There's something to be said for knowing what you are getting when you open a box of football cards, and with 2007 Finest Football, that is certainly the case. Collectors know they will find veterans and rookies on shiny stock that's one step up from Topps Chrome, a number of Refractor parallels, plenty of rookies and multiple autographs.
Finest Football is a hobby-only product with three six-pack mini-boxes per box. Each pack holds five cards (for a total of 30 per mini-box) and there is an autographed card in each mini-box on average.
Veteran Base Cards and Parallels
Finest base card designs are normally best described as futuristic-looking, but the 2007 cards are relatively understated. Simple red and black striped hold all the player info on the right-hand side, though there's still plenty of shine from the sparkling silver background to the player photo. Card backs focus on a Finest Moment from the player's career.
The 100 veterans all appear on seven different levels of Refractor parallels with varying numbering ranging from unnumbered regular Refractors to one-of-one White-Framed X-Fractors and Die-Cut Super-Fractors. The simplicity of this season's design makes it easy to pick out the different Refractor levels by looking at the color of the stripe.
Topps' sell sheet suggests that the Refractors can be found about two per mini-box, and my sample box did a little bit better than that with seven: three Refractors, two Blue Refractors (#'d to 299), one Green Refractor (#'d to 199) and an Edgerrin James X-Fractor numbered 02/25. I also found 44 of the veteran base cards with no duplicates.
Rookie Cards and Parallels
Fifty 2007 rookie cards finish off the Finest base set on cards similar to the veterans with the exception of a red border that goes around all four sides. In contrast to previous seasons, none of the official rookie cards are autographed, with the signatures appearing on parallels. No doubt this decision will irritate some collectors, but it should please others who found the low-numbered rookies of past releases hard to acquire.
The About.com review box produced exactly half of the set's rookie cards, including JaMarcus Russell, Brady Quinn, Calvin Johnson and Dwayne Bowe. The rookies also come in the same Refractor levels as the veterans, and I pulled two: an Aundrae Allison Blue Refractor numbered to 299 and a Dwayne Bowe Black Refractor numbered to 99.
As mentioned above, all of the rookies (except Chris Leak and Kenny Irons) signed autographed parallels. Regular autos are unnumbered, but the players are divided into eight tiers, with the rarest tier (Russell, Johnson, Quinn, Adrian Peterson and Marshawn Lynch) seeded only one in 415 mini-boxes. There are also four X-Fractor variations for each card ranging from 50 copies down to just one.
My sample box contained the expected three autographed parallels - Drew Tate, Kenneth Darby and Anthony Gonzalez - all from the regular, unnumbered level.
Autographed Cards
Mini-boxes of Finest that don't contain an autographed rookie parallel still serve up a signature thanks to two additional autographed subsets. Finest Moments Autos has a checklist of rookies, sophomores and veterans that should interest all kinds of collectors. Finest Moments Dual Autos offer two signatures on one card with pairings like Adrian Peterson/JaMarcus Russell, Tom Brady/Brady Quinn and Larry Johnson/LaDainian Tomlinson.
Both sets of autographed cards can be found as Refractors (numbered to 25 for singles, 10 for duals) and 1-of-1 Gold Refractors or Super-Fractors.
Insert Cards
Finest has only a few insert sets but they all work together to reinforce the same theme. Veteran Finest Moments, 2006 Rookie Finest Moments and 2007 Finest Rookie Finest Moments cards are somewhat self-explanatory, with each one highlighting a standout play or game for three different sets of players.
As with everything else in Finest, they also come in a spectrum of Refractor colors. I found eight Finest Moments cards in all, including three Refractors, one Blue Refractor numbered to 299 and one Green Refractor numbered to 199.