Allen & Ginter Insert Overview Series #78

Set: 2011 Allen & Ginter World's Most Mysterious Figures

            Total Cards: 10

            Stated Odds: 1:15

Bubba’s Derived Odds: 1:15

           # of Hobby Boxes Needed to Obtain Set: 6.25

If you've been following these from the beginning, then you'll know the only mini sets we've gotten to so far have been from 2011.  Obviously, this post is no exception.  Since this is the last mini set we'll see in quite some time in this series, I wanted to briefly touch on why this is the case.

If you open up a modern hobby box of Allen & Ginter (2012-current) you can generally expect roughly 5 mini inserts per box.  Based on the year, these numbers may vary slighty, but this is generally going to be the case.  In the early days of Topps Allen & Ginter (2006-2009), there simply weren't all that many mini inserts printed so you generally pulled less of them anyways.  In fact, Topps really didn't start pursuing mini inserts until 2008-09, and when they saw how well they were received printing exploded.

In 2010, if you bought a hobby box, you could expect to pull 9-10 mini inserts per box.  To this day finding specific 2010 regular non-insert (base set) minis can be quite difficult as the overall print run wasn't very high and they were seeded so much lower per box.  What 2010 did have going for it was the sheer number of mini insert sets.  If we forgo the two case hit sets, there were six different mini sets to chase all with a fairly high quantity of cards; 134 total cards.

Fast forward to 2011 and we were still expected to pull roughly nine mini inserts per hobby box.  The difference this year was that, not only was there one less non-case hit insert set to chase (5 instead of 6), but the sets overall were much smaller (most of them being only 10 cards).  There are only 70 minis in these sets... just over half of 2010!  This is part of the reason that 2011 Allen & Ginter sealed product is so cheap to this day; a third of the minis you pull are borderline worthless.

Not to mention... most of these minis didn't look very good.  Case and point below...

Favorite (Owned) Card:

I don't know... I just don't really enjoy how this set presents itself.  D.B. Cooper and Rasputin were probably the only two individuals I recognized off the bat... and that's usually a good thing.  I tend to like Allen & Ginter insert sets because they teach me something new and unique.

Notes and Comments:
For some reason I simply wasn't interested in the content this set had to offer.  Mysterious figures that I've never heard of before... simply aren't mysterious.  I've read a little of the D.B. Cooper incident and everyone seems to have their own opinion on what occurred.  It intrigues me a little, but my mind works in a fashion that tells me everything (or at least most things) has a logical explanation.  When you read a mystery novel the protagonist solves the mystery by the end of the book.  I like mysteries, but I like them in a sense that they are solvable.

The biggest problem with this set is unrecognizable aspect of the subjects.  No one really knows who these people were/are.  D.B. Cooper... who's seen his face?  Rasputin... nobody recognizes him outside of the movie Anastasia.  Other subjects include The Count of St. Germain, The Man in the Iron Mask, and Nostradamus.  They all suffer from the same problem.  I've heard of them in the past, but there's no chance I'd recognize them from a picture.  Ultimately, the picture/photo/drawing/what have you is the most important aspect of a card, and in this vein the set fails.

While I don't mind the design of the set overall (it's alright), I can't give it anywhere near a passing grade.

Arbitrary Rating (out of 100): 46

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% of Set Completed: 100%

Missing Cards: NONE!!!

Extra Cards: WMF1, WMF2, WMF3, WMF7, WMF8, WMF10