do something with these rookies similar uh to just honor, you know, just past card releases and maybe past error cards or just past famous or infamous cards. And that that was a fun chase. I really enjoyed chasing those. I was able to get myself a fun face card, and yeah, that I I remember grading that right away. I eventually sold it, which I kind of regret. It's a cool card to have in your collection, but but Jackson Holiday just wasn't doing it for me anymore. The other another short print chase that they're bringing back. Uh, they had this in series one. We saw it. It is the short print 1952, the rookie variants. Those are back. So they said they're only gonna release this for each player once. So once we see it for our guy, it's not gonna come back. These are very short printed. They had the base cards that I never even think I saw a hit of them across all the breaks that I watched in series one. This is based off of the 1952 Topps design. If you're thinking of that famous mantle card, then that's the one you're looking for. Um, and they do have autos of these as well. I think the blue pen is to 10 or so, maybe to 25. The red ink might just be the one-on-one or to five. Rare red ink versions are to five. Okay. They they brought back cover athletes, which it's cool, but I don't love it. It's just not a it doesn't do it for me as such like a rare card. I I'd rather have a different one. I'd rather them bring back, I forgot what it was called, the Tobbs Reverence, I think, or something like that, where it had like the little little patch, it was numbered to 10, to five, and to one for the platinum. Those were were really nice. There are some special LA Dodgers cards for for their World Series win. And when I'm looking at these cards look really nice. So those are gonna be something that are gonna definitely be sought after. And yeah, but nothing, nothing really too crazy or reinventing the wheel, which you're gonna expect with series two, which is more of what you got from series one, just updated, uh heavy lumber, of course, which I'm a fan of, but a lot of people don't really like. But overall, yeah, series fun, gonna be typically a fun rip. Don't expect to get your money back with that for breaks. It really depends on your taste for that. It could be really brutal to watch a flagship break because there are so much base cars that you don't care about. There's so many pack syrup, so it takes so long to get through each box and each case. If you're doing a multi-case break, it's gonna it's an endurance challenge for you and for the breakers. So hopefully you get yourself a breaker that can keep things interesting, can keep you talking and or keep themselves talking and can keep themselves engaged with with you and the rest of the audience. But yeah, that that can definitely be a tough break to watch, especially if it's a player break where you have like a single player with a 350 card checklist. Yeah, that that is definitely definitely a tough watch sometimes. But flagship is flagship, it's still it still stands on its own as as a great fun product every every release. Although that does it for the series two. Next, let's move on to 2025 Topps Inception Baseball. This had a pre-order price of 240, expect release day 250, 260. This will be available June 19th. And once again, yes, 2025 is correct. So this is last year's rookie checklist as they try to finish up the 2025 releases. We're halfway through the year now. So shouldn't be much left, but we'll we'll see. I'm not so sure. I didn't really research which other ones we might be waiting on. From 2025, maybe Brooklyn collection. A lot of people are waiting on that one, and I would be very sad to see it go. I wouldn't be surprised if it's gone. But back to Inception. So it's one of those single-pack boxes where you're gonna get one pack, seven cards, one auto per box. So, not a lot of cards. I don't really recommend this as someone for someone that just buys a single box because honestly, the hits are hard to come by, they're really nice ones. Of course, everyone can find something great because there are still really awesome cards in here, but I wouldn't really go on and buy a single box unless you're buying like four boxes or so. I recommend to just stick to brakes on this or just buy singles. I don't really think it's it's worth it as a product anymore because the price has gotten out of control. $240 for a single auto. And so many of the players, unfortunately, are stinkers. Again, that this isn't a full in-depth dive, so I don't want to get too far into it. But you have a 100-card checklist, 88 different autos just for the rookies and emerging stars. Those are the ones you're really gonna see. Then you have like case hits where it's different color autos or different patch autos or large patch autos. The thing that makes this really shine, though, as a set, and that I do get a lot of fun out of it, especially in breaks, because you can really see a lot of these, the different patch autos that you can get. It's really that they do a good job of standing out with like its own unique patches. Of you'll see different ones that you might not see elsewhere, sock relics I remember seeing in the past. Uh, this one usually has like the button relics and and things like that. The only downside to it is if you do hit one of those really awesome relics, most of the time it's not going to be an on-card auto. You're probably gonna be getting a sticker auto with a relic autos. Now that there are still some where you will find an on card auto. I'm looking at an example of a James Wood card. So this has a bat knob, and on the bat knob, it has the image of the James Wood card, kind of like a mock-up of it into a into the bat knob. And that is that is on card. So that is obviously an awesome card. No one would complain about that, even if it was a sticker. But it's really awesome that they really did that card justice by making it on card. They have these golden cards which really stand out. Um, I'm looking at a 101 Paul Skeens, where he even inscribed it and a rookie of the year. So these cards can really pop. I I like the style, but that there's just there's just better releases, and I think better ways to spend $250 on this hobby than than a chase at some of these cards. Because, like I said, unless you're buying four boxes by and increasing your odds quite a bit to find something great, but that's spending a thousand dollars and you're not gonna get a thousand dollars worth of cards. It it's really difficult to be able to find or turn your money. But that's not what all those hobbies are about, of course. So if you're just looking for something fun to rip, it's gonna be super quick, one pack per box. But it it could be something that you want to check out on June 19th. That that's of course up to you. But for me, I I'm gonna be uh a pass on this and maybe get into a couple of like cheap breaks or something. The last jewel release that I want to go over, and I purposely skipped Dynasty. It's so niche, it is awesome, but fifteen hundred dollars a box. That's if you get the EQL. If not, you're spending upwards of 2K, I'm sure. I wouldn't be surprised if it's like 2.5, if it's $2,500 or $3,000 or something crazy. So yeah, it's it's not worth the time. But the last one I'm gonna talk about is Tops Tier 1 baseball pre-order, already went through and they were set at $350. These will be available June 24th. And this is similar to Inception right away, like it's it's not quite like really high-end, but it's a little better, like a tier above. I would say like a mid-card. I would probably put into like mid would be right. Um, and so $350 a box. I wouldn't be surprised if it goes up to another $20 or even $30 or so for release day. This is more on card autos and inception. I believe they are all on card. I don't want to say that for 100% for sure. Uh, I do like to style these cards better than Inception. And for $350, at least what the pre-order price is, you are getting two autos in a box. So that is obviously a step up, and that that's ultimately what you would be chasing when you're going for a product like this. So what you're getting out of this is two autos, which is great. You're also getting one relic card and one base card. So you're getting four cards in a pack. And again, these are really, really tough to hit, but the cards, like when you do hit, they are fantastic. Last year, if you remember and you were following, then they had the 101 Batnap for Evelong Goria, the Charizard one that was a chase. There was like a hundred thousand dollar, a hundred thousand dollar bounty on it, which would be by far probably the most expensive Evan Longoria card. But that card was awesome. Last I saw that card has never even been found. I remember I I try to chase that card and you know, just grabbing Evan Longoria for cheap. If I found them, you know, people were just passing up on it. So I was like, yeah, I'll take I'll take a shot. Why not? But the bat knobs in this is awesome. Iron Judge has a bat knob. You also got like the name plates, which are really cool, they really stand out. The patches can be really nice. Usually they're underwhelming, to be honest. You do have a decent amount of cut autos in this, so those, of course, are top chases, very difficult to hit. And I am looking at the checklist now because they had in the past the acetate cards, where it was just the auto part that was acetate, and that's memorable for me because I was able to hit when I got a personal box a Jeter and Mariano dual auto out of that, out of 10, I believe. So that was awesome. Yeah, clearly perfect, I believe it is. And then they should have dual, they have triple autos, but we're not gonna get crazy into this checklist. Um, yeah, but typically the checklist for this is is okay. Definitely a step up above Inception, a lot more focus on vets and legends as well, and top tier guys, hence tier one, but nothing to go too crazy for. Again, I wouldn't buy just a single single box of this. I would definitely rather get you know three boxes of this than four boxes of Inception 100%. That will run you like 1050. Four boxes of Inception will be like a thousand. So if you have to make a decision, that's what I would I would say to do. Um, I think that would be the right move. Just your ceiling is higher for this, and I just think the the floor is also higher overall. It's just just a nicer product. It is fun for breaks, but again, it's it's a very quick rip. Just four cards in a box. So just something to be prepared for if you're watching a break, and there's someone that likes to savor that. All right, that's it for our June preview. Thank you so much for listening. This is a talking cards podcast with Grand Slami and the Deuce. This was just the Deuce solo today. Have a great day, everyone.