2012 Topps Chrome Break and Trade Bait

Dropped by the LCS yesterday on the way home from work and picked up a couple of boxes of 2012 Topps Chrome.  I am always excited when Chrome comes out and always debate whether or not to build the set through breaks and trades.  Obviously my plan with buying 2 boxes was to go for the set.  As far as base cards, this break of 2 boxes was about as bad as it gets for a set builder.  Check out these stacks of cards:

Here is an angled view, interesting selection for card #1.

And here is a full side view. The stack on the left is the set I am trying to build, the one on the right are the duplicates.  The only bright side is that I did get duplicates of 5 of the 11 Giants in the set.  I also did pull a Bryce Harper RC and 2 Yu Darvish RCs.  So only 101/220 cards, let the trading begin.  I will post a want list soon, if you buy a few packs, check my list and lets make a trade. Not really wanting to drop the cash for any more hobby boxes although I am sure some retail packs are in my future.

Everyone knows that the refractors are the best part of Chrome so here are my autos and refractors (and 1 insert) from box #1.

 The Dynamic Die Cut cards are pretty nice.  I was thinking of maybe going for the set until I realized there are 50 cards to the insert set and at 1/box I think I would rather focus on the set and some Giants refractors.

 Auto number 1 is Drew Smyly of the Tigers.  Smyly was a second round pick of the Tigers in 2010 and has made 15 starts this year going 4-3 with a 4.42 ERA. He is the Tigers #5 prospect in their system.

 The second auto is Orioles pitcher Tsuyoshi Wada.  It is the Sepia Refractor parallel serial numbered 09/75. He is a 31 year old former Japanese League pitcher who is on the Orioles AAA team.  He pitched in one minor league game and blew out his arm and is currently recovering from Tommy John surgery.

 Here are the regular refractors, nothing too exciting here.  I guess the Trumbo is the highlight although I like the Escobar and Weeks sliding pics.

 Here are the Xfractors and color parallels.  A little more star power here.  Really digging the McCutchen blue refractor 187/199.  The Gonzalez is the Sepia version, 43/75.

On to the next box.

Here are the autos and insert:

 Mesoraco was a 1st round pick back in 2007.  He has appeared in 52 games this year with the Reds and is hitting .210. He is still only 23 and at the beginning of the year was the #14 overall rated prospect in baseball.

Jarrod Parker has started 21 games for the A's this year and is 8-7 with an ERA of 3.48, not too bad.  I have seen him pitch a couple times and I think he has a bright future.

Another one of the cool die cut cards.  I do really like these and see there are 3 Giants I can chase.

Here are the refractors:

A little better mix of players with some stars like Ichiro and Longoria.

I was really happy here with a black refractor Vogelsong and Melky (cheater) Cabrera and Tim Lincecum Xfractors of the Giants collection.  The Gold Longoria and blue Jones are nice too.

Finally, I picked up two loose packs and pulled this card:

I was pretty happy with that.

All right, everything but the Giants are for trade.  If you have some base needs let me know, odds are if I have one, I have two. 

NOTE: I have now put a base want list on my set want page.