Buzz 12 in 12: Busting 2012 Topps Heritage (Hour 12)

Do you like Buzz Breaks? Today's your day then as we launch 12 in 12 -- a series of a dozen breaks of wax boxes and wax packs in a dozen hours. We'll post one every hour all day long ... this is our finale for today.

The box:2012 Topps Heritage baseball cards (24-pack retail)
Where to buy: Click here -- for Value Boxes with Heritage hobby packs

What's inside this one? Keep reading ...

Packs per box: 24
Cards per pack: 9
Cards in this box: 216
Base set completion: 
195 of 425 (46 percent)
Duplicates: 0

Notables on base cards – Albert Pujols, Buster Posey, Alex Rodriguez, Vladimir Guerrero, Clayton Kershaw, Madison Bumgarner, Roy Halladay, Cole Hamels, David Price, Tim Hudson, Chase Utley, Don Mattingly, Anthony Rizzo, Chipper Jones, Derek Jeter, Chris Sale, Jorge Posada, Carlos Beltran, Andrew McCutchen, Miguel Cabrera, Mariano Rivera, Craig Kimbrel

Rookie Cards (17) – Dellin Betances (SP), Joe Benson, Brad Peacock, Michael Taylor, Chris Parmelee, Drew Pomeranz, Liam Hendricks, Matt Dominguez, Jordan Pacheo, Steve Delabar, Andrew Brackman, Justin De Fratus and five multi-player cards with notables there being Matt Moore and Betances

Insert/short-print cards: 20 (gallery of these and more below)
Short-prints (Nos. 426-500) (8) – Ichiro Suzuki, Dellin Betances (RC), Carlos Gonzalez, Ben Revere, Kyle Seager, Derrek Lee, Matt Joyce, Jered Weaver
Chrome (2) – Danny Espinosa, Michael Pineda (/1,963)
Topps Stick-ons (3) – Buster Posey, Ian Kennedy, Troy Tulowitzki
Then & Now (1) – Harmon Killebrew & Jose Bautista
New-Age Performers (2) – Joey Votto, Tim Lincecum
News Flashbacks (2) – Martin Luther King Jr., Penn Station 
Baseball Flashbacks (1) – Willie McCovey

Autographs/Memorabilia: None

What's Buzz-worthy: If you're a regular reader of The Buzz then you've probably seen the eBay Buzz item where we recently spotlighted the crazy demand for the Mike Trout not-rookie card. (It's merely his first Heritage card but people are treating like it is an RC sales-wise. Another guy with this situation here? Anthony Rizzo -- but there's no premium there.) I scoured my 3,200-count box of this one and all of my Trouts set aside years ago and was shocked to find that I didn't pull him in Heritage. That got me looking for any type of boxes of 2012 Heritage on the cheap and it wasn't easy. Hobby boxes have steep asking prices and retail boxes like this one also aren't easily found. (See this link for your best shot at some hobby packs on the cheap.) I shockingly found these for roughly their original price and grabbed the last two boxes the dealer had. This box struck out on chasing Trout, but my second one (you've already seen here) delivered. The rookie crop here is quite rough these few years later, but there were some A-listers among the veterans in this box. You can land some amazing stuff here -- autographs are one in 562 packs in retail -- and Heritage can yield some big names such as Hank Aaron (I pulled that auto back when this was first released) but this was not one of those boxes. This one is realistically all about chasing Trout but the good stuff can still be in there. You'll need luck to find even retail boxes affordably, though. That's what makes the Value Boxes I mentioned earlier important -- and they can deliver very well. 

Product Grade: A
Box Grade: B- (closer to an average box but helped by Ichiro SP and other stars)
Fun Grade: B

What's next? That's it for this month's marathon -- look for a new one next month.

Follow Buzz on Twitter @BlowoutBuzz or send email to BlowoutBuzz@blowoutcards.com. 

>> Click here to buy cards on BlowoutCards.com

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