When we look back at the end of a year in watches, it seems like Seiko releases are always a highlight. They never have a bad year, and consistently deliver on both enthusiast focused favorites and more mass market, mainstream watches that are their bread and butter. This year, though, it felt like they were throwing 100 miles per hour from the start and never let up. While everyone will have their own personal favorites, here at Worn & Wound the conversation was mostly focused on the SPB149 (and the variants released alongside it) and the SPB151/153, the new diver that?s a riff on the famed ?Captain Willard.? These watches, both around $1,000 and part of the Prospex line, have a premium feel to them that makes them a compelling value proposition, even at a price point that?s higher than the traditional entry point into the Seiko range, challenging what we think of when we consider ?entry level? Seiko in the first place. 
Seiko divers have a strange way of bonding the watch community together. Almost everyone has owned an entry level or slightly elevated Seiko diver at one point or another. And if you haven?t, you?ve perhaps made a conscious decision not to. In our community, an inexpensive Seiko diver is a right of passage in the truest sense. They are so often the first watch that?s recommended to newcomers, and if you catch the watch bug at this point, you?re likely to move on to any number of other things (including more Seikos). The SKXs and Monsters of ...