Shushkewich: Canadians, Blue Jays well-represented in new Bowman set
Okotoks Dawgs Academy alum and Tampa Bay Rays infield prospect Jack Lines (Okotoks, Alta.) has a card in the 2025 Bowman set.
May 15, 2025
By Tyson Shushkewich
Canadian Baseball Network
Starting with tobacco cards in the late 1800s and through the ‘junk wax’ era in the early 90s, collecting baseball cards has been a popular hobby for more than a century.
In recent years, the hobby has experienced a resurgence in interest as collectors chase cards to keep in their man caves or flip for a profit.
Some deep-pocketed collectors are searching for rare 1952 Topps Mickey Mantle rookie cards, while others are chasing the newest prospect autographs and patches from the stars in today’s game.
Paul Skenes, the flamethrowing Pittsburgh Pirates starter who earned the NL Rookie of the Year Award last year, saw his 1 of 1 ‘MLB Debut’ autographed patch card sell for $1.11 million at auction earlier this year. DICK’S Sporting Goods was the winning bidder and they are displaying the card at one of their Pennsylvania locations under glass that would make the Mona Lisa jealous.
Card companies are doing insane things with their cards these days, including incorporating parts of jerseys, spikes from cleats, and even bat knobs into their physical product.
For those who chase prospects, Topps releases their Bowman line of cards each year (and multiple times throughout the year, especially after the MLB Draft), which features some of the first cards of the newest professional players across the league. A player’s ‘first Bowman’ card can be highly coveted, and some of the different inserts and parallels, whether autographed or not, can fetch huge amounts on the open market.
The 2025 version of Topps Bowman was released on May 7, and card collectors are quickly buying up boxes to find some of its bigger chase cards, such as James Wood, Dylan Crews, Jacob Wilson, and Roki Sasaki.
Let’s take a look at some of the Canadian players featured in the set, as well as some of the Blue Jays who are highlighted.
The Newcomers
Jack Lines (Okotoks, Alta.) (Rays)
Emilien Pitre (Repentigny, Que.) (Rays)
Jonah Tong (Markham, Ont.) (Mets)
Matt Wilkinson (Surrey, B.C.) (Guardians)
There are four Canadians represented, with Pitre and Lines getting a card almost a year after they were drafted. Sometimes, the higher drafted players will get a card in the Bowman Draft set to finish out the year, but often Topps holds some players back until the new set the following year. These four are all featured in the prospect's base set, and each player also gets a chrome card version.
Autograph-wise, all four have signatures in the product, and you can purchase these on sites like eBay, The value of them varies. For example, Tong’s base autograph has been selling for around $60-70 CAD while his parallels have been fetching more, such as his black refractor (only 10 in existence) sold for $1,393.53 CAD.
Fieldhouse Pirates alum and Chicago Cubs outfield prospect Owen Caissie (Burlington, Ont.) is featured on this insert card as part of the 2025 Bowman release.
The Veterans
Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (Montreal, Que.) (Blue Jays)
Freddie Freeman (Dodgers)
Tyler Black (Stouffville, Ont.) (Brewers)
Owen Caissie (Burlington, Ont.) (Cubs)
While Bowman usually focuses on the prospects, especially with autographs, they also include some other, more established names in the group.
Both Guerrero and Freeman have base cards in the set. Guerrero also appears on a unique Anime variation insert.
Guerrero and Black also have autographed cards in this release, while Owen Caissie appears on the Bowman Scouts Top 100 insert, featured at #39. This one is not autographed.
Freeman wasn’t born in Canada but he is eligible for the World Baseball Classic through his parents, so he makes the list.
Veteran Canadian players aren’t represented as well in this set — none of the Naylor brothers (Mississauga, Ont.), Matt Brash (Kingston, Ont.), or Nick Pivetta (Victoria, B.C.) were included.
These base sets are limited compared to Topps’ flagship products in Series 1 or 2, which feature a ton of base cards from more players across the league.
Who’s missing?
There are a few names missing from this release, but likely not for the reason you think.
Dante Nori (Toronto, Ont.), the first Canuck off the draft board last summer, was featured in the 2024 Bowman Draft release, and that’s where his first Bowman autograph lives. Fun fact, Nori is an avid baseball card collector and is currently trying to complete his ‘rainbow,’ where he owns one of each of his autographed parallel cards, including the 1-of-1 superfractor.
Nathan Flewelling (Innifail, Alta.), another high draft pick from the 2024 MLB Draft, had his autograph as part of the 2024 Bowman Chrome launch.
Did I mention that Bowman doesn’t release just once a year?
Caledon, Ont., native Josiah Romeo’s base card was included in the 2024 Bowman Draft offering, but only in this base set form, so his autograph is still to be determined.
Names that don’t have a Topps Bowman card yet include L.P. Langevin (Quebec, Que.), Sean Heppner (Richmond, B.C.), and the rest of the 2024 Canadian MLB Draft class outside of those who have been mentioned.
Montreal native Vladimir Guerrero Jr.’s card in the 2025 Bowman set.
Blue Jays
Looking for Blue Jays?
Here’s the list for you (* denotes autograph as well as base card):
Vladimir Guerrero Jr.*
Orelvis Martinez (rookie card)
Bo Bichette
Sean Keys*
Charles McAdoo*
Jake Bloss* (only auto – rookie card)
Trey Yesavage
The list for Blue Jays prospects is a bit thin, but that’s because quite a few of the top names already have cards out under the Bowman brand.
This includes Yesavage, Arjun Nimmala, Jace Bohrofen, Aaron Parker, Manuel Beltre, Tucker Toman, Connor O’Halloran (Mississauga, Ont.), Sam Shaw (Victoria, B.C.), Landen Maroudis, Enmanuel Bonilla, Cade Doughty, Brandon Barriera, Ricky Tiedemann, Josh Kasevich, Johnny King, and Khal Stephen (amongst others). All have varying price points – usually, the higher rated the prospect, the more expensive – but Blue Jays collectors have been spoiled with options as of late, while some names are potentially still on the docket for future releases, such as Alan Roden, Carson Messina, and Juaron Watts-Brown.
For those who collect former Blue Jays, Sammy Hernandez, who was sent to the Cardinals in exchange for Genesis Cabrera at the 2023 deadline, has a base card in this set.