Today's card arrived in all its shiny glory hard on the heels of my first Tony Gwynn card from 2021. It came from Jeff in one of the UK collectors groups on Facebook.
Card Number 605: Topps Silver Pack Chrome, 2021; #86BC-77
These chrome cards are included in the "Silver packs" inserted as bonuses in hobby boxes of Topps Series 1. It has a different picture of Tony than the regular 35th anniversary retro cards that make up a large insert set in the flagship Series 1 set.
The scanner really activated the refractor card. I haven't done an overhead scan, but I did take a photo to pop on Instagram, so here's that for comparison (complete with a bit of my thumb):
There are 100 cards in both the insert set and the chrome cards from the silver packs. I've seen a lot of love for these cards in the collectors groups but it's not a template I've ever been particularly fond of. Of course, I own the original 1986 card, and I have an Archives card from 2014 that also uses this template so it isn't new to me.
The cardback is pretty dull. It manages to be both a big stats box and an incomplete record.
However, this is a very nice refractor card and it means I have a quarter of the checklist of Tony Gwynn cards from Series 1 already. I would like to add the other retro card and I will be keeping my eyes peeled for it.
Total: 605 cards
