The Panini America Quality Control Gallery: 2012 Prime Signatures Football (48 Images)
Almost lost amid the maddening fervor of activity around Panini America HQ in recent days (last week’s releases of 2012 Cooperstown and Signature Series Baseball and 2012-13 Certified Hockey, last weekend’s 2012 Toronto Fall Expo) was this little nugget: 2012 Prime Signatures Football releases in just two days.
And although we’ve been meaning to post the must-see results of last week’s Quality Control process for 2012 Prime Signatures for what seems like a week now, it seems our plans were constantly getting derailed by something else. But not this time.
This time, we’re going to deliver a revealing sneak peek of what anxious football collectors can expect from a product that boasts a strikingly clean design, a wealth of autograph content and some downright stunning Prime Proof parallels.
We’ll have more on 2012 Prime Signatures Football later this week, including a sure-to-be-captivating episode of Panini Unwrapped. So stay tuned to The Knight’s Lance for that. But for now, feast your eyes on these beauties . . .
The Knight's Lance 
So I’m assuming these ain’t cheap….MSRP?
$60/pack.
1pack per Hobby box/4 cards per pack…will run ya around $60:-)
These are Sweet guys:-) Are they a mix of on card auto AND sticker?:-)
Love how basic and clean the autos look on the white background. One of the things i enjoyed about last years product too. The only negative i have about the product is its one hit per box. If this was a $100 box with 4 hits i think it would be more impressive
Gotta love a gallery with new york giants in it
Nice looking product Tracy!! I like the addition of patch rookie autos into the product this go around. It also looks like many of the rookie autos are on-card instead of sticker which is just the way I like my autos!! By chance do you know how many of the rookies signed on-card versus sticker?? Thank you for your continued status updates with sneak peeks, keep up the great work Tracy!! Take care!
Question about classic players. Does someone own the USFL picture rights or logo rights? Would be cool for a retro set of USFL players in their USFL jerseys. Doug Flutie as a NJ General, Reggie White as a Memphis Showboat, Jim Kelly as a San Antonio Gunslinger, Herschel Walker as a General, Steve Young on the LA EXpress, on and on and on…..My team was the Philadelphia Stars, so maybe Sam Mills, Kelvin Bryant, or Irv Eatman-which has to be the best name for a lineman EVER!!!
Overall I like the look of the cards!!
Great point, Keith. I pitched an idea to our guys earlier this year about doing a USFL inclusion in one of our products. Would love to see guys like Doug Williams, Steve Young, Jim Kelly, Herschel Walker, the late, great Reggie White and so many other players in one of our sets.
As a fan of the long-lost USFL, I would be first in line (my brother would be 2nd) to pick up some of those inserts and regular cards. I think there enough HOF-caliber players as well as some who just were awesome in the USFL to merit an insert set. I know another company produced USFL sets back in the day when the USFL was playing, but I can’t think of any USFL inserts or the like since.
Not to mention how colorful the patch cards could be from a lot of the teams (like my Stars).
I think lost on the casual fan is how much innovation the USFL was pushing back in the day. They had the 2-point conversion (along with college of course), long before the NFL. I believe (although my memory is a bit foggy) that they also had a kind of instant replay challenge rule in their last season.
There was also a huge number of USFL players that went on to play in the NFL. Sam Mills, Sean Landetta, Kelvin Bryant, Irv Eatman, Bart Oates, alone came to mind from my STARS. I imagine each team had similar numbers if not more go on to the NFL.
Would be a cool set.
You guys also had Jim Mora as your coach one year, right?
He actually coached all 3 years (2 in Philly and the last season in Baltimore).
For some reason I was thinking he went to coach for the Breakers, but it was actually the Stars’ move to Baltimore. I went to an Oklahoma Outlaws/Chicago Blitz game in Tulsa many moons ago. Got to see Doug Williams play. Marv Levy was coaching the Blitz that season.
Very cool. My brother and I were season ticket holders from the start for the Stars. When they moved to Baltimore, we went down to UMD to see 3-4 games as well. My brother was at all 3 USFL Championship Games, while I made it to the last two (Tampa and Meadowlands).
That is awesome, man.
Prime 2012 looks great!! I love the plain white background and I’m glad you kept it again this year! Sometimes simple can look so elegant! Great job Panini! You guys are the best in the business!
Pretty great looking product overall, definitely a step up from last year. Thanks for the preview Tracy!
You took forever with this preview I outta rip you a …just kidding…lol…cards are nice design is clean …nice Curtis Martin auto I see there…the patch auto’s are nice as well as long as you can limit the bleeding into the material …but overall still a nice product..
What a sweet gallery with Seahawk players flying off the page! The Irvin,Turbin and Beast Mode cards are must haves and I will be keeping my eye out for them. Love the white border and explosive picture color and on card blue sharpie is the cherry on this sundae Panini.
I’m loving that Bernard Pierce RPA, great product this year it looks. I’ll be honest, I wasn’t a fan of it last year but I like this years alot more. Great work Tracy & Panini team!
Love the clean neat look ,best of the year so far!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I really like the design of these cards! Very simple and easy on the eyes and the autos look amazing as always!
Cool stuff- Way to go Panini! I am looking forward to pulling some Prime Signatires;) By the way Tracy I was wondering if Hall of Famers such as Jim Kelly have memorabilia cards in sets anymore? I remember pulling a Jim Kelly jersey card from 2010 Absolute Memorabilia but no other Hall of Famers from any other sets. Is there reasons for this? I know the jerseys of these guys are probably all used up-but do you guys have anything in storage? Just wondering about that if I should expect any HOFs in future sets. Not trying to come across to harsh- just something to consider. Thanks again
Absolutely. 2012 Certified Football has a large selection of Hall of Fame memorabilia cards in it and we’ll have more sets coming as the season progresses.
Thanks:) Glad to here that, I must have missed out on the Certified gallery.
Tracy,
That Tannehill on card auto is brilliant. Is that the base RC for Prime Signatures? What are the basic RC prints runs on the Tannehill, I see the one in the photo is out of /25 but I would assume there are different print runs.
Thanks,
T
Let me see if I can track down that checklist.
Bought one box at my LCS and pulled a triple auto of the top 3 NFL Draft Picks…Andrew Luck, RG3 and Trent Richardson. Very sweet. Especially since I see some sticker autos up there and mine is all ON CARD! Only gripe is it isnt numbered and I dont see a checklist with numbering. Any idea how many copies of this card exist? (Pen Pals #8)
Fantastic card! Congrats. Just looked at the checklist and there’s no numbering/quantity information there. I’ll look into and let you know what I find out.
Great. Thanks Tracy.
PS…May have been unintentional, but I love how Alshon Jeffery signed his card on the patch. Normally not a player I PC, but I want that card!
I think it was intentional by him. But we gave him different instructions. 🙂 Does make it unique, though. Glad to hear you like it. I would assume collectors could go either way with it.
Hey Tracy, were you able to find out numbering on that card? (Pen Pals #8: Luck, RG3, Richardson triple auto)? Please let me know. Thanks! Have a Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours!
Appreciate that, Mike. Happy Thanksgiving to you as well. Unfortunately, all I could get from our NFL Brand Manager was this simple statement: “Quantities not released. Very rare.”
Nothing changes, first box I rip of these this year and guess what? Redemption. I can’t stand this, wait for a new product only to pull a redemption of a player who probably is signing on the card, and now he’s a hot player, so furthermore I’ll probably never get the card because of the on card signing. Who cares, put a sticker on it i really don’t care. Thank god I went to the national and traded all my redemptions in because I STILL would not have any of the cards I was waiting for. Funny too the guy at the national was like ” you sure, this card is coming out soon” Yeah good one. I’ll wait, impatiently for my russell wilson auto, that I’ll probably never get.