The Panini America Quality Control Gallery: 2018 Honors Football

[doniceage]

Although both 2018-19 Donruss Soccer and 2019 Diamond Kings Baseball launching today has kept things rocking in local hobby shops and on group-break sites across North America for most of this hump day, there’s still one more new release from Panini America coming this week. On Friday, the company’s 2019 Honors Football arrives boasting a bevy of old-school nostalgia and new-school shine.

By incorporating the most desirable aspects of the last Honors release in 2016 and mixing in a few new collector-friendly tweaks, 2018 Honors Football looks to be a blockbuster featuring original and BGS-graded BuyBacks of classic Panini America cards, more on-card autographs than in 2016, and updated base and autograph versions of top rookies from 2018 Score Football and 2018 Classics Football on premium Optichrome technology.

On average, each hobby box of 2018 Honors Football (four cards per box, 10 boxes per case) will deliver two autographs and two base cards. Additional highlights of 2018 Honors Football include . . .

https://www.paniniamerica.net/blog.h...nors-football/

[bakemeister52]

Love the Emmitt Smith Auto!

[jplcom]

Although both 2018-19 Donruss Soccer and 2019 Diamond Kings Baseball launching today has kept things rocking...

Panini is here to cover you in a wet blanket.

has kept things rocking in local hobby shops and on group-break sites across North America

Sadly Soccer and Baseball are not the global affairs like NFL mock drafts are.

for most of this hump day

HAR HAR HAR!!!! Working hard or hardly working? Sounds like a case of the Mondays but TGIF is right around the corner.

there’s still one more new release from Panini America coming this week.

I am absolutely amped up to see some new 2019 content. Fresh designs, new checklists, exciting player moves now that free agency has largely subsided! Maybe a smattering of impending rookies? Le'Veon Bell on the Jets, Earl Thomas on the Ravens, Nick Foles on the Jags? Yes, yes, and yes!

On Friday, the company’s 2018 Honors Football arrives

.....................................

boasting a bevy

Boasting, noun. Excessively proud and self-satisfied talk about one's achievements, possessions, or abilities.

also, BEVY!

old-school nostalgia and new-school shine

rehashed designs and repurchased products from other better companies packed in a shiny new box, got it.

By incorporating the most desirable aspects of the last Honors release in 2016

2017 was a dishonorable year.

and mixing in a few new collector-friendly tweaks

This product is literally taking everything 2016 already did and adding some friendly tweaks, I mean new-school shine (?).

2018 Honors Football looks to be a blockbuster

Nothing says blockbuster more than rehashing last years rookies, rehashing old designs, and buying back cards from ebay and sending them to get graded by Beckett.

featuring original and BGS-graded BuyBacks of classic Panini America cards

Merely classic? I would have thought these cards were legendary, iconic, or even fabled!!

more on-card autographs than in 2016

Technically 2 is more than 1.

updated base and autograph versions of top rookies from 2018 Score Football and 2018 Classics Football

REHASHED!

on premium Optichrome technology.

Ever since Panini found out they can stick all their regular releases into the Optichrome vat, they can't stop shoveling it into their products fast enough. Chromium technology is like a spice; a pinch or dash of it goes a long way.

each hobby box of 2018 Honors Football (four cards per box, 10 boxes per case)

4 cards per obnoxiously large pack, 10 packs per wasted cardboard box.

will deliver two autographs and two base cards

2016 Honors delivered two autographs and one base card. That new school shine, collector-friendly tweak Hackler was talking about was more base cards in high end products.

Updated autograph versions of some of the most iconic cards of all time, including 1989 Score Football Barry Sanders, 1990 Score Football Emmitt Smith, 2000 Score Preview Football Tom Brady, 2001 Score Select Football Drew Brees and more.

1957 Topps Bart Starr, 1958 Topps Jim Brown, 1965 Topps Joe Namath, 1971 Topps Terry Bradshaw, 1976 Topps Walter Payton, 1981 Topps Joe Montana, 1984 Topps Dan Marino & John Elway, 1986 Topps Jerry Rice, 1991 Stadium Club Brett Favre. ALL HONORLESS!


Speaking of dishonorable rehashes, this blog post is feeling MIGHTY familiar.

https://blog.paniniamerica.net/2019/...eview-gallery/


Well, well well! Our good friend Tracy Hackler already unleashed a blog post. Though mysteriously the blog post has been DELETED! 2018 Honors has come FULL CIRCLE my friends. The original January post was deleted then REPOSTED in April. A rehashed post for a rehashed product. Fear not, because the hate was strong with me that day and I already wrote a scathing review: https://www.sportscardforum.com/show...eview-Gallery)

Who thinks my comment to their blog will be approved?

post.JPG


In honor (see what I did there?!) of 2018 Honors being a rehash of previous products and Tracy Hackler plagerizing his own "work", I too shall simply copy and paste the rest:

Updated autograph versions of some of the most iconic cards of all time, including 1989 Score Football Barry Sanders, 1990 Score Football Emmitt Smith, 2000 Score Preview Football Tom Brady, 2001 Score Select Football Drew Brees and more.

Panini can't create anything original, they can only appropriate our nostalgia for other, better loved released products made by different companies. What makes old Score products more honorable anyways?

BGS-graded BuyBacks of legends such as Walter Payton, Johnny Unitas, Bart Starr, Tom Brady, Aaron Rodgers, Reggie White, Jerry Rice, Randy Moss, Dan Marino, John Elway, Drew Brees and Bill Belichick and more.

Mmmmm yes, buybacks of better Topps products. No wonder Beckett is a year plus out on non-guaranteed BGS orders, Panini has been busy buying crap off of eBay to stick into graded cases. I can't wait to pull a BGS 9.0 of 1991 Pro Set Belichick

The 32-card Honors Base set (one player per NFL team)

Thanks for clarifying that a 32-card set would be one per NFL team. Most people would think a set with 32 cards based on a league with 32 teams would naturally think it would be one per team. But I'll allow this since this 2018 product is coming out in Q2 of 2019 and they might have decided to drop the Cardinals and Raiders from making an appearance

includes base versions numbered to 99 as well as Gold (numbered to 75), Blue (numbered to 25), Orange (numbered to 10), Red(numbered to five) and Black 1/1 parallels. There are also Honors Base Signatures sharing the same parallel configuration.

What no Green parallel? Green is usually the one that's /5 in your sets! It's not honorable to have no consistency in your product line.

Classics Update Rookies and Score Update Rookies subsets honoring the top 30 rookies of 2018 on Optichrome stock and featuring an array of parallels numbered to 99 or less.

It's rather telling that the first time this whole post that "honor" is used as verb to describe this product. However it truly is an honor to be optichromed.

Base Score Update Rookies Signatures (numbered to 99 or less) are accompanied by Gold Zone (numbered to 50 or less), Artist’s Proof (numbered to 35), Red Zone (numbered to 20), First Down (numbered to 10), End Zone (numbered to six) and Gem Masters 1/1 parallel versions.

I remember Gold Zone, Artist's Proof, and Red Zone parallels. Are these more examples of "incorporating the most desirable aspects" of other companies products that did them better? If Panini renamed this product to 2018 Retreads it would be the honorable thing to do.

Base Classics Update Rookies Significant Signatures numbered to 99 or less and featuring Green, Gold, Red, Orange, Blue and Black parallel versions.

Well there's that green parallel! No consistency within their own product stack. Sad!

Gem Masters parallel versions of the base sets printed on Optichrome stock.

OPTICHROME!

The landmark Recollection Collection includes some of the best cards ever made of the best players, all hard-signed and hand-numbered.

Indeed! Recall the collections of the best cards that Panini DIDNT make!


Panini releasing a 2018 set on April 12, 2019, it's been 102 days since we hit 2019. Almost ONE THIRD of 2019 is history and here comes a 2018 product. The depths of Panini's grossness cannot be understated as they race to the bottom of the barrel on shoveling out retread crap for desperate cash grabs.

Panini taking down their own blog posts then reposting them and passing it off as new is emblematic of what the company stands for.


2019 releases

​03-29-2019 - Prizm Draft Picks
04-12-2019 - 2018 Honors (????)

[pwaldo]

^^^^

I gave you a thumps up for that post and I wish I could give you more for that smackdown on Panini. I'm seriously starting to hate that company and I just wish they never even entered the card market. Just would have had Topps and Upper Deck in the market which would have made the football, basketball, and baseball market all infinitely better IMO.

[jplcom]

^^^^

I gave you a thumps up for that post and I wish I could give you more for that smackdown on Panini. I'm seriously starting to hate that company and I just wish they never even entered the card market. Just would have had Topps and Upper Deck in the market which would have made the football, basketball, and baseball market all infinitely better IMO.

Thanks! As much as I've been a Topps fanboy in the past, I'm sure that they would be just as egregious as Panini is. This is what happens when there is no competition in the marketplace. The NFLPA decided on awarding exclusive licensing. Panini is doing what any business would do if they had a monopoly. They have to do just enough to make sure they don't lose the exclusive contract.

[pwaldo]

Thanks! As much as I've been a Topps fanboy in the past, I'm sure that they would be just as egregious as Panini is. This is what happens when there is no competition in the marketplace. The NFLPA decided on awarding exclusive licensing. Panini is doing what any business would do if they had a monopoly. They have to do just enough to make sure they don't lose the exclusive contract.

Topps has been pretty good in baseball with an exclusive IMO. They keep stuff on card that should be and use sticker autographs for junk sets. They do make a lot of mistakes but they at least seem to listen and know their collector base versus Panini just coming in and telling people to like it or beat it approach.

[jwlawrence06]

This has to be the stupidest release ever. A bunch of buybacks/updates on existing products all under 'Honors'? I'm interested to see the future of sports card collecting...I feel like we are living a new junk wax era except this time the cost is much higher.

[JWinn]

This has to be the stupidest release ever. A bunch of buybacks/updates on existing products all under 'Honors'? I'm interested to see the future of sports card collecting...I feel like we are living a new junk wax era except this time the cost is much higher.

I've also noticed what they are calling buybacks are in some cases actually replacement cards.

Saw a few Emmanuel Sanders from Flawless last night.

A 2016 Gold that should have been stamped /10 on the front is now missing that, but is hand numbered 2/2 instead. Also a 2015 Silver auto that should have numbered /25 on the front, also missing that, but is now hand numbered 1/1 instead, and "slabbed" in a Ultra Pro holder sealed with a panini sticker.

And for what it cost to pull, it's now a $300 card...........

These have got to be replacements that were held over, but never claimed, so now they go into Honors, and Panini acts like they are something new & special.

I know there's a guy in Dallas who sells these replacements on ebay. I got a Rod Smith NT patch card that was originally supposed to be also autographed and numbered in foil on the back, but he sold me one that has no auto, and was never stamped with any foil numbering. It even has the authentication for the AUTO on the back. The auto that's not there.

It was clearly a replacement that was never claimed, and never got the sticker auto, but Panini, or someone, released two of them onto the market.

It's the card I plan to use next time I go to a Rod Smith signing in the future. My error/replacement card that should have been signed, but never was. It's got a nice big clear area where the sticker was supposed to be attached that would be perfect to sign.

Maybe after I get it signed, I'll number it myself 1/1. haha

Gotta say, I would be pretty pissed to open a $300 box, and find a four year old card that sells on ebay for $20 as my big hit.