One of my favorite products is now live, and I am happy to see the final results after seeing the previews come through. In 2012, Strata was by far one of the coolest new products of the year, and I have been eagerly awaiting the second go around.

Here is what is up so far:

2013 Topps Strata Tavon Austin Auto Patch Shadowbox /15 – Another awesome year of these.

2013 Topps Strata Eli Manning Base Auto 10/50

2013 Topps Strata Terrance Williams Clear Cut Auto Jumbo Patch Ruby /15

2013 Topps Strata Andre Ellington Gold Clear Cut Patch Auto

2013 Topps Strata DeAndre Hopkins Clear Cut Auto Jersey

First off, I think the clear cut autographs continue to be impressive and making the most of this time in the card year. Having hard signed cards that look as good as these cards, is always a plus. To have the box cost under 75 bucks is even more attractive. You dont have to break the bank to get a nice looking hard signed card.

We also see that there will be some veteran autographed shadowbox style cards this year, thanks to the checklist released today. I am EXTREMELY excited about these, even though Adrian Peterson wasnt included. I think these cards are some of the best in a long time, and adding more content to them is great. They also included unsigned shadowbox cards out of 50, which is awesome as long as they dont replace the normal autographed case hits. The design has been tweaked enough to keep Strata in line with the expectations of collectors, and I hope that it does well enough to be back for a third year.

The only complaint continues to center around what is in the packs outside of the clear cut cards, and I am wondering if Strata would be better as a one pack box. It would cut costs overall, and hopefully add some potential in who could be included on the veteran checklist.

Now that we see some of the 1/1s that are up, cards like this really make me upset that they werent planned out more effectively. Because of the way the player is positioned, the swoosh is covered up. It ruins the card, an unfortunate situation that would have normally been awesome.

EDIT: Looks like some of them came out right. This might have been this one only.

EDIT 2: Looks like there are also glove patch clear cut 1/1s, as well as some event used football clear cut auto 1/1s too. These were there last year too, but look better this year.

For 70 bucks, I think this is a great buy, considering what you get. As little as 7 days ago, people were paying 108 for sticker autos and horrible looking cards out of Totally Certified, so this should be a walk in the park. If anything, I would browse for singles of the players you collect, because they always look amazing.