Bowman 2009 Cubs Team Set

I was able to pick up the 2009 Bowman Cubs team set off of ebay last week. There are 10 players in the base set and four in the prospect set. Today I'll feature the base cards. I'll show the prospects sometime soon.

First, a little about the cards. What is the deal with Bowman and black? I'll admit that I don't know much about the Bowman brand. Is there some reason why black has been the featured color on their cards for the past several years?

One thing that I you don't see too often is the player's uniform number on a card. Bowman has it in the bottom left of the card. I like that. However, the front of the card does not list the player's team. That, I don't care for.

Here are the ten Cubs cards, in alphabetical order.



#104 Milton Bradley This card features a pretty bad photoshop job. The red C on the hat is too big and the "Chicago" on the jersey looks ridiculous. I'm guessing this was taken when in 2008 when Bradley was with the Rangers. If you look at the left edge of the dugout, you see some of the lettering for "Rangers.com."



#96 Ryan Dempster A nice posed shot of the Cubs starter at spring training in Mesa.



#190 Kosuke Fukudome The Cubs outfielder is taking a swing at Wrigley. He has an interesting looking signature. I wonder what his signature looks like in Japanese?



#31 Rich Harden It looks like a shot from spring training. Harden's only spring with the Cubs was this spring, 2009. Did they take a picture in February and then get the card printed by May? Does Topps need more lead time than that?



#172 Derrek Lee This was taken at spring training, too because the Cubs are sitting on the first base side. It also looks like 2009 because the numbers and name on his back have the red trim missing (compare this to the letters and numbers on Soriano's back)



#17 Ted Lilly Ted is warming up in the bullpen at Wrigley Field.



#163 Aramis Ramirez The Cubs third baseman is taking a lead on the road. The Cubs sure are missing his bat in the lineup right now.



#176 Alfonso Soriano Soriano is waiting for a pitch at the Friendly Confines. Notice the red trim on the name and numbers, which is what the jerseys looked like last year.



#164 Geovany Soto A nice action shot of the NL rookie of the year. But I don't like that you can't see his face. If they want to use an action picture, use one of him with his mask off. I've never understood the point of a card of a player if you can't see what he looks like.



#131 Carlos Zambrano Big Z is on the hill at Wrigley. He just came off the DL and the Cubs need strong pitching from him, now that Harden has gone to the DL.