Cutch Scratch Fever

Back in 2018, Topps introduced collectors to the Home Run challenge game.  The game was fairly simple.  It took some of the top home run hitters from the 2017 season and allowed fans and collectors to scratch off a code for a chance to guess when the player on the front would hit a home run.

These cards were essentially a lottery ticket to get a limited print run card.  The cards fell roughly 1 per box (24 to 36 packs) depending on the brand purchased.  Complete details of the program can be found here.

Based on actual results of winning challenge cards entered, here are the print runs by month

March/April: /7

May: /0 (no HR hit in month)

June: /19

July: /17

August: /30

September: /68

As you can see the print run in March/April was extremely limited with only 7 cards redeemed by correctly guessing a Cutch homer in that period.  

To see what the final cards look like you can revisit this post from October when I described the design to look like the Tardis from Doctor Who and I spotlighted Jenna Coleman as that day's subject with the pink themed card.

The interesting thing I noticed while going through some doubles in my collection was there were different designs of the scratch off surfaces.

I pictured them below.

I don't recall if any of my attempted challenge cards had the larger surface used in the left image, but the other 6 unscratched cards I still own have the wavy backs.