USA Baseball Box Sets Featuring David Price

11/28/2005

DURHAM, NC — USA Baseball announced today it will follow-up on its highly successful USA Baseball National Team Box Sets with a 2005 version. Set for a late-December release, this year’s product will feature two different sets — the 27-card 2005 USA Baseball National Team Box Set and the 25-card 2005 USA Baseball Junior National Team Box Set. Both sets will include several of the projected top picks in the 2006 MLB draft.

Vanderbilt’s David Price pitched for Team USA last summer and was named a Summer All-American by Baseball America for his efforts on the mound.

This will mark the first time collectors have the opportunity to collect cards of the USA Baseball Junior National Team which is comprised of the nation’s premier high school players 18 years of age and younger.

“Over the past twelve months, USA Baseball has worked very closely with associations that govern high school and college athletics to develop a trading card program which could include the USA Baseball Junior National Team,” said USA Baseball’s Director of Marketing and Licensing, David Perkins. “Collectors recognize that the Junior National Team always has a deep pool of baseball prospects and the 2005 squad is no exception.”

The 2005 USA Baseball Junior National Team included such top prospects as Brett Anderson (P, Oklahoma), Dellin Betances (P, New York) and Shawn Tolleson (P, Texas). All are included in Baseball America’s Projected Top 50 2006 Draft Picks. Overall the team included four college freshman, fourteen high school seniors and two high school juniors. Of the fourteen seniors, nine are in Baseball America’s Top-50 List for the High School Class of ’06.

“I definitely will keep my card in a safe place. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” said Junior Team pitcher Jeremy Bleich (P, Louisiana). “I think the excitement of being on a card comes with the experience of representing the United States,” added Bleich.

The second set will feature this year’s USA Baseball National Team which was comprised of the nation’s premier college freshman and sophomore players and included Baseball America’s projected 2006 #1 Overall Draft Pick Drew Stubbs (OF, Texas) and the projected #3 pick Max Scherzer (P, Missouri).

In both sets, collectors will find several new additions to this year’s insert card line-up. Dual-autographed cards #’d to 250 or less highlight the additions and they will be inserted on average one per set. Also inserted one per set will be a new acetate-card insert set “Vision of the Future.” Finally, for collectors looking for a really tough pull can seek out green autographed cards # to only 2 across several of the autographed insert sets.

“Collectors continue to provide great feedback about the Box Set release and two of the things they continued to ask for were the introduction of dual-autograph cards and the continuation of the low numbered green autograph cards they saw in the 2004 releases,” said Perkins. “We were pleased to respond to this feedback and believe this set will build on the success of the previous releases.”

As with the previous USA Baseball National Team Box Set releases, the production run has been limited to 10,000 of each set. USA Baseball will also continue the “living set” it introduced in 2003 with its Box Set. The card numbering for this year’s set will begin with #51 and end with #94.

The USA Baseball National Teams Box Sets will carry a suggested retail price of $29.99 per set. Collectors will receive an average of one 2005 USA Baseball National or Junior National Team dual autograph card per set, one 2005 USA Baseball National or Junior National Team “Opening Day” signature jersey card per set, and one 2005 USA Baseball or Junior National Team signature card per set. All proceeds from the sale of the sets will fund USA Baseball’s athlete programs. Sets can be ordered directly from USA Baseball by calling 919-474-8721 x 219 or by logging onto www.usabaseball.com http://www.usabaseball.com/> .

USA Baseball is the National Governing Body of amateur baseball in the United States and a member of the United States Olympic Committee. The organization selects and trains the USA Baseball Olympic Team, the USA Baseball National Team (Collegiate), the USA Baseball Junior National Team (18-under), and the USA Baseball Youth National Team (16-under) which participate in various international competitions each year.