Diamond Dynasty - New April Monthly Awards Event, Prime Carlos Carrasco

Beyond the April Topps Now program wrapping up today, we get Headliners Set 11 Prime Carlos Carrasco and the April Monthly Awards Event. In the event, Topps Now Madison Bumgarner and Trevor Story are the two new cards. Let’s go over the Headliners pack first then scope out the event.

Headliners Set 11 – Prime Carlos Carrasco

Prime Carlos Carrasco first fills a need for Prime cards that will surely be in high demand once collections become more of a thing. Besides that wrinkle, Carrasco has 82 H/9 but does have a good pitch mix. On top of that, he has great control of all five of his pitches (the lowest being the sinker at 87). He also has 99 break on his slider and changeup. The pitch speed differentials maybe are not that crazy, but all in all, this looks like a very good starting pitcher option.

The odds on Headliners packs to pull a diamond are 1:10 (as always), albeit that diamond might not be Prime Carlos Carrasco. In addition, this year you can buy one pack of the Headliners choice pack, which gives you 1:3 odds of pulling a 90+ overall diamond (and of course costs more stubs).

April Monthly Awards Event

Another week, another event. Coming after the April Monthly Awards event will be the return of the Moonshot Event, so that will be interesting to see how the rewards line up for that. Do they build on the old rewards track or is it fresh? I suspect it will be a fresh track.

• Monthly Awards series players
• Topps Now series players
• Live series players
• Max team overall of 90
• 3-inning games
• All-Star difficulty
• Free entries (as always)

The event ends on May 12.

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With the event itself, the first player reward is Topps Now Madison Bumgarner. Bumgarner cards have been known to be relatively unimpressive through the years. I think one of the first years of DD he had a 99 overall card that was great, but that is more the outlier at this point. Nothing in terms of velocity, control, or break stands out here. He does have a cutter and sinker, but the issue is more finding ways to complement those pitches when using Bumgarner. At the very least, an 88 H/9 is solid for a 91 overall. Oh, and of course, he has solid power numbers for a pitcher as another upside.

The top reward is a Topps Now Trevor Story. Trevor Story has found his way into the meta multiple times throughout his tenure in DD, so this card may end up with some fans. His vision at 48 is a problem on higher difficulties, and his contact overall isn’t anything special, but he brings some pop and great defense to the middle of the diamond. With how crazy dives are in the game right now, a diamond fielder maybe isn’t worth quite as much as normal, but it’s still a bonus.

Rewards

• 1 win – The Show pack
• 3 wins – 500 stubs
• 5 wins – 2,500 XP, Headliners Set 7 pack
• 7 wins – 1,000 stubs
• 10 wins – Rewind Events choice pack
• 13 wins – 1,500 stubs, Headliners Set 8 pack
• 15 wins – 2,500 XP, Topps Now Madison Bumgarner
• 18 wins – 2,000 stubs, Headliners Set 9 pack
• 20 wins – 2,500 XP, Topps Now Trevor Story
• 23 wins – Rewind Events choice pack
• 25 wins – 2,500 XP, Headliners Set 10 pack
• 27 wins – Headliners Set 11 pack
• 30 wins – 5,000 XP, The Show pack (x10)