the annual topps/topps dodger team factory set comparison

with the release of 2015 topps series 2, i figured it was time to address the differences between the topps 17-card factory dodger team set and the good ol' flagship cards.  last year, as you might recall, there was a dodger stadium card included in the factory set (which was nice, but had become somewhat repetitive), and the only other variation was the orientation of brian wilson's card.

before i begin with the side-by-side stuff, i'll note that topps did not add a set descriptor to the backs of the factory team set cards, as they are numbered 'lad-#', with clayton kershaw being the first card up.

so far, only series one and series two have had the descriptor above the card number.

here we go - flagship on the left, factory team set on the right.

lad-1 clayton kershaw

the only foil on this year's flagship cards is the topps logo, and the factory set cards replace it with white fill.  that's the only difference between these two cards.

lad-2 andre ethier

ethier, who was probably on the fence as far as inclusion in the factory set, has essentially the same card.  the only difference is the location of the topps logo.  i would have thought that justin turner had as good a chance as ethier to make this year's checklist.

lad-3 yimi garcia

yimi's topps logo remains in the same spot, but his rookie card designation got moved, which is an improvement over the flagship card.

lad-4 adrian gonzalez

the topps logo made a move on gonzalez's card, which i see as an improvement.

lad-5 zack greinke

again, the topps logo moved, but everything else remains the same.

lad-6 aj ellis

this is the star of the set, folks.  the series two card shows ellis in his catcher gear on the road while the factory set used a photo of ellis from last year's playoffs - nlds game 1 at dodger stadium - in which ellis hit a home run.  he was 4 for 5 in that game, but has only 12 hits in 26 games this season.

lad-7 carl crawford

nothing to see here except the transient topps logo

lad-8 brandon league

another topps logo relocation

lad-9 joc pederson

the topps logo remains in place, but the rookie card designation migrated to the other side of the card.

lad-10 yasiel puig

no change

lad-11 hyun-jin ryu

the topps logo moved to a better location.  seriously, does topps give no thought to where the logo appears? there is no consistency as far as one corner or the other, so i would think that if the logo were to be moved, there would be some effort to put it where it doesn't land on top of a players' elbow.  i guess not.

lad-12 yasmani grandal

ok, now i've come to the point where maybe i should have waited to do this post.  grandal had a card in series one, but he was shown as a padre.  the factory set photoshopped him into todd hundley's old uniform, which is actually a good job by topps. grandal wore number 8 with the pads, but switched to number 9 for the dodgers, and topps took notice of that.  anyway, grandal should get a card in the update set and we will have to wait and see whether or not it matches this one.

*edit - grandal's update card is, indeed, different than the topps dodger factory set

lad-13 jimmy rollins

topps did get rollins switched over to a dodgers uniform in the flagship set, but they did not do as well with his photoshopping as they did with grandal.  i guess that they did not anticipate him wearing number 11 as a dodger, even though that was the number he wore for most of his phillies career.  oh, there's no substantive difference between the two cards.

lad-14 howie kendrick

kendrick is in the same boat as grandal - he had a card in series one as an angel, and so we must wait until update is out to make a comparison between his dodger cards.

*edit - kendrick's update card shows him at the bat, so that's nice

lad-15 juan uribe

uribe should be in update, too, but he'll be wearing a braves uniform.  here, only the topps logo location is different between the two cards.

lad-16 kenley jansen

same.

lad-17 brandon mccarthy

mccarthy made four starts as a dodger, and was 3-0.  it helps when the team averages about 8 runs per start, however, as mccarthy's era was just under six. as for his photoshopped cards, topps got the number right, and then decided that the logo would look better in an already cluttered upper right corner instead of the open and dark upper left corner.

so, no dodger stadium card. no don mattingly card. no alex guerrero or carlos frias or justin turner, for that matter. just some strange decisions on logo placement and a second guessing of photo selection for aj ellis. maybe grandal and kendrick will get real dodger photos in update and there will be three variant cards in the factory set when it's all said and done. we'll have to wait and see.

well, that didn't last long

when 2015 topps series one was released, i expressed my happiness over the fact that 'series one' was added to the backs of cards. even if it only showed up on the base cards and not the inserts, it was a step in the right direction as far as being able to identify which set a certain card came from.  upper deck had done this for at least three years, and i am very thankful for it.

well, when i opened a pack of 2015 topps opening day, i was disappointed.  here's the back of adrian gonzalez's card from that set.

there is no mention of the set anywhere on the back.  granted, the front of the card

features the opening day logo, but i still lobby for set information on the backs.

here are some other 2015 cards that i've procured through a few pack purchases.

2015 donruss yasiel puig

these are not attractive cards, but flipping the inserts covered the cost of my jumbo pack, and so i got this puig for free.  i do not know what panini is obscuring by pasting into the picture a different group of fans above the brick wall, but i'm guessing it had something to do with logos.

how about some heritage? yes, i bought another 35-card box of 2015 topps heritage recently, and was rewarded with my first howie kendrick as a dodger card

plus the clayton kershaw/adam wainwright nl aces card

and a yimi garcia card

this is not the format for multi-team rookie cards in the 1966 set, by the way.

here's another rookie card from 2015 topps heritage that i picked up on sportlots.

it features the dodgers' centerfielder, joc pederson.

i've also gone and picked up a fair number of the dodger cards from the aforementioned 2015 topps series one set, including mr. pederson

and mr. garcia

who were given cards all to themselves by topps in this set.

here's andre ethier

who looks to be the odd man out in the outfield again this year.

here are yasiel puig on his base card

and his archetypes insert

lots of running photos for puig.

i assume topps is running out of photos to use of sandy koufax because they paired fernando valenzuela with kershaw on this inspired play insert

here's one of kershaw's league leader cards

and here's his base card

i picked up a few gold parallels on sportlots, including kershaw's

and hyun-jin ryu's (but first his base card)

ditto for carl crawford

and matt kemp

although i also picked up kemp's toys r us purple parallel

i thought about doing a rainbow of kemp's last dodger card, but i've sort of lost interest.

here's a-gon's gold parallel

which we know is from series one because it says so on the back.

i'll have to remember a few years from now that these first pitch inserts of suzy

and jeff bridges

are also from series one and not opening day (which has featured presidential first pitch inserts in the past) because topps apparently doesn't think consistently putting set information on the back is worthwhile.  maybe next year?