Topps Needs Photoshop Lessons

Once it was just one of several struggling trading card companies on the market, but since last year Topps has been the exclusive producer of Major League Baseball cards. Naturally, with a lack of competition comes sloppiness and laziness. ↵↵Hence, you have the company rushing to print cards of recently signed free agents with their new team. Because otherwise Little Billy will have to wait until Series 1 next year to get a Curtis Granderson card featuring the player in pinstripes.↵

↵↵Instead of simply arranging a photo session with star players and shooting them posing in the uniform of their old team, Topps simply takes action shots from last year and tries to Photoshop the player into his new uniform. Trouble is, they do a ham-fisted job of it.↵

↵↵The blogosphere has caught two such examples in this year’s set. On the Cliff Lee card, the pitcher is shown on the mound featuring his new Mariner duds, which is fine except he’s still sporting the “HK” badge that the Phillies wore last year to honor the late broadcaster Harry Kalas. Then there’s the Roy Halladay card. While there’s no technical sartorial error on his card, they gave the pitcher jersey number 32. The person responsible for the Photoshop surely thought he would retain the same number he had with the Blue Jays. Only the Phillies retired the number 32, which once belonged to legend Steve Carlton. Whoops.↵

↵↵But, hey, a two-card set featuring Lee in the same pose in both his Phillies and Photoshopped Mariners uniform sold for $55 on eBay, so at least somebody made some money off this. ↵

↵↵(H/T to The Fightins)↵

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