Another year of Topps Chrome Sapphire UEFA Champions League is here and while it doesn’t have near the hype of years past, there is reason to be excited. Part of the reason it has less hype is due to the rookie class being considerable worse than previous years. That may be a little premature as there is some potential in this class but only time will tell. Another big thing this box has going against it is we have been so overwhelmed by huge print runs of this same checklist and card images so far this year. You can read more about that in this article on Topps Chrome UEFA print runs. The other big difference from year’s past is the expanded checklist from 100 to 200 cards makes these boxes so much more risky. All that said Sapphire is always one of the best products of the year and this year is no different.
2021-22 Topps Chrome Sapphire UEFA Champions League Breakdown
Checklist – HERE
Box Makeup (Search on eBay) – 18 packs/4 cards per pack, 6 Base refractors per box, 2 speckle refractors per box, 4 non base/speckle parallels per box (most are numbered but some aren’t as you see in the checklist) 2717 actual numbered base card parallels for each player.
Print Runs – Roughly 25550 boxes
~3450 Base cards of each player
~3100 Future Stars base cards (Search On Ebay)
~4850 Legends Variation base cards
Rookie Breakdown – HERE
SCHQ Review – Sapphire has established itself as one of the go-to rookie cards for players that make it into the checklist. That should be no different this year. The problem is the expanded checklist takes a lot of the value out of the boxes. You have roughly a 1% chance of hitting a parallel of any card in a box. That is considerably down from last year when it was 3-4% when there were more parallels per box and half the checklist. That may not sound like a lot but all things equal that would mean to hit any particular rookie parallel you would have to open 3-4 boxes for the same odds. This is just my personal approach, but when I am prospecting I focus on Sapphire parallels (Search On Ebay). This year there are only 255 total parallels of each card. When comparing that to 2717 numbered refractors in this year’s Topps Chrome, plus even more non numbered, it’s a much safer play in my opinion. Last year there were 405 numbered Sapphire parallels (no Aqua this year) of each so this year’s should be even more valuable. There are less base cards per player this year than last year. Considering last year base rookies do decent that should be the case this year. Again, the expanded checklist means you have a harder chance hitting the base rookies.
These boxes sat on Topps for many hours after release at $250. It is one of the only Sapphire products that I can remember this happening with and that has proven to be a bit of a mistake. In past years you were lucky to get one direct from Topps because people love Sapphire. Resale prices are already higher than retail (around $315) and over the long run they probably keep going up. Right now, I would rather have 2 2020/21 boxes (Search On Ebay) than 2 2021/22 boxes, but that could certainly change as time goes on and we see what rookies emerge. I think based on the current thoughts on the 2020/21 and 2021/22 rookie classes, that this year has more room for upside since the sentiment is so low. The players will have to perform for that to change. 2021/22 is certainly going to be very risky for rippers, especially since we are seeing some boxes that only have 1 numbered parallel. I do think as a hold for the future they are better than most other 2021/22 boxes. While they did up the print run from last year 25550 boxes is not a ton when compared to the high demand of Sapphire.
2021-22 Topps Chrome Sapphire UEFA Champions League pack odds
If you have any general questions just shoot a DM on Twitter @SoccerCardsHQ or IG @SoccerCardsHQ. Don’t ask me who you should buy as I don’t give that type of advice. You can join the FaceBook Group and ask others what they think. They will be happy to tell you. Just know they already have that player’s cards.
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