Upper Deck Heroes of Baseball insert series part 1

In 2002, Upper Deck released nine ten-card insert series of various 'Heroes of Baseball' in their Prospect Premieres set. The base set was all hitherto unknown rookies and prospects and included autographs and relics from players who Upper Deck predicted would be "future gems". The multiple insert series of heroes counter-balanced this parade of youngsters with players people would have actually known because they had all just retired, like Cal Ripken Jr, or were legendary figures, like Mickey Mantle and Tom Seaver.

Technically, there are only 9 cards in each set and a 'Header', which is the tenth card and messes up displaying the complete set in a 9 pocket card page. 

I got this small set from Gawain a while back but didn't get around to including it in my original 394 cards. So I'm going to show them now. They are all self-explanatory so commentary will be at a minimum.

Card Number 403: Upper Deck Prospect Premieres Heroes of Baseball,  2002; #HTG

This is the 'Header' card, which is why it isn't numbered.

The header card functions as a checklist.

Card Number 404: Upper Deck Prospect Premieres Heroes of Baseball, 2002; #TG1

Card Number 405: Upper Deck Prospect Premieres Heroes of Baseball, 2002; #TG2

Card Number 406: Upper Deck Prospect Premieres Heroes of Baseball, 2002; #TG3

Card Number 407: Upper Deck Prospect Premieres Heroes of Baseball, 2002; #TG4

This is a nice set and I like the way it picks out facets of Tony's career. My only negative criticism of the set is that it doesn't use photos from the year in question. Tony looked very different when he was stealing lots of bases in 1987 to when he was smacking his way to the .394 average in 1994. Using chronologically accurate photos would also mean seeing the lovely 1984 jerseys on card number TG4 as well, which I would have preferred.

The second half of the set will be on the blog tomorrow!

Total: 407 cards