One of the common gripes amongst baseball card collectors in recent years is “Why can’t Topps put together a decent high end product?” We’ve seen great things from Topps in other high end departments like Topps Five-Star, but nothing close to that in baseball.

Until this year. Until now.

For all intents and purposes, I call 2012 Topps Museum Collection a high end product. Really, any product over $150 at release I consider high end. I remember when it used to be anything over $100, and some people would only claim those $300-$400 boxes are the only true high end nowadays.

Would you call it a game changer? Some would. I would. The quality of this product reminds me of something that Upper Deck would of done, but with the signature Topps flair. As one person has stated on Twitter, “It’s like Marquee and Tribute had a baby.”

The reason I mention former Upper Deck products is that one of the gripes of Topps collectors is about how stingy Topps has been in the use of the uniform patch relics. This product features no shortage of patch relics, that’s for sure. Usually it seemed that Topps reserved the best patches for the most hard to get cards, that has definitely changed with this product. While the numbering on the jaw dropping patches is low, and that’s rightfully so, there are still a ton of other great looking patches in this product that are easier to pull.

And that has definitely reflected on secondary prices as well. Just checking the secondary market prices on places like eBay really showcases what a well designed card, some on-card autographs, and beautiful patches can do to the value of cards.

Good show, Topps. Good show.