SCF Official Review: 2011 Panini Prestige

[Enigma]

First and foremost, I'd like to thank our sponsors at Panini for providing us with this box.



24 packs per box
8 cards per pack
Current Retail Price (online): 79.99 - 89.99

Product Description

Box Break
- 4 Autograph or Material Cards (at least one autograph)
- 24 Rookies
- 2 Extra Points Gold
- 1 Extra Points Red
- 3 Draft Picks Light Blue
- 4 Stars of the NFL
- 1 Connections
- 1 League Leaders
- 1 TD Sensations
- 3 NFL Draft
- 4 Prestigious Pros
- 1 Inside the Numbers
- 1 Rookie Review and 1 NFL Passport

2011 ROOKIES
- Nick Fairley
- A.J. Green
- Julio Jones
- Blaine Gabbert
- Cam Newton
- Mark Ingram
- Mikel LeShoure
- Jake Locker
- Torrey Smith
- Jon Baldwin
- Ryan Mallett.
- Ryan Williams
- DeMarco Murray

200 Commons and 100 Rookies per set


Case Break
Look for one or more of the following autographs:
Peyton Manning, Drew Brees, Tom Brady, Aaron Rodgers, Adrian Peterson, Blaine Gabbert, Cam Newton, Jake Locker, Mark Ingram, Mikel LeShoure, Ryan Williams, DeMarco Murray, A.J. Green, Julio Jones or Collegiate Lettermen


Highlights
- NFL Draft Class trapped autographed embroidered patch
- Top NFL rookies from the class of 2010 with autographed versions sequentially numbered to 299 or less
- Collegiate lettermen featuring an autograph within a letter of a top rookie's last name from the Class of 2011

WHAT WE PULLED



Base: 140/200 (70%)
Dupes: 0
Rookies: 25/100 (25%)



Connections (1)
Draft Picks Light Blue /999 (3): Blaine Gabbert, Davon House, Owen Marecic
Inside The Numbers (1)
League Leaders (1)
NFL Draft (3)
Passport (1)
Prestigious Pros Red (4)
Prestigious Pros Gold /100 (1): Santonio Holmes



Rookie Review (1)
Stars Of The NFL (4)
Xtra Points Gold /250 (2): DeAngelo Williams, Quan Sturdivant
Xtra Points Green /25 (1): Jacob Tamme
Xtra Points Purple /50 (1): Darren Sproles
Xtra Points Red /100 (1): LeGarrette Blount



Platinum Patches Michael Turner 3-color Patch



Draft Picks Rights Andy Dalton Auto /499



Inside The Numbers Aaron Rodgers Jersey /250



Passport Martez Wilson Auto /25



Preferred LeSean McCoy Jersey /250



FINAL THOUGHTS

Base - 4.5/5
Design - 4/5
Fun - 3.5/5
Value - 4/5
Rebuy - 3.5/5

Total - 19.5/25 (78%)

Panini starts their foray into the 2011 football season with Prestige. With 200 veterans and 100 rookies, set collectors will have fun piecing this together. Especially when you consider some of the rookie are short prints. The design work is typical for Prestige over the last couple of years. A little busy with the border and presentation, but the full-body color photos are great with the veterans. The "in the facemask" view for the rookies is less than spectacular, but I guess you can only do so much to avoid logos with hurting card integrity. The Xtra Points parallels are back in multiple levels.

Do you enjoy insert/chase sets? Well, Prestige has enough for two or perhaps three releases. Take away the Xtra Points parallel and the Draft Picks Rights for the rookies, you will find nine more sets. Seems like a bit of an overkill, but this is the status quo traditionally for Prestige. When you toss in the numbered parallels and inserts, you have a nightmare for many collectors.

On average, each box should yield four autographs or relics with one being guaranteed to be a relic. The one set that is mind-boggling is Platinum Patches (as seen in this break). All the cards in this series are supposed to be patches, yet the cards are unnumbered. For many years, what has helped to make patch cards more valuable and special is the fact they are limited and collectors know how limited by the serial number. Now Panini changes the game and makes them seem like an ordinary jersey card, which ironically is serial numbered in Prestige.

All in all, Prestige is Panini's first release of the football collecting season and is more of a "get your feet wet" type of product. It encompasses the collecting habits of almost everyone in one fashion or another. The base set is set up to make the veteran portion fairly easy, but the rookies a challenge (which is how it should be). There are enough insert sets to make your head spin and barely any are numbered, so there's no telling how many are proliferating the market. There is a great mix of rookies and veterans in the "hit" pool which provides a good value at the price point among the other cards you get. But this is definately not a must-have type of product.

Once again, I'd like to thank our wonderful sponsors at Panini for giving us the opportunity to open and review this release. For more information on all their products, visit them today at www.paniniamerica.net.

[11chaos]

Nice Auto of Martez Wilson who was drafted in the third round to the New Orleans Saints.

That is a sharp looking Turner Patch, shame it seems like it was made to be numbered.

Andy Dalton is a great Pull, shame he's a Bengal.

that was nice of Panini to supply a box to be reviewed.

[WVcoltsfan]

pretty nice box! I like those passport autos!