2016 Panini Instant: Jacoby Brissett #51 (1 of 85)

The 2016 NFL season rolls on and Panini Instant is there to capture the moments with their newest made to order series of cards. During Tom Brady's 4 week vacation at the beginning of the season, the back up QBs got a chance to show the league what they were capable of. Jacoby Brissett, the Patriots 3rd round pick in this year's draft got the call after Jimmy Grappalo went down with an injury. The product of NC State, the QB led the team to a 27-0 win over the Texans.

His Instant card captures his first NFL touchdown on September 22, 2016 where he scrambled for 27 yards and dove into the end zone for the score. The base version of the card ended up with only 85 total copies sold, kind of surprising since the card carries the rookie card (RC) designation. Maybe people aren't prospecting with this kid?

Panini Instant

You know the old saying "imitation is the sincerest form of flattery"? Well I guess that is the case here with Panini's newest venture, Panini Instant.

Hot on the heels of Topps' successful Topps Now program, Panini is also offer up special cards that commemorate certain events or feats in sports during the 2016 NFL season. I happened to see a blurb about this a few weeks ago in one of their newsletters I receive in my inbox. Actually what caught my eye wasn't the article able the program itself, but the image of Carolina Panthers QB, Cam Newton.

Panini is even pricing their cards the same as Topps. Each card retails for $9.99 with free shipping. However Panini took it a step further and is producing serially numbered colored parallels. Orange are numbered to 50, blue are numbered to 25, purple are numbered to 10, green are numbered to 5 and there is also a black 1/1 for each card. Prices range from $24.99 to $149.99.

While Topps is releasing the print run for each card after the 24 hour window to purchase the card has closed, Panini is actually printing this print run on the back of the card. You can see above that the first card in the set had a print run of only 140 cards.

The cards themselves seem to be printed on normal card stock. They of course have a UV coating on the front and back. I love the simple, boarderless design and the full bleed photos. However it may just be me, but the image looks a little fuzzy...even in hand. Cam already has two cards in the set and his #1 target, wide receiver Kelvin Benjamin has a card. These photos seem to be a little fuzzy too.

Overall I'm excited about the program and it's nice to see that Panini has a little a variety over Topps, however if Topps had the NFL license and was making Topps Now cards, I think I'd give Topps a slight edge.