2026 topps series 2 blaster review

i pre-ordered a mega box (not yet shipped) and a blaster/value box (arrived on release day - june 10) directly from topps back on may 11 when series 2 was first offered. let's take a look at the six packs i opened from the blaster.

pack 1:

not a lot to say now that this is the second go around for the card design. pitchers pitching, batters batting. one fielder and a couple of base runners.

the nolan arenado stars of mlb insert is the start of what was a fairly diamondback heavy blaster, and the jt realmuto holiday foil (base - sun) is the one "new" thing in the pack.

pack 2:

four dbacks in this pack. the adrian del castillo card is clearly showing off a dodger stadium background, so i suppose i will add it to that mini-collection. i've sort of begun gatekeeping that collection a bit more.

chase delauter is one of the rookie cards people were anticipating with series 2, but his bat has cooled off after a hot first week to the season. the last three cards are all inserts/parallels with the oswaldo cabrera card being a rainbow foil. the adrian beltre card is from the "glove works" insert set (no wes parker or steve garvey on the checklist), and the munetaka murakami stars of mlb insert was nice to find instead of someone else. as i write this, i note that murakami has either homered or struck out in exactly 50% of his at bats so far this season. that's 20 homers and 80 k's in 200 official at bats. 

pack 3:

paul gervase is my first series 2 dodger, and he's actually still with the team (although his card is airbrushed). the big news in this pack, however, is that someone at topps forgot to turn on a level in the "titans of the game" insert images before sending them to the printer.

that jackson chourio card at the bottom of the image looks empty. i knew what it was, but still turned the card over 

to confirm that it was indeed a titans of the game card. as a reminder, here is what these cards looked like in series 1

a bit different from series 2

let's cleanse the palate with a look at the back of gervase's card

gervase has appeared in a couple of games for the dodgers this season. if he had not, he would have been in zach lee and bruce brubaker territory in that he would have had a dodger card of his own while appearing in only one game for the club.

pack 4:

here we have justin verlander back in detroit, another diamondback, satchel paige keeping the browns' legacy alive, and a stars of mlb card featuring a red sox rookie that i am not familiar with.

pack 5:

the penultimate pack of the blaster was my favorite, largely because of kiké hernandez showing up, but it also included the "hit" of the blaster - the gold holofoil parallel of heston kjerstad. those are numbered to 399 on the back

speaking of backs, let's look at kiké's

nine-plus dodger seasons in the books for him, and he is the franchise's all-time leader in postseason games played. i am hopeful that he recovers from his injury and increases that number this fall.

pack 6:

perhaps the worst pack of the bunch. the combo card is strikingly boring compared to the action shots on the other cards, and the marcell ozuna card boasts a poor photoshop job. at least the juan soto insert is different - it's a league leader type card but is from the "crooked numbers" insert set.

i still have a mega box yet to be delivered, so i'll get another chance to rip some series 2 packs. i don't think i'll purchase any additional sealed product from this set, however. let me know if you have some dodgers to trade!