Card Design vs. Licensing

In general, I can't really deal with unlicensed cards.  It really hurt my soul when Upper Deck lost their NBA, NFL, and MLB licenses, since I really favored their card designs the most.  In general, I don't really care for a lot of Panini designs by and large, as they seem to me to mostly be recycled and uncreative.  It also really annoys me when expensive products, especially high end stuff, have sticker autographs.  Like, why does National Treasures have sticker autographs.  Is a $500+ MSRP not enough to get people to sign on a card?

I do have a soft spot for Hall of Famers and on card autographs.  So, this leads me to the 2012 Panini Cooperstown sets.  These cards aren't for everyone, and in fact, many people think they are straight up ugly.  To get around the lack of licensing and logos, many of the players have photoshopped (nee airbrush, we don't really use "airbrushing" any more, although it is a setting on photoshop!) and have their hats cropped out.  But the pictures are stylish and black and white, and the cards have beautiful on card autographs on them.  I think the only sticker autographs in the set are the guys who died before the cards could be produced.  This set is familiar to many people for featuring a nice (the first?) Vin Scully on card autograph.  Good stuff.

The set is very affordable, and even the wax is still very affordable.  It's a fun set to open and collect, and if you're looking for some nice looking on card Hall of Fame autographs, give it a look.  Some of the short numbered parallels are hard to find and expensive, so maybe there are a few guys out there putting the set together.