MiLB Corner: Minor League Team Sets
The Stockton Ports are my home team. My wife and I have been season ticket holders for the Ports since 2013. Minor League Baseball is baseball in its purest form. Players are working hard to rise up through the system. Mistakes are made on the field with the hope that they will learn from it and do better next time. Even the worst Minor Leaguer is in the top one percent of all baseball players.
To me one of the more underrated aspects of the trading card hobby is the Minor League Team Set. There’s nothing glamorous about owning a 2017 Stockton Ports card of Angel Duno, but there are several aspects about Minor League team sets that are interesting.
Limited Print Run: Most Minor League team sets average between 1,000 and 2,000 sets. Some team sets are limited to 500 copies. The actual number is not advertised, but most teams order these sets as a one-time purchase, making them available until they sell out.
Random Players: The team set showcases most of the regular players from the first part of the season. In the lower levels, many of these players will not even make it past Double-A. On some levels it is exciting to think that this might be one of the few cards a player may get.
First Professional Card: Some draft picks and prospects will have their first professional card in the Minor League team set. A couple examples: the 2021 Stockton Ports update team set has the first professional card for the Oakland A’s second baseman Zack Gelof. The 2022 Delmarva Shorebirds team set features the first professional card for MLB’s number one prospect Jackson Holliday. The release date for both of these cards predate major releases like Bowman Draft or Panini Prizm Draft Picks.
Every couple of weeks, in the MiLB Corner, we will be taking a look at various Minor League teams sets. We will look at the checklist, the design and other interesting facts about the team from that season. We will also dive into other Minor League cards sets like the Pro Cards sets produced in the early 1990s and the more recent Topps Pro Debut.
On a personal note: I mentioned the 2017 Stockton Ports card of Angel Duno earlier in this post. One of the reasons this card resonates with me is that I own and wear one of his game used jerseys from a theme night the Ports hosted in 2017 or 2018. There’s a personal connection to me for this player.
