Random Topps Team Set of the Week: 2010 Topps Toronto Blue Jays

Thanks to the Topps Card Randomizer, introducing the Random Topps Team Set of the Week:

• Team: 2010 Topps Toronto Blue Jays
• Record: 85-77, fourth place, AL East Division.
• Manager: Cito Gaston
• Card on the Top: Aaron Hill

The checklist consists of the following players:

• TOR1 Aaron Hill
• TOR2 Lyle Overbay
• TOR3 John McDonald
• TOR4 Ricky Romero
• TOR5 Edwin Encarnacion
• TOR6 Scott Downs
• TOR7 Alex Gonzalez
• TOR8 Vernon Wells
• TOR9 Brett Cecil
• TOR10 Brandon Morrow
• TOR11 Dustin McGowan
• TOR12 David Purcey
• TOR13 Marc Rzepczynski
• TOR14 Adam Lind
• TOR15 Jose Bautista
• TOR16 Travis Snider
• TOR17 Scott Richmond

The cards in order from the set (the checklist at the end was cut from the back of the package. What, you don't do that?):

Key differences between the team set and 2010 Topps eponymous set:

• John McDonald played 63 games for the Blue Jays at second, third, and short. He does not appear in either the base set or the Update Series set though. Alex Gonzalez played in 85 games for the Blue Jays in 2010 before being traded off to the Atlanta Braves. Although he ended the 2009 season with the Red Sox, he was not included in either series of 2010 Topps. He was included in the Update Series as a member of the Braves. Scott Richmond went 8-11 with the Jays in 2009.  Injured for most of 2010, he did play in 9 games in the minors.  He does not appear in either the regular or update products.  So the only place you'll find a card of these three players as members of the Blue Jays using the 2010 Topps design is in the retail set.

• You can see more of the background on Aaron Hill's card than you do in the retail set:
  
  

• Ricky Romero's picture is more close up on the base set than in the retail set:
  
  

• The eponymous set uses a different picture of Scott Downs compared to the retail set:
  
  

• You get an even closer shot of Brett Cecil in the base set:
  
  

• Brandon Morrow played for the Mariners in 2009. He was traded to the Blue Jays in before the end of the year. His 2010 Topps card has him representing the Mariners (as it should be) and the retail set uses the same picture, but a photoshopped Blue Jays jersey. He does appear in the Update Series as a Blue Jay:
  
  

• Dustin McGowan? Same deal as with Brett Cecil:
  
  

• The picture used for David Purcey's regular Topps card is different from his retail card:
  
  

• And we're back with the closeup pictures with Marc Rzepczynski:
  
  

• Jose Bautista made a name for himself in 2010, after years of bouncing around with five different organizations. He played in 113 games with the Jays in 2009, but for some reason, Topps didn't see it fit to include him in the base set. So when he broke out the whooping stick in 2010, it made Topps look the fool that he wasn't part of the eponymous set. To make up for it, they included him in the Update Series. At least Topps' included him in the retail set:
  
  

• Travis Snider's retail card uses a different picture than his regular card:
  
  

So of the 17 players included in this set, one's card features a picture was photoshopped from the base set, five are closeups of their eponymous card, four use totally unique pictures only found in the retail set, and as Blue Jays, only three of them you will only find in the retail set.

Next week's featured set will be the 2008 Florida Marlins. Hope you'll be here when we compare the cards from the retail set to their counterparts found in Topps and Topps Updates and Highlights.

Sincerely,

JayBee Anama