Say this about Panini America’s Torque NASCAR brand: It knows how to make a good first impression. When 2016 Torque NASCAR Racing arrived last October as the company’s second-ever NASCAR product, it made history on a number of fronts. It marked the company’s first usage of race-used sheet metal . . . the first usage of race-worn and race-used memorabilia . . . the first usage of jumbo memorabilia . . . and the first usage of multi-piece memorabilia cards.
The result was a high-end, hit-filled maiden offering that followed the successful NASCAR debut of Prizm with something a little more high-end. The good news for fans and collectors who loved Torque’s debut? It’s back for an encore tomorrow with the release of 2017 Torque NASCAR Racing. Once again this season, Torque will deliver one autograph or memorabilia card per pack. Each five-pack hobby box will deliver, on average, three autograph cards and two memorabilia cards.
The Panini America Product Development and Creative teams collaborated last season to breathe bold, new life into the venerable Donruss Elite Football franchise, ushering in an exciting new chapter in Elite’s proud history. The complete overhaul included everything from a new product logo to new parallels to a bevy of well-executed new designs. The product was met by collectors with a warm embrace — and almost immediately heightened expectations for next year.
Well, next year is now — and 2017 Donruss Elite Football is set to arrive in hobby shops across North America in two short days. As you’ll see in the revealing Quality Control Gallery that follows, last year’s revamp continues to serve the product so well. On average, each hobby box of 2017 Donruss Elite Football (five cards per pack, 20 packs per box) will deliver two autographs, one memorabilia card, eight inserts, six parallels and three Rookie Cards (numbered to 499).
At first glance, Panini America’s Unparalleled name seems like a misnomer for a football product that has so many parallels. But dig a little deeper and you come to find — as many collectors did last season during the brand’s debut — that it’s unparalleled not because it’s devoid of parallels but because there’s no other football product quite like it.
And when 2017 Unparalleled Football arrives in hobby shops across North America in early August, it will wield a similarly dazzling array of parallels and a new configuration that delivers two autographs and one memorabilia in every box (eight cards per pack, eight packs per box, 16 boxes per case).
In an effort to keep collectors updated on the status of those Panini America redemption cards that are currently being processed, we’ll post a list every week, like the one included in the attachments below, detailing the most recent cards being fulfilled this week.
The following list is intended to inform collectors about which redemption cards from which products are being processed this week. We’ll update this list every week so stay tuned next week if you don’t see your card here.
Having a (Lonzo) Ball: The Sights, Sounds of Panini America’s 2017 NBA Draft Pre-Party
NEW YORK — On Tuesday night in New York City, just a few long Steph Curry 3-pointers or so away from Times Square, Panini America welcomed a few new members to the family during the company’s inaugural NBA Draft Pre-Party inside the impressive National Basketball Players Association corporate facility. The entertaining night featured special appearances from new Panini America athletes Lonzo Ball, Jayson Tatum, Jonathan Isaac and Lauri Markkanen— and veteran leadership provided by Knicks legend John Starks.
In addition to signing some autographs for upcoming Panini America products and projects, the rookies in attendance — representing last night’s second (Ball), third (Tatum), sixth (Isaac) and seventh (Markkanen) overall picks — shot some hoops with party guests, and helped Michael Hodges of STL Sports Cards and Bryan Gavin from Ultimate Box Breaks, crack a few early cases of 2016-17 Spectra Basketball.
