1987 Kraft Home Plate Heroes
 

I stumbled upon an interesting article on these Kraft panels today and I think the author may be a member here as well.

https://sabrbaseballcards.blog/2019/...bering-scheme/

I was trying to find a list or photos of entire boxes or flat boxes to verify a personal discovery I made today. I have several sets of these and collected a variety of panels, flats and boxes for the Steve Garvey combinations, but had never taken notice beyond the different pairings, maybe because I didn't have any variations for the Garvey boxes side by side to notice. i'll have to pay attention when I eventually dig them back up again to see.

What I found today in a stack of about 30 flat boxes was that there were two different products featured. The most common was the plain old Macaroni and cheese dinner, but maybe 1/4 of the boxes I had were a slightly different product with slightly different packaging, spiral macaroni and cheese dinners. The only real difference is the mac & cheese dinner had a dark blue box color and the spiral mac and cheese uses a light blue box color.

that made me wonder if the same player panel pairs could be found in the different dinner boxes and within my small sample, i confirmed 3 panel combinations were found in both dinner varieties.

Now for the card variation purist, there is no difference between the two boxes when it comes down to the cards. Once removed from the box in either panel or single form, you would have no idea which box they came from. This raises an interesting question for some fanatical collectors...Does this constitute a true variation?

For me, I would definitely want the two different boxes if they were to feature any of the 5 Garvey pairings. In theory, there could be up to 5 more Kraft boxes that I now need for my collection! I have flat boxes and full unopened boxes for each of the 5 panels and in at least 1-2 or more cases, a proof or unfolded/unused box as well. The want list may have just grown by 2x-3x if all 5 pairings have dual box types. I am that kind of collector, at least for the Garvey stuff, that would welcome this variation even if it did not affect the actual card itself.

This may be old news to some, but thought I would share just in case anyone else was as oblivious to it as I was.

Well it would seem from your scans that there is also a difference in the color of the blue MLB Players logos on the cards, so perhaps they are not so identical. I wonder if all of the spiral boxes have the lighter blue logos?

The color of the logo on the standard mac box matches Box K on the printing key. The printing key is gone on the spiral box but I wonder if it matches the logo there as well? Might well be a discernible and consistent variation on the cards themselves.

Good eye on that, you are correct. I'll dig out the other pairs and scan them too in a bit.

They look different on the first pair more than the other two pairs. Might just be a print issue?

I have known of the Spiral vs regular macoroni boxes for some time, although, it's difficult to complete my Dodgers panel variations in both because sellers rarely sell individual boxes. Most want you to purchase a bunch you don't need to get the one you do and I'm just not willing to do that. Having said that, here are the Dodgers variations I've confirmed.

Rickey Henderson / Fernando Valenzuela - both spiral and regular
Mattingly / Valenzuela - regular
Joyner / Valenzuela - regular
Alvin Davis / Steve Sax - both spiral and regular
Joe Carter / Steve Sax - regular
Incaviglia / Valenzuela - regular
Winfield / Sax - regular
Cory Snyder / Valenzuela - regular
Canseco / Sax - regular
Ozzie Guillen / Sax - regular

I know the Kirk Gibson / Steve Garvey panel came in the spiral variation.

I need a henderson/valenzuela spiral flattened box if anyone has one