Terrible Collation From This Years SPA Cases!

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chakhae1

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I am surprised that this has not been discussed anywhere I am active, but Upper Deck over the past couple of years has had boxes without any hits and I finally got info on what kind of things they are replacing these unfortunate boxes with. Sadly, nothing much.

I saw a case break of SPA over a month or so ago and as typical UD goes, out of the 12 boxes most of them had 2-3 autos, a couple had 5 or so autos and one had none. The replacements were no one worth mentioniing and the box was also missing all the inserts, but those weren't replaced at all. The autos I do believe were one FWA and a SOTT, but the only positive thing about this process is that the replacements arrived quickly and as far as I know nothing had to be mailed to the head office and it can be completed online.

So my question is what are your opinions on this and has anyone actually received anything decent from Upper Deck?
 
My opinion on this is to not buy SP Authentic.

One of my good friends here busts multiple cases of SPA each year and his first (and only) case this year yielded the same result. Boxes with zero autos and some with more than they should have and in the end, he was missing hits/autos expected from a case. He asks my opinion on busting more and I asked him if he was expecting a different result, which is the definition of insanity. I told him he should just buy the singles he needs (and yes, I do get the catch-22...no singles if no one is breaking...the good news is that people are out there doing the same thing over and over expecting a different result).

There are much better ways to lose your money.
 
I completely get not breaking the product. And that's exactly what I've decided to do going from >10 masters per annum through 19-20 to 0 for 20-21.

However - not breaking it has (I think) a lot more to do with the price point being crazy given the value obtained rather than the QA issue of missing hits on the basis that, at least in my experience, UD will make you whole on what you missed assuming you're able to substantiate your losses (which is fair enough IMHO).
 
BrookIsland said:
Just to level set: what do you expect UD to replace the missing hits with?
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I don't know, but I would hope they would care more about sending out multiple boxes of nothing but base cards in a product that has been one of their staples than sending out $5 autos as replacements. Also happened with Goodwin Champions as well and it clearly seems to me that something is really lacking there at UD HQ.

Collectors have been walking away from the hobby b/c of the insane prices and this is just another reason not only to get away, but stay away from it.
 
chakhae1 said:
I don't know, but I would hope they would care more about sending out multiple boxes of nothing but base cards in a product that has been one of their staples than sending out $5 autos as replacements. Also happened with Goodwin Champions as well and it clearly seems to me that something is really lacking there at UD HQ.

Collectors have been walking away from the hobby b/c of the insane prices and this is just another reason not only to get away, but stay away from it.
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Ok, so just to play devil's advocate, if you're UD, you're taking someone's word that they didn't get any hits in a box and you have ~65 FWAs available (plus the retros), perhaps ~10-15 of which is worth more than $10-15 USD. You can't possible send a Kaprizov/Laffy out to everyone who says they didn't get any autos, right?

That said, the vast majority of boxes *with* autos have a return of ~$25-35 USD total if you count the base limited autos, the /950 (i.e., non-inscribed FWAs) and the SOTTs which are the common hits.

Breaking boxes is, in general, therefore a terrible investment! Less so if you do it by the (master) case.

That brings us to the fact that this is really not a replacement issue. At least IMO.

What you're raising is an issue that the box price has no relationship to the value proposition at 300 USD a box. At 100 USD or so a box, taking a 60-70% haircut per box may make sense for some people. Less so when that haircut goes to 90%+.
 
BrookIsland said:
Ok, so just to play devil's advocate, if you're UD, you're taking someone's word that they didn't get any hits in a box and you have ~65 FWAs available (plus the retros), perhaps ~10-15 of which is worth more than $10-15 USD. You can't possible send a Kaprizov/Laffy out to everyone who says they didn't get any autos, right?

That said, the vast majority of boxes *with* autos have a return of ~$25-35 USD total if you count the base limited autos, the /950 (i.e., non-inscribed FWAs) and the SOTTs which are the common hits.

Breaking boxes is, in general, therefore a terrible investment! Less so if you do it by the (master) case.

That brings us to the fact that this is really not a replacement issue. At least IMO.

What you're raising is an issue that the box price has no relationship to the value proposition at 300 USD a box. At 100 USD or so a box, taking a 60-70% haircut per box may make sense for some people. Less so when that haircut goes to 90%+.
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My initial thought is that UD is at the mercy of the honesty of their customers, but equally so, the customers are at the mercy of UD selling them a $300 product that has minimal QA. UD HAS to know something is wrong with their packout.

Between that and inserting previous years' cards as hits (as opposed to bonus cards) coupled with jacked up prices, walking away couldn't be easier.
 
Say you open 1 box and get no autos, UD should then send you replacement autos. But what if you open a 5 box inner case and get the expected 10 autos overall, but have 1 box what no autos. Should we expect UD to send you 2 "missing" autos even though you had other boxes that had more than the stated autos?

And you can't blame the inflated cost all on UD, the distributors are as much or more to blame in my experience. Thank goodness it isn't like football and basketball are right now.

Triple B said:
My initial thought is that UD is at the mercy of the honesty of their customers, but equally so, the customers are at the mercy of UD selling them a $300 product that has minimal QA. UD HAS to know something is wrong with their packout.

Between that and inserting previous years' cards as hits (as opposed to bonus cards) coupled with jacked up prices, walking away couldn't be easier.
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Considering the price point has nearly tripled and the amount of autos has come down 33%, SPA is absolutely not worth the money.
 
Burner said:
Considering the price point has nearly tripled and the amount of autos has come down 33%, SPA is absolutely not worth the money.
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This point 100%. Collectors need to open their eyes and realize that most if not all product is not worth the investment. I am just too much of an addict to stop busting wax, but for sure it has reduced substantially over the past couple of years.
 
Triple B said:
Between that and inserting previous years' cards as hits (as opposed to bonus cards) coupled with jacked up prices, walking away couldn't be easier.
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This is one of the biggest problems to me. UD presumably makes back their manufacturing costs for those update cards when they sell the initial release they were produced for. By inserting cards that were essentially already paid for into a future release, as a hit rather than bonus content, that seems like double-dipping to me. Basically selling the same card twice before it actually comes out of a pack.

Maybe I’m wrong and the late returns/future update cards are taken out of the equation when the product gets packed out without them but I doubt it. The boxes and cases are already pre-sold leading up to release and UD wouldn’t know until packout what makes it in on time and what doesn’t. I’d be real curious to know more about how update cards are accounted for when the beans get counted.

Update cards should be bonus hits regardless. Nobody is buying 2020 SPA (in 2022) to pull a Rhett Gardner FWA from 2019 as one of their only two hits.
 
FrozenInferno said:
This is one of the biggest problems to me. UD presumably makes back their manufacturing costs for those update cards when they sell the initial release they were produced for. By inserting cards that were essentially already paid for into a future release, as a hit rather than bonus content, that seems like double-dipping to me. Basically selling the same card twice before it actually comes out of a pack.

Maybe I’m wrong and the late returns/future update cards are taken out of the equation when the product gets packed out without them but I doubt it. The boxes and cases are already pre-sold leading up to release and UD wouldn’t know until packout what makes it in on time and what doesn’t. I’d be real curious to know more about how update cards are accounted for when the beans get counted.

Update cards should be bonus hits regardless. Nobody is buying 2020 SPA (in 2022) to pull a Rhett Gardner FWA from 2019 as one of their only two hits.
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I definitely hear you in part - and getting random, XRCs of no-name players and/or similar SOTT/Limited auto updates for non-stars is definitely deflating as you're breaking boxes (particularly if you get multiples of them...).

That said, on the economics, I have to think UD is at the mercy of all of the signers to get their cards in on time so counting on everything UD has sent out coming back fully (or properly) signed is likely unworkable - i.e., they have to assume some portion will always not make it back in time and that therefore they similarly bake in using as back-fill the updates from the prior year(s).

I think we're all really agreeing with each other in any case, SPA is unfortunately not good value at 300 USD (or even 300 CAD) a box.
 
Burner said:
Considering the price point has nearly tripled and the amount of autos has come down 33%, SPA is absolutely not worth the money.
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THIS. Triple the cost and longer odds? No thanks. Seriously, wax prices exploding in the last 2-3 years is the best thing that could ever have happened in this hobby.
 
The logic to why anyone is buying UD retail also puzzles me. UD S1 and 2 Blasters cost more and come with 1 less YG. The same goes for SPA Blasters. Didn't they used to guarantee a jersey? And now there's only 1-2 per case. Makes zero sense whatsoever.
 
creasecollector said:
Key point here.
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It is up to UD to manage their distribution. They can very easily require them to sell at MSRP, and if they don't, pull them from the distribution chain. I'm not sure why they would let distributors mark product up, if I was UD I'd take that profit for myself.

In fact, in todays day and age why even use distributors at all, pretty easy to ship direct to stores and consumers. The product is dimensional and ships easily, not like these are couches or fridges.
 
chakhae1 said:
The logic to why anyone is buying UD retail also puzzles me. UD S1 and 2 Blasters cost more and come with 1 less YG. The same goes for SPA Blasters. Didn't they used to guarantee a jersey? And now there's only 1-2 per case. Makes zero sense whatsoever.
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As far as I remember, SP retail blasters never guaranteed a jersey. In my opinion, the main attraction from that product is the numbered rookies. Also, the blue rookies are a nice affordable way to get rookie year cards of your favorite prospects.
 
I stopped collecting SPA 2 years ago, and it doesn't appear that I'll ever be collecting it again.

I agree with everyone here, and I've been saying it for a few years now, updates should be bonus cards.
 

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