2015 Panini Donruss Soccer Box (it's here!)

I said I was going to break one of these so here it is.

Here's your base card, front an back.  I can't really say I hate the design and I wasn't really expecting much going into this, so I suppose this was a very "gentle" surprise.  I wouldn't go so far to say that I love it.  The card back is absolutely hideous...

However, my two main qualms of the base set is as follows:

1. The set is 100 cards and you receive right around 150 base cards in a box.  ... ... ... WHY!?!?  This kind of thing confounds me.  Why would a person POSSIBLY want the same card over and over again in the same box?!?!
2. This 100 card set only features about 15 clubs from across the world.  I would say that the vast majority of clubs were great picks, but there are no English clubs and for some reason Panini chose to include Club America (a team from Mexico for those of you that don't know) in this set.  Every other club is European... I don't get it.

The box also came with two short print national team variant base cards.  They aren't numbered or anything, but I thought these were pretty cool.

The box did, however, have plenty of inserts.  Here's some samples.

Every pack had 1.75 inserts on average so I ended up with quite the stack.

I got many and more of the most of the above inserts.  I simply picked out my favorites to show off.  If you notice, some of these inserts feature players from English squads, but they are in their International duds.  Panini must have had some type of licensing issue again... surprise, surprise!  

I'm not exactly sure why I scanned all four of this particular insert set.  While the players featured are almost certainly your more recognizable players, the design on the set is a bit underwhelming.  I did however, scan the back of this particular insert because I absolutely love it.

I can even forgive the duplicate photo on the back mostly because its cropped so tightly that it makes it look completely different.

My favorite insert would definitely have to go to Pitch Kings.  For some reason or another, Donruss always seems to save their sets with this iconic "Kings" insert.  All 6 of these cards are absolutely stunning and they certainly do feature the kings of the pitch... minus the English players of course.  The Messi pull is also pretty sweet!

Last but not least, I received 5 numbered parallels of various inserts or base cards.

I got pretty lucky and pulled some halfway decent names with these.

...but not so much these.

And finally, our 1 promised autograph from the box.  I was expecting complete crap for an autograph going into this.  I was beyond excited when I saw this come out of a pack.  Not only is Luke Shaw a name I recognize, but this kid plays for Manchester United... an ENGLISH club!  Heck yes.  I don't even care that it's an English club that I don't particularly enjoy.  Unfortunately for Luke, he broke his leg in two places last month and is probably going to be out for almost the entire season.

The video isn't that bad, I promise.  I mostly put it up to show how dangerous tackling can be in soccer.  A lot of people whine and complain about how the sport is full of babies going down at the slightest touch.  Granted, the above wasn't a love tap, but it certainly wasn't a dirty play.  In fact, it's borderline not even a foul because Moreno gets very close to getting the ball.

Anyhow... I'm very happy with that auto and I wish Luke the best in his recovery.