2012 Bowman Baseball just hit shelves this week and in the product are “International” parallels of the player cards.  They resemble the basic cards only they have the flag of the player’s country of origin emblazoned in the background.  We’ve seen this before, but these are gorgeous.  They remind me of the 1997 release, my personal favorite set.

Last week, Yankees legend and perhaps the games’ greatest closer of all-time Mariano Rivera suffered a torn ACL, an injury that could end his career.  He’s been on record as saying that he doesn’t want to go out like that.

But if it is the end of the line of “Mo,” then this 2012 Bowman “International” card could be one of the best Rivera cards we’ve ever seen given the context.  It’s almost like a farewell shot posed in front of the flag of Panama.

This card immediately jumps into the discussion for one of my five favorite Mariano cards to pass through my collection.

Hats off to Topps for the design, and hats off to The Sandman for a stellar career.

This entry was posted on May 8, 2012 at 3:25 pm and is filed under Newspaperman with tags 2012 Bowman, baseball, baseball cards, Bowman, Mariano Rivera, Panama. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.