* Magazine review: Beckett 2009 Baseball Preview

Beckett offers a very straightforward product. Aside from the team-by-team analysis, the only additional articles deal with the top ten free agent signings (Mark Teixeira leads the list) and ten worst off-season moves, which includes bad trades and poor acquisitions (Nick Swisher’s departure from the White Sox heads this one).

There’s also a small 2008 statistical leaders section and 25 sleepers and busts for fantasy players (a tease for a stand-alone publication).

One quibble: the teams are arranged in alphabetical order, rather than in divisions, which makes it a bit unwieldy to see who’s where.

Since Beckett is known primarily for cards and memorabilia, the team reports include a unique and fun feature: An account of the cards that have been produced for every ball club, the total value of those cards and the average price per card, all with their overall MLB rankings. Some of the numbers are surprising.

The one figure that jumped out at me was the card count for the Washington Nationals: 10,199. I mistakenly assumed that the figure included the previous incarnation as the Montreal Expos, so it seemed very low; the San Diego Padres — which entered the Majors the same year (1969) — had 42,934. An email to Beckett explained the discrepancy: those 10,000+ cards were solely for the Nationals, which have only been around since 2005. In that case, the number seems pretty high.

The New York Yankees have the most total cards — which includes every set Beckett includes in their regular publication — with 113,694. In second place with — and more than 40,000 behind — are the Boston Red Sox.

One would think the older the team, the more material produced, but the more successful teams would merit extra cards based on World Series appearances, statistical leaders, or historical achievement.

Understandably, the Yankees also lead in total value with $2,592,652.60; the Pittsburgh Pirates are next with $1,538,499.10. They also rank #1 in average value per card at $51.76; the Detroit Tigers are next at $45.51. I’m guessing — since Beckett doesn’t offer any explanation behind the numbers — that the Honus Wagner card comes into play here.

It’s interesting to note that the Washington Nationals are carrying on the tradition of the Montreal Expos: their total card value is almost $100,000 worse than the 29th team.

A complete list of rankings follows:

Tagged as: annuals, Baseball Cards, Baseball magazines, Beckett