Topps Finest cards were always popular and fall into the “premium” and “super premium” categories as Topps was working hard on innovating the printing process and construction of the card. Today we are looking at the #114 Rasheed Wallace rookie, who, at the time, had the top career field goal percentage in the ACC! But we’re looking at this card for a different reason. Topps was introducing its “Chromium” technology and that gave these cards a unique, metallic shine. In this article, I want to draw your attention to a very informative blog post about how these cards were made. The author saw that printing plates for Chrome were reversed, but regular Topps were not. He then took apart a Chrome card and looked up the patents that Topps lists on the back of these Finest cards. He discovered that the cards were printed in reverse on a clear plastic section. Then this plastic section was joined with the foil (think of the card as a sandwich…top plastic part, ink underneath that, foil part). It’s a really cool blog post and really worth a read! And when you look at the patents, you’ll realize just how much effort Topps was putting into this design.
Unfortunately, with this new technology came what collectors today call “greening” or “Hulking.” And nothing conclusive is known. Stories include sets where only half of the cards turned green, cards turning green in PSA and BGS slabs, cards suddenly turning green after over 15 years of no changes, cards coming from the pack with some green… Some swear that if humidity and light are completely avoided, there is no change. But others seem 100% confident that the fate of all early Chromium cards is to turn green eventually. What can we say for sure? First, it never hurts to avoid humidity and sunlight, regardless of whether this helps with greening. Second, many factors probably contribute, but there seems to be a reaction between the ink and other materials. Changes in production were made and cards made after 1998 aren’t yet affected by greening. It’s an upsetting feature and the market is beginning to notice.
This Rasheed Wallace card comes from the 140-card Series I of 1995-96 Finest. Within this series is a 29 card subset of rookies arranged by order in the draft. They have an orange border and “NBA 1st Round Draft Pick” on the front. So this Rasheed Wallace is the fourth card of this subset.
If you’re curious to learn more about this set, please check out my articles on other cards from 1995-96 Finest!
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