It’s Clearly Donruss
2020-21 Clearly Donruss BK Powered by Acetate
2020-21 Clearly Donruss Basketball marks the second year for the spinoff. Like its debut, the checklist puts an acetate spin on the year’s main Donruss Basketball set.
That means a distinctly different feel and a see-through appearance. It also opens up the opportunities for new parallel takes.
And while there are autographs on the checklist, they’re not the primary focus. In fact, they’re not among the hobby box guarantees. Each four-pack box has three parallels and one insert.
The base set finds its roots in the earlier 2020-21 Donruss and chromium Donruss Optic sets. The layout’s the same and there’s plenty of overlap in the players. The big difference is in the presentation. Acetate is a plastic-like stock. Cards are hard, clear and have a more high-end approach.
Being a Donruss set, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that the Rated Rookies subset makes the jump.
Among the parallels are Gold, Purple, Blue, Red, Green, Holo Silver, Holo Gold and Holo Platinum.
There’s also Holo Mosaic versions that, according to Panini, are extremely tough pulls. These have a background pattern that’s similar to the namesake parallels in Mosaic Basketball.
INSERTS AND AUTOGRAPHS
Most of the 2020-21 Clearly Donruss inserts port over from Donruss and Donruss Optic. These include Dominant, My House, The Rookies, Star Gazing and Zero Gravity.
New this year are Clearly Retro Rated Rookie cards. These take Rated Rookies from the past and give them the acetate treatment.
Inserts have a similar mix of parallels as the base set.
As for signatures, they come in the form of Clearly Rated Rookie Autographs. Anthony Edwards, LaMelo Ball and James Wiseman are among those signing for the set.
2021 Upper Deck Space Jam: A New Legacy trading cards are a natural fit. For collectors, they’re also another way that the franchise has passed the torch from one generation to the next.
Michael Jordan was the star of Space Jam. He was an exclusive spokesman for Upper Deck. LeBron James stars in the sequel. He, too, has an exclusive with the card maker. If anyone was going to make trading cards, Upper Deck seems like the natural fit. They did for the 1996 original and, now, they’re back in action for the second.
Packs and boxes for the release are retail-only. Blasters include six packs, each with five cards. Although it doesn’t appear to be an overly complex release, there are some premium possibilities including autographs.
It’s not yet known exactly how big the base set is or what it entails. At the very least collectors should be able to land something a little different from James. Bugs, the rest of the Tune Squad and some of James’ real-life teammates and opponents could also find their way onto the checklist in a variety of ways.
Each blaster pack includes a Neon Blue parallel.
With one in each box, Ready to Jam is the only insert expected in each blaster. However, others are randomly inserted.
One way that movie going has changed in the last quarter century is how films are distributed. The original arrived in theatres on long rolls of film. Today, things are digital. However, the past is inspiring the present with one of the insert sets here. New Legacy Manufactured Film Cels highlight movie frames on film-like material. These come in four tiers of rarity, making it more challenging to finish the set.
Breaking the Game is a lenticular 3-D set. Short prints are also part of the checklist here.
Autographs from the film’s stars and voice actors as well as sketch cards are also available.