2023 Topps Heritage Baseball Forum

Though I am a young collector, I am old-school in that I love set collecting. My dad got me into set collecting when he pointed out I should try to put together the complete set of my first set -- 2007 Topps (I hadn't even noticed the card numbers on the back at first). For my borderline OCD self and little funds to spare on cards, it made the perfect challenge. To this day, I still enjoy hand-collecting sets from packs and trading for those last few cards. 

Well, back to my dad, he only collected for 1-2 years in his childhood. He collected for parts of '73 and '75, but he mainly collected Topps in 1974. He eventually was able to put together a master set with all known variations, errors, traded, and team checklist cards. 

When I was about 11 or 12 years old around 2010, my dad gave me that collection. Since then, I had 2023 circled as the year that Topps would produce a Heritage set of '74 Topps. I wondered if I still would be collecting, if Topps would still be making Heritage, and if card collecting would even be a thing anymore, because when I started collecting, the few LCSs I would visit always seemed to have a doom and gloom attitude about the hobby, saying it was dying (lol). 

Well, here we are. We made it to 2023, and all the stars have aligned such that I will be able to collect this set like crazy. I haven't yet figured out how deep I am going to go into collecting the SPs, because obviously it is ridiculous now, but one thing is for sure, I will be ripping a lot of 2023 Heritage. I know the '74 set backwards and forwards, so I'm interested to see how they tip the cap to some of the errors and variations. 

• How will they deal with the Washington Nat'l League variations?
• Will they have a league leaders card with a player's name misspelled (like Apodaca vs Apodaco)
• Will they have one or several "no position" variations

Lastly, what I am most curious about is how they will handle "high numbers" and the traded set. 1974 was the first year that Topps released the entire 660 card set in one series. 1973 was the last year that "high numbers" had any meaning and we're short-printed. With that in mind, does Topps not produce Heritage High Numbers (HHN) starting this year? In the past, HHN never struck me as a particularly popular set, but even so, can Topps refuse the urge to continue producing it to make a few extra bucks in order to preserve historical accuracy? I hope they do not produce it, but I am doubtful. 

As for the traded set, '74 was the first year Topps produced "traded" cards (which was only produced once more time in '76 before becoming a mainstay boxed set in 1981). However, what made them unique was that they were issued in regular packs late in the 1974 season. In a sense, the traded set could be considered the "high numbers" of that season. Does Topps maybe produce a set similar to HHN called "Trades" instead? Does Topps short print traded cards using players traded over the off-season? There are a ton of options Topps could do here, or they might just not even touch it. That would be unfortunate though, as it was something very unique to the '74 set. 

That was my long-winded reasoning for being excited about the 2023 Heritage, and some curiosities I have about how Topps will deal with it -- I think it will require more creativity than prior years to deal with the high numbers and traded fiasco. We'll see if Topps delivers. I am just hoping they stay as historically accurate as they possibly can.

Fantastic story - thank you for sharing.  Among other things, I appreciate that you are a set collector and that you got that from your Dad.  I'm trying to teach my daughter in a similar way although right now, she is more of a PC, A&G collector, and a "hit-hunter" and absolutely nothing wrong with that - I'll take what I can get.

If 2023 Heritage is similar to 2022, they will tend to mimic the "errors" - gaps in the black border, etc., for 2022.  I'm not sure what sort of licensing issues they'll run into for SD/Washington, etc., but hopefully, they will bring back what they can for nostalgic purposes.  In any case, I hope you enjoy collection the set. 

I know exactly how you feel!  I latched onto the 2020 Topps Heritage set for similar reasons.  That '71 design and memories involving my grandparents led me to chasing the master set.  I'm seven Throwback variations away from completing it.

Good luck deciding what to go after and better luck going after it.

PS...any help from the community with the 2020 Topps Heritage Throwback variations that I'm still chasing would be appreciated!

A couple of years ago they did the SD/Wash variants in Archives with Toronto/Buffalo which made perfect sense.  I would really like to see something like Oakland/Vegas or Tampa/Charlotte that have been rumored but not really substantially.  Like you I don't know if it will pass muster with MLB. 

As far as High Numbers go, I hope they stick around just because it is usually one of the few late season sets (along with Update) with a fairly large number of players that don't get cards elsewhere.  There are more than enough of the Ginter, Archives, Gold Label, Gallery, Fire that have the same 150 players + 50 legends.  To me, HHN stands out because at least some relievers or non-superstar traded vets get included.  Maybe they could do it like Traded or at least have a subset of traded players.  Of course there would have to be some trades made for that to work and trades don't really happen that much outside of the deadline anymore.  And that might be past their deadline for player additions to the set. 

Who knows?

I've been looking forward to this set for years as well! Back when I was a kid and my dad & I started collecting, he spent years putting together a 1974 Topps set for me, because it was my birth year.

I never caught the set collecting bug, I've always been more of a player collector. But I've had 2023 Heritage circled on my calendar for years, because I'm going to honor him and relive those memories of going to card shows and shops and sifting through the commons with him to complete that set.

i'm going HARD on 2023 Heritage, and would love to trade with you to get there!

That is a great story, thanks for sharing.  I hope one day my son might "pay homage" to me in a similar fashion.  It sounds like your dad got what he probably wished the most for-a thoughtful and appreciative son.  Keep us updated on your progress! 

I too am looking forward to the 23 Release. I keep checking on the release date for 2023 Topps Heritage but haven't found anything yet.  Had a friend that went to a Topps Convention a couple of weeks ago and he tried prying information out on it then and had no success.  Lots of Topps products have been hush hush lately...hopefully we will know more soon.

As far as the SPs go...the base set SPs are not as difficult to find over the variation SP or SSPs, but if you're going to build the set, I would try to get the base set SPs too.  

Very curious to see if card #161 in the set has the card number in the incorrect direction!  Uncorrected error in 1974.

It's people like you that restore my faith in this hobby that has gone so crazy recently. Thanks for sharing your story and i wish you luck in your chase. 

I started collecting in 1974. My dad brought home packs of 74 Baseball and I was hooked. I’m putting together the 74 Topps set and the 2023 Heritage set.