2014 Topps Factory Team Set - Philadelphia Phillies

After two weeks’ worth of All-Star teams, its back to regular team sets.

As a refresher, I started these before Series 2 came out so I’m just comparing Series One and Opening Day to the Factory Team Set (FTS) release.

Today, I have the Philadelphia Phillies. They had 10 cards in Series One, 10 cards in Opening Day and as usual, 17 cards in the FTS. Of the 37 “different” cards, how many were actually different? Let’s take a look.

Of the ten cards in Series One, nine of them showed up in the FTS.

Cole Hamels, Ryan Howard Carlos Ruiz

Domonic Brown, Ben Revere

Jimmy Rollins, Jonathan Papelbon

Cody Asche and John Mayberry were in Series One and the FTS, but left out of Opening Day.

Of the 10 cards from Opening Day, seven had already been used in Series One, and two new ones showed up in the FTS.

Chase Utley, Cliff Lee

With eleven different cards shown so far, that leaves five player cards that were new to the FTS (and presumably Series Two).

Marlon Byrd, Kyle Kendrick

Jonathan Pettibone, Darin Ruf

Freddy Galvis

And of the course, the stadium shot. I have seen more Cubs games at the Phillies’ old ballpark, Veterans Stadium than any other park but I have not yet been to Citizens Bank.

For those keeping count, one card from Series One didn’t make Opening Day or the FTS.

Ethan Martin didn't start the 2014 on the big-league roster so it’s understandable that he didn’t make the other sets.

And one card from Opening Day didn’t appear in Series One or the FTS.

Roy Halladay was granted free agency at the end of October last year and chose to retire in December due to a persistent back injury. He signed a one-day contract to retire with the Blue Jays so it makes sense here too that Halladay wasn’t included in the FTS. I did say that I wasn’t looking at Series Two for these comparisons but in this case, I did. Halladay is included so he gets a proper “sunset” card with complete career stats.

To answer my original question, how many of the 37 “different” Phillies cards were actually different. Seventeen from the FTS, one from Series One and one from Opening Day gives us a total of 19 different players. There a few Topps logo swaps (Lee, Papelbon and Rollins) but otherwise, 19 doesn't make for a real diverse collection.

But on a happier note (maybe) we also have the Phillie Phanatic from Opening Day.