I have always criticized the use of printing plates in a high end product. They are ugly, they are worthless to many people, and most of all, they are still considered to be 1/1s that really arent 1/1s. Basically if you are producing a base product, and you want to include printing plates for shits and giggles, fine. But if you expect me to spend more than 100 dollars a box for this piece of shit that you call a case hit, you gotta be fucking kidding me.
We all are very familiar with the culture of the 1/1, as everyone in the hobby craves them like the Heroin dragon. They will do anything for a shot at a one of a kind card of any player, let alone their favorites. The problem is that many times, the Printing Plates are inserted in place of true and worthy 1/1s, and that leaves me with a very bitter taste in my mouth.
There is also another dimension to the plates, as the auto ones can usually never contain a hard signed signature. 99% of the time, they are sticker autos on an ugly plate, and that is just a complete cop out. Hell, Upper Deck puts them into Exquisite and the Cup, and that is pretty much the most inexcusable of all. Why would anyone fucking care about a used piece of thin scrap metal with a reverse negative of a player they cant identify for 500 plus per pack? Thats just plain stupid.
Lastly, I just hate seeing stale ideas run rampant akin to levels of Lavelle Hawkins autos in SP Signature Edition. Printing Plates are a very stale idea, and yet they are present in just about every single product. There are even products that frame the plates inside bordered cards in an effort to make them look better. Then you have a product like Triple Threads, who actually designates them as the top pulls of the product. Why? As if the design wasnt bad enough, now we have to get cards with all the elements of a normal hit, but a priting plate front. How terrible can that get? Obviously pretty bad.
If printing plates went away, the only people who would care are those people so desperate to pull a 1/1, that they run around the store screaming “MOJO!!!!!!!!!!!” at the top of their lungs when they pull one. To that, many of the informed collectors out there know that some of the best cards of any player are not 1/1s, and I agree with that 100%. Although my Mauer, Harvin, and Peterson collections are full of cards, none of them are one of a kind. Some of them are low numbered, but I dont care if I have the only card in existence. I just want one that looks cool. Printing plates have never been that, and never will be.