This morning, Topps released the first photos and a trailer for their flagship product, 2024 Topps Series 1. As expected, Elly de la Cruz was the face of the product, with Evan Carter of the World Series Champions in the Texas Rangers following suit. Kodai Senga’s card was shown with the traditional Topps All-Star Rookie Cup. The design has very wide borders, and seems to fade from Black on top to White on the bottom and very neon-looking lines for the team name, circle around the player position on the bottom right, as well as connected to a bold White last name that leads to a baseball field shaped finish that surrounds the team logo on the bottom left. Topps has not announced the face of their product, but any number of stars or top rookies could be on the front of these Series 1 Hobby and Jumbo Hobby boxes as well as retail Blasters.
As for Rookies, the confirmed names that will be in Series 1 are Elly de la Cruz of the Reds, as well as Evan Carter of the Rangers. We can guess at the possibility of 1B Nolan Schanuel of the Angels who played all of 6 weeks through mid-August and the end of the season , OF Pete Crow-Armstrong of the Cubs who hit a lowly .176 in 13 games, INF Ceddanne Rafaela of the Red Sox who played in 28 games, INF Kyren Paris who was called up by the Angels in early September but only had 40 at-bats through the rest of the season, INF Ronny Mauricio who was in 26 games and had 101 at-bats for the Mets and OF Jasson Dominguez who was also called up in early September by the Yankees but only saw 31 at-bats due to injury as well as his fellow call-up in Catcher Austin Wells who played in 19 games and launched 4HR, hitting .229 over 70 at-bats to end the season. Some, none, or all of these players could make it into Topps Series 1 and more that weren’t named, but I would bet on seeing Schanuel, Paris, Crow-Armstrong, Wells, and Rafaela have their rookie card in a Topps product or a few at some point in 2024.
Ronny Mauricio will unfortunately either miss the 2024 rookie class due to his 2024 season-ending injury while playing in the Dominican League, or sneak in due to the virtue of wanting to show off some of baseball’s top prospects in Series 1, same with Dominguez who will have a delayed return to the Majors due to requiring season-ending Tommy John surgery in 2023, but could surely have a rookie card in a later product if he makes a return to the Majors in 2024. Others who will most likely make their debut in 2024 and have a rookie card, barring injury, are infielder Jackson Holliday of the Orioles and SS Colson Montgomery of the White Sox.
In the checklist, the following colors have been added to the parallels: Yellow – 2 per box (hanger), Yellow Foil (hanger), Yellow Crackle #/50 (Hobby). There have also been more Holiday themed parallels added like the Halloween ones that we saw in 2023; the parallels for 2024 seem to be of a Spring theme as follows: Eggs 1:21 packs, Rabbit 1:56 packs, Flowers #/50, Umbrella #/10, Watering Can #/5, Roses 1/1. Without fail, the rainbow that so many collectors chase has been made ever larger by Topps.
