Finest Football is usually a pretty straightforward product: base cards and rookie cards on Topps' Chrome stock, generous helpings of Refractor parallels and autographs. It's a simple but effective formula that's served it pretty well.

That doesn't mean it can't use any tweaking though, especially since competition makes all the card manufacturers continue to try to innovate and improve with each successive season. In the case of 2008 Finest, Topps is punching up the content with autographed NFL logo cards of some of this season's top rookies.

As you can see from the Darren McFadden card pictured here, these cards will pair an autograph with the entire NFL shield from the player's jersey, and they are limited to just 15 copies. They aren't the first cards of their kind - Upper Deck, especially, has been using game-worn shields in 1-of-1 cards for a while - but they definitely look cool and it's hard to see them not becoming a popular addition to Finest.

This season's edition of Finest Football is currently scheduled to go on sale on September 18, but you can keep an eye on its actual release date with About.com's Sports Cards New Release Calendar.

Image courtesy of and copyright Topps.

The new series is actually called Donruss Americana II, but calling it a sequel seems to fit with its theme. Last year's debut set did a nice job bringing together various forms of entertainment together into one set of trading cards, complete with some impressive autograph and memorabilia card programs.

Americana II picks up right where the first series left off - literally, since the base set numbering carries over. The focus is once again heavy on movie and TV stars but there is definitely sports-related content in there, and it covers athletes from baseball to tennis to figure skating.

And if you've been reading this blog over the last few weeks, you also know that the Ring Kings insert is devoted to Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) fighters and personalities. The sample box for the About.com review unveiled a very nice example: the Georges St. Pierre autographed memorabilia card pictured here.

Simply click on the link below to get the whole scoop on the Americana encore.

• Review: 2008 Donruss Americana II