Not until the week of release did I plan on buying a hobby box of 2020 Bowman Draft. With a price tag of $300+ I just didn’t see the value. When Topps released its Bowman Draft 1st Edition, I was all in buying 20 packs. I spent more than $300 on 20 packs of a product that lacked autographs.
So why wouldn’t I spend the same amount on a hobby box of the regular product that guaranteed three autographs. Autographs in Bowman are super popular and expensive. The more and more I thought about it, I decided it only made sense to buy some Bowman Draft.
Topps had it on sale for $309 during release week, so I took the plunge. I was excited to break it open, and it was a just for fun break. If I was skunked, it would be okay because I enjoy the rip.
Before I break down the box, let’s talk Cubs cards. I was lucky and pulled duplicates of the base Ed Howard AND Howard’s Chrome card.
I also pulled my first Jordan Nwogu Cubs baseball card.
During the break I was just starting to comment the lack of color in the box. That mattered no more when I pulled a regular insert. I was super excited to pull the Franchise Futures card featuring Ed Howard and Burl Carraway.
Now let’s break down the box. Not only was I short a complete base set…I was 18 cards short!
27- Oswald Peraza
34- Austin Hendrick
71- Connor Phillips
72- Pete Crow-Armstrong
74- Bryce Bonnin
110- Jordan Nwogu
116- Jackson Miller
125- Levi Prater
133- Zach Daniels
137- Gilberto Jimenez
140- Bryson Stott
176- Mitchell Parker
177- Jackson Rutledge
187- Brennen Davis
190- Marco Luciano
194- Nolan Gorman
196- Hunter Greene
200- Hunter Bishop
182/200 – 91% of a complete set. Ironically, 91 is also how many duplicate base cards were in the box. It’s a good thing I’m not a Cincinnati Reds fan because I was missing four of the nine cards from the Reds checklist.
Fortunately, I’m not a set builder so this didn’t bother me. Although, I really would have liked to swap out a couple duplicates for a Jordan Nwogu and Brennen Davis.
Each hobby box (called a jumbo box) contains three autographs. The super jumbo boxes contain five autographs. My three autographs included a base (not numbered) autograph, a refractor /499, and a purple /250. The base autograph is Pittsburgh Pirates pitcher Logan Hoffman.
My refractor autograph is Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Landon Knack numbered /499.
The first autograph I pulled was color, and a 1st Bowman, and a non-pitcher. That’s the trifecta. Hayden Cantrelle of the Milwaukee Brewers was the team’s fifth round draft pick out of Louisiana-Lafayette. It’s purple and numbered /250.
All in all, it was a really fun break. The chat room in my YouTube live break made it even more valuable to me. The fellowship as we chatted, opening the cards, and of course the cards inside made the $300+ price tag a little easier to swallow. Watch below…
Some of the top prospects are in my eBay Store along with some refractors. The autographs and base paper and chrome will be stashed in a box for a couple months until baseball season.