Shoebox Legends

Parkhurst Champions Wire Photos

2012-01-29T11:17:00.001-05:00

I've got a day full of poker and floor hockey ahead of me, so there's not much time for a legitimate post. Instead, enjoy some scans of a few 2011-12 Parkhurst Champions wire photo cards, some of the better looking hockey cards released so far this year in my opinion.

Here's an awesome shot of Mike Bossy celebrating a Stanley Cup Final goal on the very same day that he'd hoist the Cup for the third straight year.

A helmetless, and very tiny looking, Johnny Bower. Love those pads.

Of the few of these cards that I have, this one is my favorite by a long shot. When it comes to capturing a moment on cardboard this is close to perfection. Two of the game's all-time greats celebrating as the referee signals the goal and the crowd goes wild. Even my favorite mac 'n' cheese maker gets some exposure.

I recently saw a very nice autographed (by both Park and Barber) version of this card on eBay, but it sold for much more than I'd ever be willing to pay for it.

Denis here will be making another appearance on the blog in the very near future...

These 8 are the only wire photo cards I have. I'm still looking for the other 22, if you have any you'd be interested in parting with let me know. I'll try to resume regular posting this week.

WHA Card of the Month - January 2012

2012-01-26T17:14:00.000-05:00

Beginning in 2012, I'm going to start paying some long overdue respect to the World Hockey Association here at Shoebox Legends. My Card of the Month posts this year will instead be WHA Card of the Month posts, and I'll talk a little bit about the "rival league"...

1972-73 O-Pee-Chee - #297 - Bobby Sheehan

Bobby Sheehan here represents my very first 1972-73 O-Pee-Chee card. He also represents my favorite part of the '72-73 O-Pee-Chee set, the fourth and final series (cards 290 - 341) featuring players from the World Hockey Association. Given that 1972 was the first year of existence for the league, these are obviously the first WHA hockey cards issued by O-Pee-Chee. It's a crime that it took me close to 5 years to add one to my collection.

The NHL has seen a few competitors throughout the course of its history, but none of them as successful as the WHA was. The Association began in 1972, and challenged the NHL by establishing a 12 team league and attracting a few bonafide NHL stars, most notably Bobby Hull and Gerry Cheevers (and eventually Gordie Howe). All told, 67 NHL players jumped ship to the WHA for its inaugural season. They were lured by higher pay and the promise that there would be no reserve clause.

I stated above that none of the NHL's competitors throughout its many years were as successful as the WHA, but success is a relative term. Many franchises, and indeed the WHA as a whole, encountered plenty of logistical and financial challenges. In the brief period that the WHA existed it saw its teams change their names (sometimes mid-season), relocate (sometimes mid-season), swap divisions, and sometimes never play a single game! It saw expansion, teams fold (sometimes mid-season), its divisions disappear and then eventually a merger with its cheif rival, the NHL.

The WHA's founders did have experience at this sort of thing. They were the same guys that were responsible for basketball's ABA, begun a few years prior in the late '60s. Putting together an operation on this scale is no easy task though, and things went far from perfectly. One of the best examples of failure would be the team Bobby Sheehan skated for in '72-73, the New York Raiders.

The Raiders wore some very 1970s red and blue sweaters, and although it's difficult to make out on this card, the logo is actually a hockey player wearing a viking helmet skating in front of a backdrop of the city. They were supposed to be the team in the WHA, but they were doomed from the very beginning. Their first overall draft pick from the WHA's entry draft? He signed with the Boston Bruins in the NHL. Oh, and guess where they had to play their home games? At Madison Square Garden, the home of their major competition from the NHL, the New York Rangers. The original owners didn't even last the first season, with the league taking control of the team and selling it in the off-season. The new owners renamed the team to the New York Golden Blades but were no more successful than the first group. Just 24 games into that second season they were out of the picture and the league once again had control of the team. After two failed attempts, the WHA realized that it could not compete in the New York market and moved the team to New Jersey where they played on a rink where the ice was sloped (I'm not kidding).

The New York Raiders were just one of many great failures from the other league, but there were many successes as well. I'll be sharing plenty of them here through cards in the coming weeks and months.

2011 Top 20 Under $25 - #2 - Don Cherry!

2012-01-24T18:53:00.000-05:00

Time for the runner-up in the 2011 Top 20 Under $25 Countdown...

What is it? A 1974-75 Topps Don Cherry!
When and where did I get it? CheckOutMyCards.com, September 19th
How much did it cost me? $5.80 (plus a little for shipping)

My quest to hand collate the 1974-75 Topps hockey set presses onward, and Don here was a major addition this past fall. Only Bobby Orr and the Scotty Bowman card I featured a few weeks ago have a higher book value as this set goes. This is one card I would have loved to add to my collection even if I weren't in pursuit of this set though.

I mentioned in my last post that this spot in the countdown was occupied by someone better known for their personality than for anything they accomplished in professional sports. I'm sure that when many young hockey fans out there hear the name Don Cherry they think of this guy:

These days you can tune in to the "Coach's Corner" segment of Hockey Night in Canada on a Saturday night and enjoy some commentary from Don along with some over-the-top suits like this one. I can't sum it up any better than his Wikipedia page, which states that he "is known for his outspoken manner, flamboyant dress, and staunch patriotism".

Back in the mid-'70's though, you could find Cherry in slightly more muted attire (although I do like the polka-dot tie on this card) standing behind the Boston Bruins' bench. Unfortunately for Don, superstars Phil Esposito and Bobby Orr weren't around long after he took the reigns and he was never able to replicate the success of the Bruins teams from earlier in the decade.

Don't get me wrong, this is only because the bar was set so high by those previous Bruins teams. In fact, Don was pretty damn successful as a coach. He led the B's through a stretch of four straight division titles and two Stanley Cup Finals appearances, although the team lost both times. He even won the Jack Adams award as coach of the year in 1976. Not too shabby at all, but I still stand by my claim that he is better known for his work as an analyst than for his accomplishments as a coach.

Don was also a player, which is mentioned on the card back. Interestingly enough, despite playing over 18 seasons of professional hockey he appeared in just one single NHL game, called up for a playoff game in 1955 for the Boston Bruins. If a professional hockey career that long with just a single NHL game played doesn't show Cherry's love for and dedication to the sport, then I don't know what does. Maybe the decades that he's spent closely involved with the sport of hockey since then?

Love him or hate him, you can't deny that Don Cherry is one of the most significant and recognizable figures in hockey's illustrious history. This is a card that I will enjoy for a long time to come!

2011 Top 20 Under $25 - #3 - Al Kaline Auto

2012-01-23T21:20:00.000-05:00

We've finally reached the top 3 in the 2011 Under $25 countdown. Here's the bronze medalist...

What is it? A 2005 Upper Deck Baseball Heroes Al Kaline Auto, #'d/99
When and where did I get it? During baseball season, back in June, on eBay
How much did it cost me? $20 (plus $3.75 shipping)

What's not to like about Al Kaline? He won a batting crown at age 20, was an 18-time All-Star and a 10-time Gold Glove winner. He won a World Series (.379, 2HR, 8RBI in 7 games!), amassed 3,000 career hits and came just a home run shy of 400. He was elected to the Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility. Aside from all of that, you have to respect a guy who played his entire 22-year career for a single ballclub. When I think of the Detroit Tigers, Al's name is the first that comes to mind.

This card, which commemorates the last of Kaline's 18 All-Star game appearances, is from the 2005 Upper Deck Baseball Heroes set. The autographs from this set are something I only got into this past year, and they are definitely some of my favorite autographed baseball cards. I think these cards look great, and the checklist is extremely impressive. Not long after I picked up this Kaline I ended up with Harmon Killebrew and Ozzie Smith autos from this same set. All of the autos are hard signed and serial numbered based on the color, with this emerald version numbered to 99.

Two more posts and I can finally put this thing to bed. Coming up next is someone who's more famous for his personality than for anything he accomplished in professional sports...

2011 Top 20 Under $25 - #4 - A Pair of 1987-88 O-Pee-Chee

2012-01-21T15:49:00.000-05:00

At #4 in the 2011 Top 20 Under $25 countdown we have a pair of '80s O-Pee-Chee superstars:

What is it? Two of the top four cards from the '87-88 O-Pee-Chee set, Wayne Gretzky and Mario Lemiuex
When and where did I get them? At the local hobby shop, way back in July
How much did it cost me? $22 total ($10 for the Gretzky, $12 for the Lemieux).

You could make an argument that at $22 for the pair I may have overpaid slightly for these cards. I'm sure that had I spent hours scouring the web I could have found them for a bit cheaper. These are truly mint, well-centered copies though. Besides, I like giving business to the local hobby shop when I can, in the same way that I'll spend $15 on something at the family owned hardware store down the street that I could have purchased at Home Depot for $10. Don't forget the best part about purchasing at the shop, no shipping.

I don't have very many '87-88 O-Pee-Chee cards, and this was a good way to knock off two of the more valuable cards from the set in one fell swoop. I have to say that I like Mario's '86-87 card better.

What a start to Lemieux's career with back-to-back-to-back 100 point seasons. Still not as impressive as this guy though:

Always nice to add a new Gretzky to the collection. While I don't collect him actively, I've got over 100 unique Gretzky cards now. Sounds like a lot, but it really isn't.

The statistics on the back of this card are just insane. 1,520 points in his first 8 NHL seasons. There will never be another scorer like this.

Three spots to go in the countdown, coming up next is an on-card autograph of a Hall of Famer.

2011 Top 20 Under $25 - #5 - 1968-69 Topps Gump

2012-01-19T15:36:00.000-05:00

Getting close to the end on this series of posts (thankfully), here is the first of the five remaining items...

What is it? A 1968-69 Topps Gump Worsley, graded NM 7 by PSA
When and where did I get it? eBay, in October
How much did it cost me? $12.30 (plus $2.70 shipping).

The 1968-69 Topps hockey set has long been a favorite of mine. While I'm not working hard at any '60s sets until I've at least finished off the '80s Topps hockey run, I've ended up accumulating quite a few of these '68-69s. Gump here is actually my 24th card from the set, which isn't bad considering it consists of 132 cards in total. Just a couple more cards will put me over the 20% mark. Normally I wouldn't pay $12 and change for this card, but I've got a soft spot for Gump and I couldn't pass it up in this condition. The card is fairly well-centered, and more importantly not plagued by the "diamond-cut", which was pretty common with these. Here's a better look at the front:

I think what attracted me to this card is the old school Habs jersey and the glorious brown pads. Gump's paddle looks pretty beat up as well, but unfortunately whoever cropped his photo for the card took out the blade of the stick. I like the back of the card nearly as much as I do the front:

Topps starts off with some flattering material, mentioning in the cartoon caption that "Gump has one of the sharpest wits in the NHL". The compliments continue in the write-up, where it is mentioned that Lorne had won more pro trophies than any other goaltender at the time (really?). In the end though, after commenting on his sharp wit and success in accumulating hardware, the writer made sure not to inflate Gump's ego too much by stating that Worsley was "inclined to put on weight". Certainly an interesting card back!

Coming up next in the countdown will be a pair of '80s greats...

2011 Top 20 Under $25 - #6 - 1985-86 7-Eleven Hockey Set

2012-01-17T21:33:00.000-05:00

What is it? A 1985-86 7-Eleven hockey card set
When and where did I get it? Flea market, in October
How much did it cost me? Ready for this? $1.

Back in early October I went to a very small, hole-in-the-wall flea market with my younger brother. The place was nothing special, maybe 20 total tables and only two people there with any form of sports cards. One guy had a glass case with terribly overpriced '90s singles and inserts, no thank you. The other guy was a disorganized mess, with boxes, binders and piles everywhere. I don't think he had any idea what he had, just a gigantic cardboard disaster spread out on some folding tables and bookshelves. This is more my type of seller, so I decided to poke around for a few. I ended up spending $11 with this guy and coming away with two items. The first was my 1992 Topps baseball factory set, and the other was this hockey card set.

I found this small stack of cards in a ziploc bag at the bottom of a shoebox that was filled with mostly small, non-sport sets. I wasn't entirely sure what they were myself, although they were obviously released by the 7-Eleven chain in the mid-80s. I would have purchased these had he said $10, or maybe even $15, but all he wanted was $1. Sold! I didn't even bother looking beforehand, but after buying them I was psyched to see that it was a complete 25-card set.

They aren't the world's most exciting cards. The front is largely plain black, and contains two (often blurry) portraits of notable players from an NHL franchise. Each of the 21 teams that existed at the time has a card, and the teams are sorted alphabetically.

The backs are not that exciting either, with the left portion dedicated to card number, team logo and 7-Eleven logo, and the right portion reserved for team name and a brief write-up on the organization. According to the copyright these were produced by Super Star Sports. I scanned in the fronts and backs of all 25 cards in case you'd like to see what Super Star Sports had to say about your favorite franchise.

Tom Barrasso's is arguably the cheesiest photo of the 42 subjects pictured.

I always appreciate the chance to add a new Lanny McDonald to the collection. Heck, I would have forked over $1 for just this card.

In looking these up after the fact, I've seen them referred to as the 1985-86 7-Eleven "credit cards" set. I can see that, given that they are a bit smaller than your average card, and have a horizontal layout and rounded corners. I'd say they're slightly smaller than a credit card though, and thicker as well.

Ron Duguay's photo is the one most obviously from the '80s. He looks like he could step in and play guitar for Winger if they were in a pinch.

Wayne Gretzky is not present in this set, which seems odd given the year these came out.

Even the Whalers get a card. I guess this is technically one of my older Ron Francis cards. Mike Liut is obviously wearing a St. Louis sweater in his photo. This is the last time the Whalers will be featured in this countdown.

I like that the back of the card mentions the infamous Hartford Civic Center roof collapse!

I have to say, these write-ups are more informative than half the crap that gets released these days...

For a small set, there are Hall-of-Famers a plenty.

This would be the most valuable card in the set, if anyone considers any of these valuable that is. I guess this is technically a Lemieux rookie, although it doesn't feel right to call it that. Obviously it can't compete with the 1985-86 Topps/OPC Lemieux but it's not a bad companion to that card.

I don't know how these were distributed by 7-Eleven...can anyone help?

The next three cards in the set are the ones I like most, as they feature some of hockey's hardware.

Finally we close things out with a checklist.

These are certainly unique, and while they aren't exactly the best of what '80s hockey cards have to offer there's no way I could turn them down for the price. I hope you enjoyed this look at a set that you don't see every day.

1974-75 Topps Hockey...Just 11 Left!

2012-01-13T13:09:00.000-05:00

Quick break from the 2011 Top 20 Countdown today. While I was browsing eBay the other day I came across one of the more interesting cards I still needed for my '74-75 Topps hockey set. The condition and price were both right, so card #250 from the set is now in hand:

This card is sort of a mess of design and color, and it doesn't really even look like it belongs in the set. I guess that's appropriate for the mid-'70s. Unfortunately, it also symbolizes the Bruins' loss to the Broad Street Bullies in the '74 Stanley Cup Finals. Had I stopped here I would have been an even 20 cards shy of finishing this set off, but the seller had a ton of really good condition '74-75s and offered $5 max shipping, so I knocked these off the want list as well:

Gotta love those Seals sweaters...

Marcel is the only Hall-of-Famer in this bunch. He scored 121 points in 1974-75!

Finally, the bane of every vintage collector's existence, the unmarked checklist card. At $4, this was the most expensive card in the lot.

All told, with shipping factored in, these 10 cards cost me just shy of $2 a piece. While this is more than I'd generally like to pay, they are all in sufficient condition that they'll never have to be upgraded, and the fact that I'm getting so close to the end on this set made the purchase worth it.

11 cards to go on this one...

2011 Top 20 Under $25 - #7 - Rogie Vachon Auto

2012-01-11T13:30:00.000-05:00

I'd like to have this 2011 Top 20 countdown wrapped up in the next week or so, so let's proceed with card #7...

What is it? A Rogatien Vachon Brushstrokes Auto from 2008-09 Upper Deck Legends Masterpieces hockey
When and where did I get it? eBay of course, end of October
How much did it cost me? $12.99 (free shipping!)

I added at least 35 autographed cards to the collection in 2011, and this one is amongst my favorites. The '08-09 Legends Masterpieces set is in my opinion one of the best hockey sets to be released since I got back into collecting in 2007. At just 87 cards with no short prints, I was able to complete it fairly easily. Because I put my set together via a retail box and some singles though, I didn't end up with any autographs. I have picked up a handful of them since. The brown framed border gives these a similar look to the 2011 Gypsy Queen baseball framed parallels that everyone loved so much, and there are some great names on the checklist as well.

This one was purchased just because of how pleasing it is on the eyes. Rogie's autograph is one of the more unique looking signatures I've seen, and the photo on this card is perfect. I have quite a few cards of Vachon in the old Kings jersey, but this is the first in my collection that features the fantastic purple "double crown" mask. The brown pads also tie in nicely with the border frame. All in all a very aesthetically pleasing piece of cardboard.

The backs of the Brushstrokes auto cards are nothing fantastic, so instead here's Rogie's card from the base set, which isn't half bad either.

Coming up next in the countdown is an entire set of hockey cards that I got a real steal on...

2011 Top 20 Under $25 - #8 - 1952 Bowman Walt Masterson

2012-01-10T12:45:00.000-05:00

Not much time today, so here's a quick post to knock off the next item on the 2011 Top 20 Under $25 countdown...

What is it? A 1952 Bowman Walt Masterson, graded EX-MT 6 by PSA
When and where did I get it? May 2nd, once again on eBay
How much did it cost me? $20.00 (plus $3.00 shipping and handling)

Walt Masterson wasn't exactly a stellar pitcher, but I didn't purchase this card because of its subject's career. I purchased it because it's one of my favorite cards from 1952 Bowman, which (as I've stated many times) is one of my favorite vintage baseball sets. Here's a better look at the front:

As a Red Sox fan, this is pretty close to vintage perfection. I love the smaller size and simplistic design of the '52 Bowmans. The minimal design makes it all about the picture, which on this card includes everything...an old school Sox jersey, a cloudy sky, those funny looking, tinted glasses, and a uni-brow that would give Wally Moon a run for his money.

My copy of the card comes with some bonus gum/wax stains on the back too!

I'm off to see the new Winnipeg Jets franchise take on the Bruins this evening, hopefully some regular posting will resume tomorrow...

A Trio of Dollar Box Dodgers

2012-01-06T13:00:00.000-05:00

If you read just the last week's worth of posts here, you'd get the impression that I collect hockey cards only. I guess it's just difficult to get enthused about baseball when it's 12 degrees outside and the NHL and NFL seasons are in full swing. The fact that the Bruins have been on one of the most impressive runs I've ever witnessed as a hockey fan hasn't helped. I do still enjoy baseball cards though, I swear. Today we'll take a break from hockey...here are three Los Angeles Dodgers cards from the dollar box at the local hobby shop:

1972 Topps - #11 - Bobby Valentine

I've got a ton of Topps base from 1974 and later, but most of the sets prior to that are represented scarcely at best in my collection. So, any time I see a card from '72 in great shape it's difficult to pass it up. The cards in today's post have been kicking around for quite some time, in fact when I picked this up Bobby hadn't yet been named the new skipper of the Red Sox. For that matter, the Red Sox hadn't really even begun their monumental collapse of 2011.

1961 Topps - #130 - Norm Larker

I'm not really too sure why I chose this one. I'm not a big fan of 1961 Topps, and this isn't the world's most exciting looking card. I think my decision to drop $1 on this was based solely on the fact that the card is in great condition for a '61.

Norm played just a handful of season's in his MLB career, partly because he was already 27 by the time his rookie season came. He was a member of the 1959 Dodgers championship team, and as the cartoon on the back of his card indicates enjoyed a very successful season the following year. He would bat .323 in 1960 (second only to Dick Groat's .325) and was selected as an All-Star for the only time in his career.

1960 Topps - #105 - Larry Sherry

Speaking of the 1959 championship team, Larry, as everyone knows, was the '59 World Series MVP. I believe this is his rookie card, and it's in great shape given that it came from the dollar box.

The cartoon on the back references the '59 World Series performance, 12 2/3 innings, 0.71 ERA.

So there you go, some proof that I still collect baseball cards after all!

1974-75 Topps Hockey - 21 Cards Left!

2012-01-05T17:42:00.000-05:00

Recently I picked up yet another card towards the 1974-75 Topps set courtesy of eBay. Like the Scotty Bowman I featured a week or so ago, this card was one of the bigger names I had left to track down for the set:

1974-75 Topps - #195 - Denis Potvin RC

This is Denis' rookie card, and it ranks just behind Bobby Orr and the aforementioned Scotty Bowman card in terms of highest "book value" in the '74-75 set. The Orr and Bowman are listed at $30, with Potvin's rookie booking at $25. I was psyched to win this copy, which is in as good or better shape than many of my '74-75s, for a mere $2.28!

Potvin was the first overall pick in the 1973 amateur draft, and was a key player for the back-to-back-to-back-to-back Islanders championship teams of the early 80s. Denis was one of the premier defensemen of his era, one of the best of all-time actually. Aside from the four Stanley Cups, this lifetime Islander accumulated a Calder and three Norris trophies. He retired as the leader among defensemen in career goals, assists, and points, both regular season and playoffs. Potvin was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1991, and was the first Islander to have his jersey retired a short time later.

The seller that I purchased this card from on eBay offered $2.00 shipping regardless of how many cards were won. So...I did what any good collector would do and checked out what else he had up for auction. I ended up winning three additional vintage hockey cards:

1971-72 Topps - #10 - Jacques Plante

One of the most innovative and successful goalies in the game's history. Although he's better known for his time spent with the Montreal Canadiens in the 50s and early 60s, this is a cool card nonetheless. If you've gotten your name on the Cup and won the Vezina a half dozen times each (Vezina 7 times), you're alright in my book!

Jacques wasn't the first goaltender to wear a mask in an NHL game, but he was the first to do so regularly.

1971-72 Topps - #6 - GAA Leaders

Plante makes another appearance here, and this card signifies a pretty impressive feat. Jacques had hung up the skates in 1965 but made a comeback and returned to NHL play a few seasons later. After some time with the Blues he was dealt to the Maple Leafs before the '70-71 season. His first season with the Leafs was stellar, he ended up topping the league in GAA. In fact, he was the only goalie that season with a sub-2.00 GAA:

1971-72 Topps - #1 - Goal Leaders

Finally, perhaps my favorite card of the lot, the very first card in the 1971-72 Topps set. Virtually any time you have 3 Hall of Famers on a single piece of cardboard that card is going to be a winner. Even 40 years after this card came out, these three players are all still in the top 25 for goal scoring all-time (#'s 5, 25 and 16 respectively).

Quite a season for Phil Esposito in 1971-72, huh? Those 76 goals are good for 5th most ever scored in an NHL season to this day, behind Mario Lemieux, Brett Hull and a couple of monster seasons from Wayne Gretzky.

Thanks to the combined shipping from this seller, these four cards cost me a total of $8.53 shipped.

Retro Ron

2012-01-04T22:05:00.000-05:00

Not much time for a post tonight. I just finished watching the Bruins hand the New Jersey Devils a good ol' fashion ass whooping, and I've got an early start to my work day tomorrow.

In lieu of a legitimate post, please enjoy this 2011-12 O-Pee-Chee Ron Francis retro parallel. It's been sitting in draft form for a couple of months now. This card cost me 55 cents, and even with shipping costs came to less than a single pack of O-Pee-Chee. It's my 27th Ron Francis card.

I'll be back with some actual content soon...

The Ultimate Hockey Card Set - Card #59

2012-01-03T13:27:00.000-05:00

Today's post is the first selection of 2012 for The Ultimate Hockey Card Set. I'm not sure if it's because I've already covered some of the obvious choices, or because I'm getting more and more cards inventoried by the day, but choosing these cards seems to be getting harder with each post. Today we'll look at card #59...

Card #59 from my favorite parallel set, 2008-09 O-Pee-Chee Retro, features the game's last 50-goal scorer. Perry was the only player to notch 50 last year, capturing the Rocket Richard trophy. This year the Ducks are struggling mightily, and Corey has 14 goals in 37 games, which puts him outside the top 30 goal scorers in the league.

I'm not sure if this is considered a true rookie card (my guess is that it isn't), but I thought this card #59 from 2007-08's In The Game O Canada set was interesting. There were much better options than this though, and the card I went with is much older.

Ugh, two Canadiens in a row! Patrick here is much more deserving of inclusion in this set than Carey Price is, but it won't be this card that does it (even though it certainly is a nice looking piece of cardboard). This card is 13 years older than the Carey Price above it, but still nowhere near as old as the card I selected.

Moving backwards through time we have Super Mario, card #59 from the 1990-91 Upper Deck set. A decent card from the junk wax heyday, but I've already selected a Mario Lemieux card for the set. That's not to say that there won't be multiple cards of certain players when all is said and done, but this won't be the card to start that trend. How about a little older?

Mike Gartner occupies spot 59 in the 1986-87 Topps set. He's an under-rated scorer for sure, and was one hell of a skater. This is pretty much a horrible photo though, not one of his finer cards.

Getting warmer. I've always been partial to the 1981-82 set and the team leaders subset features some pretty big names.

Looking back a year further, I found that card 59 in the '80-81 Topps set is also a team leader card, and of my beloved Whalers no less! Blaine Stoughton was quite a scorer, but the scratch-off design of '80-81 Topps has always bothered me, and it looks particularly awful on the leader cards where roughly 1/3 of the surface area of the card is black scratch-off material.

Card #59 in the 1978-79 Topps set is none other than Mike Milbury. Those old school skates look pretty funny nowadays.

The runner up is this Bobby Hull card from the 1970 Dad's Cookies set. I've actually got a couple of these Dad's Cookies cards. As you can tell, they are definitely not standard sized cards. They measure 1 7/8" wide and about 5 3/8" tall. These cards are a unique, cheaper alternative to some of the other sets from the era. I think I would like this oddball set much more though if the players weren't all shown in the same NHLPA sweater. The cards aren't truly numbered, but every checklist I've located online lists Hull as #59 in the set. I think this is just where he happens to fall when the set is arranged alphabetically by last name. I don't actually know if these were included with cookies back in the day, or if these were some type of wrapper mail-away promotion. Can anyone shed some light on this in the comments?

Well, those are the runners-up, let's take a look at the winner:

1954-55 Parkhurst - #59 - Milt Schmidt

I already talked about Milt's amazing life in my very first post of the year, so I'll spare you the details here. For some time now I've wanted to add a card of Milt from his playing days to my collection. Because of the fact that the bulk of his career was played during an era where there weren't really any sets being released, there aren't many choices. By my count there were just 6 cards of Milt produced during his career as a player:

1940-41 O-Pee-Chee V301-2 (never seen this card in real life or even on eBay for that matter)
1951-52 Parkhurst
1952-53 Parkhurst
1953-54 Parkhurst
1954-55 Parkhurst
1954-55 Topps (Milt is the final card in the set, making this a tough one to come by in good condition)

When I recently had an opportunity to snatch up one of the 6, I jumped at the chance. I was amazed when I emerged from a flurry of last-minute bidding activity with this card for slightly less than the cost of a blaster. This is my very first 1954-55 Parkhurst card and it's a thing of beauty when held in person. Milt is pictured on the front wearing his vintage B's gear and sporting the captain's "C". As far as condition goes, I'm amazed at the shape this card is in, given that it's well over 50 years old at this point. Nicely centered, crease free, and four clean corners. I also found it interesting to see how similar the facsimile signature on this card is to the autograph from his 2006-07 Parkhurst card I showed a few days ago. This set is unique in that the card numbers are displayed prominently in a red box on the card front.

The backs of the '54-55 Parkhurst cards aren't spectacular, especially compared to the large, full-color fronts, but they're not half bad either. One year of stats plus bio in both English and French.

Hopefully I'll have an opportunity to pick up another of Milt's cards at some point, but for now I'm extremely happy to have this one in hand.

The Ultimate Hockey Card Set, now at 12 cards and counting, can be viewed here.

Cards for Christmas!

2012-01-02T12:44:00.000-05:00

Still catching up here on some posts from 2011...

Over the last week or so, I've seen a few other bloggers out there display cards received as holiday presents. Until this past year I never really received cards, or anything card related, as a gift. This year one relative, my younger brother, broke the mold and gave me four awesome hockey cards:

First card is this 1975-76 Topps Cesare Maniago. This one was much appreciated as this is one of the 1970s Topps sets that I have the fewest cards from. In fact, this is just my 16th 1975-76 Topps card.

The back has a trivia question about the dimensions of a puck, which I failed...

Next up is a very unique item, a 1984-85 7 Eleven Disc of Ron Francis. My brother went above and beyond with this one, as he located it on my Zistle want list. This disc uses the same "cutting edge" technology as the Sportflics baseball cards of the era, and displays either Ron's mug shot or the Whalers logo depending on how you tilt it. Definitely a cool oddball item for the Whalers collection.

My Cesare Maniago collection is really picking up some steam. I think with the two I got here I've added around half a dozen older Maniago cards to the collection in the last year or so. I have quite a few 1977 O-Pee-Chee WHA cards, but this is my first from the '77 O-Pee-Chee NHL set. As usual, I'm amazed at how much brighter and clearer this card is than its Topps counterpart.

'70s goalie cards are right up my alley, I mean I've got a handful of them in the blog header that's been up for the past couple of months. I really appreciate the thought that went into picking out these cards.

Finally, my favorite card of the four:

This is one nice vintage hockey card! I just started pursuing the '73-74 set and definitely did not have this one. Two 50-goal seasons in the NHL for Mr. Leach. 1975 Stanley Cup winner. Won the Conn Smythe as playoff MVP in 1976 despite the Flyers losing to the Canadiens. Something about 19 goals in those playoffs. In the opinion of some, he belongs in the Hall of Fame. The best thing about this card to me though is the Seals gear.

I have to confess that I did not know Reggie was called "Little Beaver". Fittingly, I am told right beneath the cartoon to watch NHL Hockey on NBC-TV. Well, I actually will be doing that when I enjoy the 2012 NHL Winter Classic in just a few hours here.

This gift was an absolute score. I had none of these four cards, and they are all right in my collecting wheelhouse. Tom, if you read this, thanks for the killer gift!

2011 Top 20 Under $25 - #9 - 2006-07 Parkhurst Milt Schmidt Auto

2012-01-01T10:40:00.000-05:00

Happy New Year everyone! Nine cards left in the 2011 Top 20 Under $25 countdown. Today's card is another autograph:

What is it? A 2006-07 Parkhurst Milt Schmidt auto
When and where did I get it? This past September, where else but eBay
How much did it cost me? $9.38 (plus $2.25 shipping and handling)

After typing up this post, I realized that I ranked this card way too low in the countdown. In fact, I should've considered making this card #1. Oh well, not going back now.

To say that I was excited to grab this card for less than $10 would be an understatement. Milt's name may not be instantly recognizable to the casual, modern-day NHL fan living outside of New England, which is a shame, but he's one of the most significant and successful individuals in Boston Bruins history. His life story is pretty amazing, actually.

Milt dropped out of school at age 14, and took an 18 cents an hour job at a shoe factory to help support his family. He continued to play Junior hockey though, and eventually the Boston Bruins acquired the rights to his team, making him and his pals Woody Dumart and Bobby Bauer property of the B's. He would get the call up to the Bruins in 1937, and along with Dumart and Bauer formed one of the most famous lines in Boston history for roughly the next decade and a half. In 1939 they brought a Stanley Cup to the city of Boston. The next season his 52 points were the most of anyone in the NHL. Then in 1941 Milt led the Bruins to another Stanley Cup.

At this point Schmidt, along with a few teammates, enlisted in the Canadian military, an act more admirable than anything he had accomplished in skates. He would miss three seasons in the prime of his career as a result. Milt returned to the NHL in 1946 and didn't seem to miss a beat. Before retiring to take over coaching duties in 1954, he would be named team captain, and even capture a Hart Trophy as league MVP.

Schmidt would coach the Bruins for an uneventful 11 seasons before eventually becoming the organization's GM in 1967. It was in this position that he would achieve even more success. Milt was the architect of the dominant Bruins teams of the early 70s, including the Stanley Cup-winning 1970 and 1972 teams. He was responsible for flat out robbing the Blackhawks of Phil Esposito, Ken Hodge and Fred Stanfield. Milt was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1961. His #15 was retired by Boston in 1980. In October, 2010 the Bruins honored the 75th anniversary of his signing with the team on Milt Schmidt night, an event I was lucky enough to be present for:

A 92-year-old Milt was in great spirits as he was joined by other Bruins legends on the ice before the game, and he even raised his own jersey to the rafters at TD Garden. As luck would have it I ended up in the box right next to the one reserved for Milt and his family, and I was fortunate enough to speak with him briefly and shake his hand.

Being able to meet someone who played for the Bruins in the 1930s, once led the NHL in scoring, was captain coach and GM, won the Stanley Cup and served in the military during the middle of all of it was pretty special. Milt Schmidt is certainly a class act.

Out With The New, In With The Old - Ryne Sandberg Edition

2011-12-31T09:41:00.000-05:00

This past year I started a new, recurring series of posts called "Out With The New, In With The Old". Basically, whenever I end up with a somewhat valuable modern card that I'm not interested in keeping, I flip it and use the money to pick up some vintage. So far I've done this three times:

Flipped a Jordan Eberle Score short-print for a couple of vintage Johnny Pesky's
Sent Sal from Puck Junk a PK Subban Young Guns rookie and got a vintage Phil Esposito in return
Finally, in my best effort to date, I sold a Logan Couture Young Guns rookie that I had pulled from a hobby box and used the money to pick up 5 O-Pee-Chee WHA cards of Bobby Hull and Gordie Howe

For today's Out With The New post, I sold a baseball card for the first time:

This is a 2004 Donruss Studio - Studio Proofs Platinum parallel of Ryne Sandberg. I was fortunate enough to land this card in a group break just about 2 years ago now. Not the world's most impressive card in my opinion, but as you can see on the back it is serial numbered 10/10:

I figured with numbering this low it would probably attract the attention of some Sandberg collectors out there, so after it accumulated dust for close to 2 years I finally listed it on eBay earlier this month. I went with a 99 cent auction with no reserve just to see how it would do. To my surprise there was quite a bit of bidding activity and the card ended up selling for $27.50, which was better than I had expected.

The PayPal funds from this sale went to the purchase of 5 new vintage hockey cards from one of my favorite eBay sellers. Here are all 5, from least favorite to favorite:

1979-80 Topps - #150 - Ken Dryden

I'm still plugging away at one of the most, if not the most, iconic hockey card sets ever made, 1979-80 Topps/O-Pee-Chee (just working on the Topps version for now). Dryden's is one of the top cards in the set book value-wise, so crossing this one off the want list felt pretty good.

Of course, one of the things that made this set so great was the card backs. I think I can safely say they are my favorite hockey card backs of all time. The skate design is absolute genius and many of the cartoons are quite creative. Ken's, featuring the Dryden brothers waving at each other from opposing goals, is no exception.

1973-74 Topps - #1 - NHL Goal Leaders - Phil Esposito/Rick MacLeish

1973-74 Topps has only appeared on my radar recently, after I picked up a decent chunk of the set from the quarter box at the local hobby shop. This card features a couple of the decade's greats, plus it's always nice picking up card #1 from any vintage set.

If I told you that 3 players surpassed the 50 goal mark in the 1972-73 season, you might be able to guess at Phil Esposito and Rick MacLeish, but would you have known Mickey Redmond was the third? If so, give yourself a pat on the back. I for one certainly did not know that. Continuing with the theme of first cards in a set...

1979-80 Topps - #1 - NHL Goal Leaders

Like the 1973-74 set, the 1979-80 Topps set also led off with a card featuring the NHL's goal leaders. Mike Bossy was still at the beginning of his amazing stretch of 50+ goal seasons, having recorded 69 in his second year in the league, 10 more than the next closest player.

This card is a great addition to my collection for another reason though:

The joy of a completed page! While I still need around 70 cards to finish this set off, at least the first page in my binder is now complete. Now for the best two cards in the lot...

1979-80 Topps - #185 - Bobby Hull

The 1979-80 Topps Hull isn't exactly his toughest card to track down. This copy is flat out mint though, and it's the third most valuable card in the set behind the Gretzky rookie and the Gordie Howe, both of which I already have. It was the first time Bobby had been featured on a Topps card since the 1971-72 set, since he had been playing in the WHA for the bulk of the decade. It was also the final Topps card of Hull.

Another great back featuring two of my favorite things...hockey and beer! Finally, my favorite card of the 5:

1974-75 Topps - #261 - Scotty Bowman

I believe this card is the most expensive in the 74-75 Topps set in terms of book value, along with the Bobby Orr, both of which book at $30. The coach cards are one of my favorite elements in the set, and this is not only one of the greatest coaches in hockey history, but one of the greatest coaches in the history of sports period. Scotty won more games and more Stanley Cups than anyone before him (and anyone after him to date). He had already won a Cup with Montreal when this card was produced, and he'd go on to win four more (consecutive) Cups with the Canadiens from 1975-76 through 1978-79. He reached the playoffs in all 8 years that he coached the Habs, winning the cup an amazing 5 times!

That alone would have been enough to earn Bowman a place in hockey history, but he would also bring Lord Stanley's cup to Pittsburgh at the helm of the 1991-92 Penguins team. He then moved on to coaching the Red Wings where he would coach his teams to 3 more championships before retiring. Between the 1970's Montreal teams, the stacked Pittsburgh squad of the early 90's, and the powerhouse Red Wings, Scotty stood behind the bench of some of the best teams in the history of the sport.

Well, that's what a serial numbered Ryne Sandberg card can net you on eBay I guess. I was really happy with this flip, I don't miss the Sandberg at all and I've made significant dents in the 1970's Topps hockey run with these 5 cards. Best of all they are all in really good shape, and were all previously on the want list. I'm now just 22 cards away from a complete 1974-75 Topps set...I wonder what else I have kicking around to sell?

Card of the Month - December 2011

2011-12-30T09:59:00.000-05:00

Just one day to go, I almost dropped the ball on a Card of the Month for December. After yesterday's lengthy baseball post it's back to hockey today...

Recently I've been focusing primarily on older hockey cards, but over the past couple of months I have accumulated a few Young Guns rookie cards of note. I've already shown two of the better ones in Steven Stamkos and Claude Giroux, which was actually last month's Card of the Month (can you really still get Giroux's Young Guns rookie for around $10? If so, get it now!). Those were both great additions, in fact it just so happens that as of this morning they are the two players leading the NHL in points and goals:

December's Card of the Month is the Young Guns rookie of a player who has the potential to join the likes of Giroux and Stamkos atop the NHL stat leader lists someday, perhaps in the very near future:

2010-11 Upper Deck - #456 - Tyler Seguin - Young Guns RC

Tyler Seguin has grown by leaps and bounds in his second year with the Bruins. Though he's admittedly cooled a bit after starting the season at a torrid scoring pace, he has improved dramatically from his rookie season in virtually every statistical category. It hasn't all been perfect, in fact he was benched one game for missing a mandatory team meeting on a road trip a few weeks back. Nevertheless, let's look at where he was at last year and where he's at now.

In his rookie season he played in 74 games, scoring 11 goals and assisting on 11 others, for 22 points. Not bad for an 18-year-old kid, although there were without question more impressive seasons from other rookies like Taylor Hall, who scored as many goals as Seguin had points, or Jeff Skinner, who surpassed 30+ goals and 30+ assists en route to the Calder Trophy. So far this year in just 33 games Tyler Seguin has 14 goals, 17 assists and 31 points, all improvements on last season's totals already. His 31 points are good for the top spot on the Bruins scoring chart. He's scored 3 goals on the power play this year, something he did only once last season. He's also tallied 3 game-winners so far, the first 3 of his career. Perhaps most impressive though is his improvement in +/-. Last year he seemed a bit too focused on offense at times, and his -4 on the season reflected that. This year? How about a +25 to lead the entire NHL! I know some of this is due to the fact that the Bruins play a tight defensive game and have the best goaltending tandem in the league, but I think Seguin deserves at least some measure of credit for improving his game at both ends of the ice.

The Bruins are playing some of the best, most consistent hockey I've ever witnessed these past couple of months. In the 24 games they've played since November 1st they are on an astounding 21-2-1 tear that has brought them from the basement to the top of the mountain in the Eastern Conference standings. Hopefully both Seguin and the team can keep rolling as we enter 2012...

2011 Top 20 Under $25 - #10 - 1992 Topps Factory Set

2011-12-29T19:28:00.000-05:00

I've kind of mailed it in the last couple of times with single-card posts. Time for an image-heavy one. We're past the halfway point with my 2011 Top 20 Under $25 countdown. Here's item #10...

What is it? A 1992 Topps baseball factory set.
When and where did I get it? Early October, at a flea market with my younger brother.
How much did it cost me? $10, no shipping!

Of all the items in the countdown, this one by far contains the most cards for the money. When I saw this 792-card set available at a local flea market for just $10 I jumped at it. I knew it was a complete, mint-condition set because it was in the factory box and still encased in cellophane. At just over a penny per card I couldn't turn it down.

1992 was the first year that Topps used white cardstock for its flagship baseball set. It was also the last year for the standard card backs I had grown up collecting (although these are obviously white), as the backs would be glossy beginning with the '93 set. Oh yeah, they also featured panoramic views of baseball's stadiums (great link here), the first time Topps featured pictures on the back since the early 1970s:

It was also the first set without gum in the packs. I think the design is decent but the photography is great. The Ripken at the top of this post is arguably the best photo in the set, but there are plenty of others in the mix in my opinion. In the interest of keeping this monster sized post manageable, I'm going to just show the scans of some of my favorite cards and keep the commentary to a minimum. Enjoy! There's pretty much something for everyone in this set...

One of my favorite players, Nolan Ryan, leads things off with card #1...

...followed by some Record Breaker cards. Remember these?...

...maybe they do have these in recent Topps sets, I guess I haven't picked up enough packs to even know...

...Jon Farrell gets the award for best (or worst) hair in the set...

...this always seems to be the case with me, but I like the horizontal cards best in this set...

...see?...

...some of the early Topps cards of the stars of my youth are in this one...

...as well as some late career cards of some Hall-of-Famers...

...Sammy sure looked much different back then...

...and like most of the flagship sets leading up to this one, there are manager cards...

...Manny, Manny, Manny...if only you could go back to the Youth Service League and start over...

...Cliff won a medal I guess, not sure what for...

...I love this card of a troubled-looking Jack Clark in front of the Green Monster, one of my favorite photos in the set...

...I betcha Robbie's mom had this card displayed on her fridge back in the day...

...another great horizontal shot, I've seen those one posted many times...

...there are two two-sport stars in this set. Will we ever see one again? Probably not...

...worst shirt in the set goes to Greg Anthony hands down. This paisley and floral combination should never appear on a baseball card. From any era. Ever. Moving on...

...your latest World Series-winning manager...

...a terrible trade by the Red Sox...

...what's not to love about this card? What a great moment captured on cardboard. Not to mention a baby blue Expos jersey...

...this is one I'd put up with the Ripken that led off the post in terms of best cards in the set. There is just so much going on here...

...another one of my favorites. I actually chose this card when assembling my own custom "hobby box" this past summer...

...another beauty. Pretty close to perfection on cardboard as far as I'm concerned...

...the other two-sport star...

...John Franco signing some autographs for the Mullet Club...

...as a Red Sox fan, this card just feels wrong...

...speaking of the Red Sox, their new skipper is included...

...and we close it out with a very happy Joe Carter. He's got plenty of reasons to smile, as he was about to win consecutive World Series and hit one of the most dramatic and famous homers in baseball history to clinch the second title.

So, there you have it. Maybe not the world's most valuable set but some pretty great cards for mere pennies and one I'm happy to have in the collection. Don't worry, the last 9 posts in the countdown will be much shorter than this one!

1986-87 Topps Hockey - One Card Closer!

2011-12-28T11:26:00.000-05:00

I'm getting closer each month to finishing off my #1 collecting goal for hockey, completing the entire 1980s Topps run. Recently I spent a whopping $1.56, plus $2.50 shipping and handling, to knock another card off of the 1986-87 Topps want list:

This is Steve Yzerman's third Topps base card. I don't have a Beckett in front of me, but I believe it's one of the more valuable cards in the set behind the Roy RC, Gretzky, Lemieux and Wendel Clark RC. I was more than happy to grab this one for $4 shipped.

Yzerman would enjoy a 90-point season in 1986-87, his best to date at that time. He would go on to top 100 points for 6 consecutive seasons after 86-87 though! It still pains me that the Whalers took Sylvain Turgeon two spots ahead of Steve in the 1983 entry draft. Imagine if Ron Francis and Steve Yzerman could have been teammates throughout the 80s. What might have been!

With Stevie Y occupying his proper spot in my 1986-87 Topps binder, I am now just 7 cards away from finishing this set off!

Merry Christmas!!!

2011-12-25T09:09:00.000-05:00

2011 Top 20 Under $25 - #11 - Normand Leveille Auto

2011-12-22T14:59:00.000-05:00

Back to the countdown of the top 20 (under $25) items from this past year that did not get a post initially. Today we have #11 in the countdown, yet another auto...

What is it? A 2010-11 Panini Limited Select Signatures Normand Leveille auto.
When and where did I get it? Early March on eBay.
How much did it cost me? $12.00 (plus $2.95 shipping).

Of all the autographs I added to the collection this year, I'd say this is the most unique. I first saw the card on Casey's Drop the Gloves blog and tracked down my own copy just a couple of days later.

I think most hockey fans know the story, but for those who don't Normand was an up-and-coming young winger for the Boston Bruins in the early 80s. He was a good enough scorer to be drafted by the B's in the first round (14th overall) of the 1981 entry draft. After a decent rookie campaign in 1981-82 (33 points in 66 games), he was off to an even better start in 1982-83 when tragedy struck.

On October 23rd, 1982 the Bruins were squaring off against the Canucks in Vancouver. Normand had just enjoyed a great first period where he scored his second and third goals of the young season. In the locker room during the first intermission though, he began to feel dizzy and complained of shoulder pain. While being evaluated by the training staff, he lost consciousness and was rushed to an area hospital. Doctors confirmed that he had suffered a brain aneurysm due to a congenital condition. After hours of surgery and three weeks in a coma, he regained consciousness. He did well with his recovery, regaining most of his motor skills and was even able to walk again, however his hockey career was over. He would never again take to the ice in an NHL game after that first period in Vancouver.

It's certainly interesting to consider how different the Bruins franchise may have looked later on in the decade had Leveille been on the roster. He had topped the 100-point season in Juniors and was scoring at a point-per-game pace at the NHL level when the injury brought his career to a dramatic halt.

Normand did make one final appearance in front of the Boston faithful during the closing ceremonies for the old Boston Garden. With Ray Bourque's assistance, he made one final lap around the ice, bringing many in attendance to tears. Definitely a memorable moment in Bruins history.

While he may be an obscure name to many hockey fans, I was thrilled to add this one to the collection. Considering the card is hard-signed by Normand rather than being a sticker auto, and is numbered to 99 copies, I thought this was a steal for around $15 shipped...

The Rest of My Vintage Hockey Haul

2011-12-18T10:55:00.000-05:00

Happy Sunday everyone. After consecutive baseball posts, it's time to get back to some hockey cards. A few weeks ago, I posted a pretty good quarter box haul of vintage hockey. Here are the rest of the cards from that same trip to the local shop, the ones that didn't come from the quarter box:

The majority of my quarter box haul from this day consisted of 1973-74 Topps hockey, and I grabbed a few more from this set out of the dollar box, including this Henri Richard. Maurice's younger brother was a lifelong Canadien. He won an astounding 11 Stanley Cups as a player with the team, including 5 straight to start his career. His number is retired by the team and he was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1979.

Alex Delvecchio's 1973-74 Topps card finds him at the tail end of an extremely long career that began in the 1951-52 season! He would play in just 11 games in 1973-74, his final year in the league. In total, the longtime linemate of Gordie Howe appeared in 1,549 games over 23 seasons, all with the Red Wings. Like Richard, his number is retired by his team and he was elected to the Hall of Fame.

The next three cards are all from the 1974-75 Topps set, and brought me to 240 out of 264 cards. I have a feeling this will end up being the first Topps set from the 1970s that I complete.

Second year card of Bill Barber, also in the Hall of Fame. I thought I already had a copy of this one for some reason, but the Want List said otherwise...

A few big names that I needed for the 1979-80 set were available on the cheap as well:

The man who once scored 10 points in a single game against the Bruins...

The man responsible for one of the most comical looks ever captured on a hockey card...

One of only two leaders cards that I still needed. Pretty decent group of netminders there, huh?

Even after these four 1979-80 Topps cards, I still have a decent way to go for this set. 73 cards left to be exact. I've finally gotten this one into a binder and my want list is up to date, so if you've got any extras floating around let me know.

I grabbed this off-center, mis-cut 1963-64 Topps Black Hawks (yes Black Hawks, not Blackhawks) team card. Truth be told, it's not as bad as it looks in the scan. Besides, it was so cheap, and other than the alignment issues is in really good shape. Having the Stanley Cup front and center certainly doesn't hurt either. I'm a big fan of team cards and this is now the oldest in my collection.

This card is everything a 70s hockey card should be. I've had my eye on this one for quite some time, great to finally cross it off the list. 23 cards to go now for the 74-75 Topps set, and another great Esposito for the collection to boot. Speaking of which...

Like the 73-74 Topps cards from the quarter box haul, this card was in fantastic shape and couldn't be left behind. Finishing things off, we have my favorite card from the lot:

All in all I took home a pretty sizable stack of 73-74 Topps that day. Even though I'm still less than halfway to the 198-card set I have added it to my want list so I can start picking away at it.

This lot cost me $12 total, I think I did pretty well...

2011 Top 20 Under $25 - #12 - A Couple More Lineage Autos

2011-12-16T13:20:00.000-05:00

Continuing on with the list, today's post actually contains two different cards from the 2011 Topps Lineage set. I stayed away from this one, mainly due to the atrocious backs. I didn't buy so much as a single pack, but there were a couple of things that intrigued me about the set. More than anything I was interested in the 1952 Topps Reprint Autos, as there were 5 Red Sox on the checklist. I posted the first two, Don Lenhardt and Ike Delock, when they arrived in the mail a few months ago. I ended up purchasing two more around the same time, but never got around to posting them until now:

What is it? A 2011 Topps Lineage Dick Gernert 1952 Reprint Auto.
When and where did I get it? eBay, just as the playoff races started heating up in August.
How much did it cost me? $12.01 (plus $3.00 shipping).

Gernert was a mainstay on the Red Sox from 1952 through the end of the decade before being dealt to the Cubs after the 1959 season. He'd go on to play for the Tigers, Reds and Colt .45's before retiring. Given that this is a rare high-series card in the 1952 set, it's unlikely that I'll ever own an authentic copy of this card, but this isn't a bad substitute at all.

What is it? A 2011 Topps Lineage Ted Lepcio 1952 Reprint Auto.
When and where did I get it? eBay, same day as the Gernert card above.
How much did it cost me? $10.45 (plus $2.25 shipping).

This Ted Lepcio was the card I wanted most out of the four that I've shown so far. It's the only horizontal card, and I've always like the photograph with bleachers in the background. Like the Gernert card, this is a high series short print in the 1952 set, so unless I feel like shelling out some cash I'll likely never end up with the original.

The auction that I won was actually for a redemption card, and I was a bit skeptical since I don't have much experience with these. I entered the code on Topps' web site and just a couple of weeks later the card was in my mailbox. No complaints there. I guess if you count shipping the total for both cards came to just a hair over $25, but close enough!

This brings me to four out of the five 1952 Topps Red Sox autos from this set. The only one I'm missing at this point is Johnny Pesky. I'm pretty sure his autograph is short printed compared to some of the others, as I've only seen a couple of them ever hit eBay, both going for more than I was comfortable paying. Maybe someday...but for now I'll enjoy the four I do have.

The Ultimate Baseball Card Set - Card #232

2011-12-14T18:42:00.000-05:00

Ever feel old? I recently joined a floor hockey league, and after my first session this past weekend I was sore for a couple of days. It made me realize that I'm definitely not getting any younger. I definitely am getting older. Perhaps if you can relate to this feeling, today's induction into The Ultimate Baseball Card Set will help you feel a bit better.

As is the custom though, before we get to the winning card, here are some runners-up...

Card #232 in the 2010 Topps set is a pretty nice team checklist of your World Series champion St. Louis Cardinals (as well as a guy who recently became $250 million richer)...

I have card #232 from one of my all-time favorite sets. However, despite being a high-numbered card, Mr. Kokos here is not all that exciting, and besides I already posted about this card almost four years ago now.

Card #232 in the 1960 Topps set is Jim Busby of the Boston Red Sox. This is possibly my favorite set of the entire 1960s Topps run, and that old Red Sox logo is a thing of beauty. There are a couple of other decent #232's from the 60s as well...

...I like the background of this 1966 Glenn Beckert...

...and this 1969 Topps Dave Ricketts isn't too shabby either. All of these are nice cards, but they don't make me feel any better about the fact that the years are ticking by. The winning card sure does though:

1977 Topps - #232 - Minnie Minoso Record Breaker

I really like the Record Breaker cards from the old Topps baseball sets, and this may be the one I like most out of the many in my collection. I never knew it existed until a short while back when I was working on completing the 1977 Topps set. As you can tell from the front, the card pays tribute to Minoso becoming the oldest player to record a hit in an MLB game. An impressive feat no doubt, but it's even more impressive when you see the details. If you had to guess how old Minoso was when he recorded this hit, what would you say? 47? 50? 52? If you guessed any of those you'd be too low! Check it out...

No, your eyes do not deceive you, Minnie Minoso connected for a single towards the end of the 1976 season at the age of 53! How amazing is that? I'm sure many of you were aware of this, and maybe this is one of those sports trivia facts I should have known, but I was shocked to learn about it.

Minoso's accomplishments deserve a post of their own, which I hope to get to someday, so I won't give you a full breakdown here. If there was ever a feat that was worthy of a baseball card though, I'd say this is it. Perhaps even more amazing than his 1976 single is the fact that he got two more MLB at bats four years later in 1980, at the age of 57!!! Unfortunately he wasn't able to record a hit in either, but impressive nonetheless.

When you think of sports records that may never be broken, I'd say this has to be near the top of the list for baseball. All of a sudden I don't feel so sore...

The Ultimate Baseball Card Set, which now stands at 3 cards and counting, can be seen here.

The Ultimate Hockey Card Set - Card #9

2011-12-12T22:40:00.000-05:00

Time to select card #9 in The Ultimate Hockey Card Set. A couple of weeks ago I sold off some David Krejci cards, and I used the money to pick up two new cards for the collection that I've had my eye on for some time now. The first was Steven Stamkos' Young Guns rookie. You'll see the other one at the end of this post...

Choosing card #9 was not difficult at all, there were really no cards that even came close to topping the winner. There are a few #9's in my collection that are at least worthy of showing though...

The 1990-91 O-Pee-Chee Premier set is definitely a classic. I hope to include a card from this set one day, but today is not that day!

Richard Brodeur's card from the 2008-09 Upper Deck Legends Masterpieces set is pretty sweet as well. That Canucks jersey is fantastic.

This was plucked a while back in what was definitely one of my most successful quarter box raids to date. Emile was a significant figure in the Whalers organization for years.

Card #9 in the 1977-78 Topps/O-Pee-Chee Glossy insert set has a pretty good shot of Rick MacLeish...

One of the most collected sets of my youth, 1991-92 Upper Deck, features an Eric Lindros card at #9. I always liked the Canada Cup subset from this set, most of the big names from the era were included, and so were some up-and-coming stars like Lindros and Selanne.

Marcel Dionne is #9 in the 1981-82 Topps set. A great player but not the most exciting looking card, and that's coming from someone who loves the 81-82 set.

That brings us to our winner, the other card that I picked up with my David Krejci loot...

1985-86 Topps - #9 - Mario Lemieux (RC)

This one has been on my "white whale" list for quite some time. Completing the entire run of 80s Topps sets has been a major collecting goal for a while now, and Lemieux's rookie was the biggest obstacle of the entire decade in terms of book value. It felt great to cross this one off the want list.

Mario was always one of my absolute favorite non-Whalers. His 1992-93 season alone was one of the most remarkable sports stories of my lifetime. After a crazy start to the season that at one point included twelve straight games with a goal, it looked like Lemieux might be able to make a run at Gretzky's records for goals and points in a season. In mid January, fans were shocked by the announcement that he had been diagnosed with Hodgkins lymphoma. At the absolute pinnacle of his career, when he had mastered the game and was playing at an elite level every single night, he was sidelined by a terrible illness. He missed over 2 months of play, yet returned on the same day as his final radiation treatment, and had a goal and an assist! He led his Penguins to 17 straight victories to finish the season and a #1 playoff seed. Despite playing in only 60 games he still won the scoring race with 69 goals, 91 assists, and 160 points. How could you not root for this guy?

You could make the argument (and I wouldn't disagree with you) that Lemieux is the most prolific scorer in hockey history. He's 7th all-time in points, and 9th all-time in goals. Look at this list of the top 12 goal scorers of all-time though:

#11 (tie) - Jaromir Jagr - 656 goals in 1,297 games played (as of this post).
#11 (soon to be #12) - Brendan Shanahan - 656 goals in 1,524 games played.
#10 - Luc Robitaille - 668 goals in 1,431 games played.
#9 - Mario Lemieux - 690 goals in 915 games played.
#8 - Steve Yzerman - 692 goals in 1,514 games played.
#7 - Mark Messier - 694 goals in 1,756 games played.
#6 - Mike Gartner - 708 goals in 1,432 games played.
#5 - Phil Esposito - 717 goals in 1,282 games played.
#4 - Marcel Dionne - 731 in 1,348 games played.
#3 - Brett Hull - 741 goals in 1,269 games played.
#2 - Gordie Howe - 801 goals in 1,767 games played.
#1 - Wayne Gretzky - 894 goals in 1,487 games played.

So, if you set Lemieux aside and look at the other 11 players on this list, the least amount of games played by any of them is Brett Hull's 1,269. Even that is 354 games more than Lemieux was able to play in. Guys like Messier and Gordie Howe...Lemieux could practically play an entire second career before approaching their total games played numbers!

I decided to take a look at the 8 guys ahead of Lemieux in career goals. I broke down how many more career goals they had than Lemieux, how many more career games they played than Lemieux, and how long it may have taken Mario to catch up to their goal totals had he remained healthy:

#8 - Steve Yzerman - 2 more goals, 599 more career games - at his career average pace, it would have taken Lemieux just 3 games to surpass Yzerman. No question at all that injury kept him out of the 8 spot...

#7 - Mark Messier - 4 more goals, 841 more career games - so, if Lemieux had gone on to play as many career games as Messier, he would only have had to net 4 goals in the next 10 1/2 seasons or so to surpass Mark! No question that he was a more prolific scorer than Messier.

#6 - Mike Gartner - 18 more goals, 517 more career games - Again, no question. At his career pace Lemieux would have needed just 24 more games to net 18 goals. Gartner played 517 more games than Lemieux. Enough said.

#5 - Phil Esposito - 27 more goals, 367 more career games - Getting tougher but still falls in Lemieux's favor. At his career pace we'd be talking less than 40 games for Lemieux to make up the 27-goal difference. Phil played the equivalent of nearly 5 full seasons more than Lemieux.

#4 - Marcel Dionne - 41 more goals, 433 more career games - Again looking at career goals-per-game Lemieux may have surpassed Dionne had he played just 56 games more than he did in his career. At this point I'm thinking Lemieux is at least the #4 best pure scorer of all-time.

#3 - Brett Hull - 51 more goals, 354 more career games - Here's where it starts getting tricky. Hull had 51 more goals than Lemieux, a significant number for sure. Here's the thing though...in 1992-93 Mario had 69 goals. In 1995-96 he had 69 goals. The two seasons in between? He sat one out completely and in the other played just 22 games (and scored 17 goals). Even if you assume that he would have scored only 35 goals in each of those two seasons if healthy (an insanely low estimate given these would have been his peak years, as evidenced by the two 69-goal bookmark seasons I referenced), that still would have been enough to surpass Hull's career numbers.

#2 - Gordie Howe - 111 more goals, 852 more career games - If you use Lemieux's career average of .75 goals per game played (Howe's is actually .45 goals/game), it would have taken him around 148 games to score 111 goals in theory. Let's take those two lost seasons I just referenced when comparing Brett Hull a moment ago. If we assume he would have netted 45 goals in each of those seasons, still a potentially low estimate in my opinion, that would have been an extra 73 total. At that point you'd be looking at a deficit of less than 40 goals, and Howe would still have over 700 career games in hand. Mario may have made up the difference had he played the full 1990-91 season alone (he scored 19 goals that year despite appearing in just 26 games). Sorry but I think Lemieux was a more effective goal scorer than Howe, the numbers don't lie. There, I said it.

#1 - Wayne Gretzky - 204 more goals, 572 more career games - Okay here is where it gets incredibly difficult. I know Gretzky played 572 games more than Lemieux, but 204 goals is a whole lot of scoring. Let's have some fun playing with hypotheticals...

We'll say that Lemieux really did have the same types of seasons in 1993-94 and 1994-95 that he had in the years prior to and following. If he scored an average of even 55 goals those two years (14 less than he scored the seasons before and after this two-season stretch) that would give him 93 more in total (since he did score 17 in 1993-94), leaving him around 110 shy of Gretzky. If you factor in the two months that he missed in his amazing 1992-93 season, based on the rate he was scoring that year, that's another 25 goals missed, which would put him about 85 shy of Wayne. In 1990-91 he scored 19 times despite appearing in just 26 games. Had he played out the season at that pace, he would have scored just shy of 40 more goals, at which point he'd be less than 50 goals from surpassing Gretzky's total. Factor in Lemieux missing the 1997-98, 1998-99, and 1999-2000 seasons entirely and it's totally conceivable that he could have surpassed the Great One. You can only imagine how many he may have tallied during those three lost seasons given that he scored 50 just before that and then 35 in just 43 games in his first season back in 2000-01.

At his career pace of .75 goals/game Mario would in theory have needed 272 more games to surpass Gretzky's goal total. You could make the argument that this stat is skewed by some of the monster years he enjoyed. Well, then let's take a look at the three seasons before his first retirement in 1997. The lowest goals/game he registered during any those three campaigns was a .66 goals/game. Even if he appeared in just 70 games a season for those three lost years, and scored at that pace, that would give him an additional 140 goals. I know this sounds absolutely crazy, but had things gone differently for Lemieux it's not out of the realm of possibility that he could have been the only player in history to tally 1,000 career goals!

All said and done, Mario missed 513 career games due to injury. Obviously the illnesses, back injuries and other issues prevented us from ever finding out for sure, but it is interesting to consider whether or not Lemieux could have potentially passed Wayne Gretzky as the league's all-time leading scorer. No matter what he's easily one of the top three offensive players of all-time as far as I'm concerned. It definitely makes for an interesting debate at least. I'd love to hear any thoughts? Are you in agreement or have I given Lemieux way too much praise here?

The Ultimate Hockey Card Set, which now stands at 11 cards and counting, can be viewed here.

2011 Top 20 Under $25 - #13 - Liut Auto!

2011-12-09T10:57:00.000-05:00

Continuing my countdown of the top 20 pick-ups from 2011 that were under $25 and did not initially get a blog post, today we look at spot #13...

What is it? A 2011-12 Parkhurst Champions Mike Liut auto.
When and where did I get it? eBay, just a few weeks ago now.
How much did it cost me? $7.50 (plus $3.00 shipping).

Release a set of decent looking hockey cards featuring players from my youth and I'm pretty much sold. Include some Hartford Whalers and I'm even more interested. Throw in autographed versions of the Whalers cards and there's no doubt I'm tracking them down as long as the price is right.

When Upper Deck released its 2011-12 Parkhurst Champions set a while back I was excited to see three Whalers on the checklist; Gordie Howe, Ron Francis and Mike Liut. I'm not sure whether or not there's a Francis auto, I'm beginning to think there isn't because I haven't stumbled across a single one on eBay yet. Howe's card is great but the auto is a bit out of my price range. I was able to snag Mike Liut though for a mere $7.50!

This would be my first auto of the Whalers top goaltender during the latter half of the 1980s. I've since picked up one or two more of these Parkhurst Champions autos on the cheap, I'll have those posted soon.

The Ultimate Baseball Card Set - Card #21

2011-12-08T10:53:00.000-05:00

I decided a few months back that I was going to compile The Ultimate Baseball Card Set, a franken-set of my all-time favorite baseball cards to go along with the hockey version I've been plugging away at. I selected the first card, a 1971 Topps Thurman Munson, all the way back on the first Sunday of the 2011 NFL season. I've done nothing since! Time to get cracking...today I'll choose card #21 for the set. As usual, let's look at some of the cards that did not make the cut first:

This 1975 Topps Rollie Fingers was in the running for sure. Despite that fantastic facial hair though, this card just didn't cut it. The photo isn't exactly stellar, and as you can tell from the scan my copy of this card is more than a bit off-center (it's got some wax stains on the back too!).

Nolan Ryan's 1990 Leaf card didn't really stand a chance, but '90 Leaf was one of the more desirable sets during my first go-round at collecting so I thought it was at least worth showing. I picked this card out of a quarter box at one of the few cards shows I've ever been to about 4 years ago.

The runner up was this 1962 Topps Jim Kaat. A great card for sure, but like the Hall of Fame selection committee recently did, I'm going to pass on inducting Jim here.

That brings us to our winner. If you were a child of the 80s and 90s like I was, you might have already guessed which card I went with for #21 in the set...

1982 Topps - #21 - Bob Bonner/Cal Ripken Jr./Jeff Schneider RC

Aside from being one of the iconic cards of the 80s (if not one of the most iconic Topps cards period), this card was the pride of my childhood collection. Ripken was a boyhood idol, and this card was one of my most prized possessions from the time I pulled it from an '82 Topps vending box I got as a birthday present. When I think of the baseball card boom of the 80s, this is one of the first cards that comes to mind.

I think most collectors feel the same way about this card, as it came in at #12 in this past year's top 60 list of Topps baseball cards. True, Ripken's solo card from the 1982 Topps Traded set is much more valuable but in my mind this is the card I think of when it comes to Cal's rookies. Nowadays you can get a really nice copy for less than the cost of a blaster.

When I first got back into collecting in 2007 I actually pulled another one of these in a 1982 Topps rack pack from Dave and Adam's Card World. That one's been traded away, but I still have my childhood copy to this day.

The Ultimate Baseball Card Set, which now stands at 2 cards and counting, can be viewed here.

2011 Top 20 Under $25 - #14 - Another Graded Pesky

2011-12-07T18:48:00.000-05:00

What is it? A 1950 Bowman Johnny Pesky, graded EX-MT 6 by PSA.
When and where did I get it? April 3rd on eBay.
How much did it cost me? $17.67 (plus $2.00 shipping).

2011 was a big year for Johnny Pesky as far as my collection goes. When the year started off I had no vintage Pesky cards, which is an absolute shame. As a Red Sox fan who collects baseball cards, there was simply no excuse for this. I remedied that situation early on this year when I flipped a Jordan Eberle short print for two vintage Pesky cards. A couple of weeks after that I picked up this 1950 Bowman card to complete the trifecta.

This is definitely the oldest card in the countdown, at least by a couple of years. As I've said numerous times, I'm a sucker for early 50's Bowman baseball cards, so I couldn't pass on this one for less than the cost of a blaster shipped. This actually came from the same seller and in the same shipment as another 1950 Bowman card that I posted back in May.

Now, if I can only track down 1949, 1951 and 1952 Bowmans, and maybe even the 1951 or 1952 Topps Pesky cards...

NHL Realignment - What Do You Think?

2011-12-06T11:29:00.000-05:00

As you've probably heard, the NHL's Board of Governors has approved a realignment plan that, pending approval from the NHLPA, should be in place for the 2012-13 season. The current format of two three-division conferences will be replaced by a four conference format.

The catalyst for this change was the Atlanta Thrashers franchise moving to Winnipeg. It just didn't make sense for a team located in Manitoba to be a member of the Eastern Conference's Southeast Division going forward. Other teams had some gripes with the current format as well, most notably the Red Wings. The Wings are currently a Western Conference team despite being located in the Eastern time zone. The result is a whole lot of games being played two to three time zones away, which means many 10 PM starts that tend to reduce the number of your fans who can watch the games in their entirety.

So, going forward the league will have four (yet to be named) conferences. The teams will be grouped into these four conferences as follows:

Conference "A"
Anaheim Ducks
Calgary Flames
Colorado Avalanche
Edmonton Oilers
Los Angeles Kings
Phoenix Coyotes
San Jose Sharks
Vancouver Canucks

Conference "B"
Chicago Blackhawks
Columbus Blue Jackets
Dallas Stars
Detroit Red Wings
Minnesota Wild
Nashville Predators
St. Louis Blues
Winnipeg Jets

Conference "C"
Boston Bruins
Buffalo Sabres
Florida Panthers
Montreal Canadiens
Ottawa Senators
Tampa Bay Lightning
Toronto Maple Leafs

Conference "D"
Carolina Hurricanes
New Jersey Devils
New York Islanders
New York Rangers
Philadelphia Flyers
Pittsburgh Penguins
Washington Capitals

Along with the realignment comes some obvious scheduling changes. In the regular season, every team will play every other team twice (once at home and once on the road) regardless of conference. The remaining games will be inter-conference match-ups. In Conferences "C" and "D", which contain seven teams each, each team would play the other teams in the conference six times total (three home, three away). In Conferences "A" and "B", which contain eight teams each, each team would play the other teams in the conference either five or six times (on a rotating basis).

As for the playoffs, the top four teams from each conference would qualify. They would play a 1 vs. 4, 2 vs. 3 playoff within the conference. The winners of each conference would make up the 4 semi-final teams in a run for the Cup.

I for one am actually really excited for this new alignment. I think the league dealt with the Winnipeg problem in a creative way that helped some other current Western Conference teams with their scheduling gripes as well. The same number of teams will qualify for the playoffs under the new format, and by keeping the first two rounds of the playoffs within each conference I think existing rivalries will be magnified and new rivalries will be built. Geographically this makes a whole lot of sense. I am also happy that most of the classic rivalries (Boston/Montreal, Chicago/Detroit, Philadelphia/New York, etc) have been preserved within the new structure. I love that every team plays every other team both at home and on the road in a given season. This means that NHL fans in every city will have at least one to chance to see all of the league's major stars. Like any proposal, it is not without flaw. One thing I can think of right off the bat is that the teams in Conference "A" and "B" have a 50% chance of making the post-season, while the teams in Conference "C" and "D" have a greater than 50% chance. Overall though, I still like this change.

So, what do you think of the realignment? Does your favorite team benefit, or is it hurt by these changes in your opinion? Finally, what do you think some good names would be for these four new conferences? I'm definitely interested in hearing all of your thoughts on this major change...

2011 Top 20 Under $25 - #15 - 1993 Finest John Olerud Refractor

2011-12-04T09:00:00.001-05:00

What is it? A 1993 Topps Finest John Olerud refractor.
When and where did I get it? March 2nd on eBay.
How much did it cost me? $20.50 (free shipping!).

Like almost everyone who was collecting in 1993, I found the Topps Finest refractors to be some of the most desirable baseball cards of the era. Seeded at one per box (a very expensive box at that), these were supposedly limited to around 250 copies each, give or take. The scarcity of the cards, combined with the sheer number of Hall-of-Famers and stars in the set, has resulted in a ton of collector interest that really hasn't waned at all over the years. These refractors still demand a premium on the market, in fact you can expect to pay well into the hundreds for decent examples of the biggest names in the set like Nolan Ryan and Ken Griffey, Jr.

As it stands now, Olerud is my second of these refractors, the other being the Will Clark I got earlier this year. I always liked Olerud as a player, although I have to admit this is largely because I played several seasons as the Toronto Blue Jays in Ken Griffey Jr. Baseball for Super Nintendo, and he was an absolute beast in that game. Aside from that, my brothers and I always found it comical that he wore a batting helmet while fielding his position (too young to realize there is nothing comical about a brain aneurysm I guess).

In all seriousness though, if you were to take a time machine back to 1993 and bust a box of Finest, there would be very few refractors you'd be happier to pull than this one. John was enjoying his breakout season, flirting with batting .400 as far into the season as late August. He'd finish at .363 with a .473 on-base percentage, a 1.072 OPS and 54 doubles, all good for first in the AL. Throw in career highs of 200 hits, 24 home runs and 107 RBI and Olerud appeared to be on the path to super-stardom. He was named an All-Star and finished third in AL MVP voting that season as the Blue Jays won their second consecutive World Series.

Eventually John came back down to earth. While he was never a top-tier player, he did enjoy a lengthy career that included 2,200+ hits, 500 doubles, 250+ home runs and four 100+ RBI seasons. He would go on to spend time with the Mets, Mariners, Yankees and even Red Sox before calling it a career.

1993 was one hell of a season for John Olerud, and for the Toronto Blue Jays organization. Given the prices that some of these refractors fetch, I thought dropping an Andrew Jackson on this one was more than reasonable.

2011 Top 20 Under $25 - #16 - 1986 Topps Traded Set

2011-12-03T09:46:00.000-05:00

Time for #16 in the 2011 Top 20 Under $25 countdown...

What is it? A complete set of 1986 Topps Traded baseball.
When and where did I get it? Picked it up at the local hobby shop back in April.
How much did it cost me? $10 flat.

This blog has been all about hockey lately, but I do still enjoy baseball cards...really, I do. Just like with hockey, I'd love to finish as many pre-1990 Topps sets as possible. When I saw this '86 Traded set for a ten spot I couldn't resist. There is truly something for everyone in this 132-card set. I've picked out some highlights to show here. Since this post is image heavy I'm going to keep the commentary sparse.

My favorite card without a doubt is the Will Clark rookie at the top of this post. He was one of the two players I always collected as a kid, so it's got some nostalgic value. The set has some other notable rookies as well, including a couple of juicers...

...The Big Cat...

...Bobby Bo...

...Bo Jackson...

...Wally Joyner...

...Kevin Mitchell...

...and John Kruk sporting a very impressive sweat ring on his cap. A couple of guys in the set have made headlines recently...

...the recently departed former Red Sox manager Terry Francona, in Chicago Cubs jersey...

...and the new Cubs skipper Dale Sveum. A few of the Red Sox cards are interesting...

...Sammy Stewart...

...slugger Don Baylor...

...and the great Tom Seaver. Tom's photo is heavily airbrushed, but he's not alone...

Like any great 80's set, we have some examples of the era's fashion trends. We've got everything from some bling...

...to some of the terrible uniforms of the day...

...the rainbow Astros uniform...

...a very nice Cardinals warm-up jacket...

...no idea what the White Sox were thinking with these...

...and of course, not to be outdone, the Pittsburgh Pirates. There's some interesting eye-wear to be found...

A couple of other cards of note...

...a Rooster...

...the elder Griffey...

...an All-Star, Gold Glove, Hall-of-Fame, no-hitter throwing knuckler, still throwing despite looking like a grandfather...

...Lou Piniella...

...a Bip! (but not a bipping)...

...and the Wild Thing.

Great variety in this set. Not bad for $10, huh?

Bruins Extend Krejci 3 Years!

2011-12-02T10:11:00.000-05:00

Congratulations to David Krejci, who signed a 3-year contract extension with Boston yesterday. Krejci, who would have been an unrestricted free agent come season's end, is now locked up through the 2014-15 season. The contract was for a reported 15.75 million, or 5.25 million/year.

David's name was mentioned in trade rumors earlier this year as he struggled through some tough stretches, but he has always been somewhat of a streaky player throughout his career anyway. He's a good reliable two-way player who plays a great possession game and logs a lot of minutes night in and night out. When he's on his game, he's a highly skilled offensive player as well. I actually think this was a good signing for the B's. Why would you want to disturb the chemistry on a team of mostly young players who just went 12-0-1, capturing 25 of a possible 26 points in the month of November? This coming off-season's free agent class is pretty weak on centers too, so it's likely that he would have commanded more money in the open market, especially if he has a playoff run like he did last year. For this reason I think it was wise for the team to wrap up negotiations now.

I hope that this extension will keep David with the Bruins organization for years to come, but the reality is that the contract is setup in such a way that the team would have no trouble trading Krejci if it does come down to it. He does not have a no-trade clause currently, and will not have one for the first year of the deal next year either. In the second and third years, he does have a partial no-trade clause, but can only reject a deal to 6 teams.

Congratulations David on your new contract. Thanks to Casey at Drop the Gloves for this O-Pee-Chee retro parallel, which is yet another card that came in the recent prize package.

2011 Top 20 Under $25 - #17 - 1986-87 Topps Mario Lemieux

2011-11-30T19:01:00.000-05:00

I better get rolling with this under $25 countdown if I'm going to finish by the end of the year. Here's a quick one at #17:

What is it? A 1986-87 Topps Mario Lemieux.
When and where did I get it? eBay, a few weeks ago.
How much did it cost me? $6.99 (free shipping!).

For the longest time 1986-87 Topps was one of those sets that just seemed foreign to me. I started collecting as a kid in 1989, so most of what I had was junk wax era and later. I did have a few cards from earlier in the decade, which I thought were practically priceless because they were so "old". I definitely recall a 1981-82 Topps Bill Barber that I kept in a top-loader and swore would help me with retirement someday. The 86-87 set was without representation in this small, cherished stack of cards though. Sure I saw a picture or two in a Tuff Stuff (remember those?), and a couple of my friends had a few, but that was about it.

After getting back into collecting in 2007, I ended up trading for a huge chunk of the 1986-87 Topps set. Since then, I've picked up a card or two here and there but haven't pursued the set too vigorously. One thing I did manage to accomplish this year was to organize all of my 1980-81 through 1989-90 Topps cards and get updated want lists. In the end, I found that I was less than 10 cards away from finishing this one off.

Mario here was one of the few cards I had left to go. I knew it would be one of the more expensive remaining pickups since it's the second most valuable card in the set ($30 BV) behind the Roy rookie. I was happy to grab this one for just $7 shipped. The card has good centering, good clean corners and looks right at home with the rest of the 86-87s in the binder.

I think Lemieux's is one of the better looking cards from this set. The design has grown on me and I love the fact that in most cases the colors used for the border match those of the player's uniform almost to a T. I like the closely cropped photo of Super Mario and the giant #66 in the foreground.

You'll be seeing some more 86-87 Topps here in the near future. If I can show some restraint from blowing my card budget on packs I should have this set finished off soon...

Best of Luck to Ya Bobby V!

2011-11-30T18:17:00.000-05:00

This should be interesting to say the least...

The Ultimate Hockey Card Set - Card #245

2011-11-29T20:45:00.000-05:00

It's time to select another card for The Ultimate Hockey Card Set, a franken-set of my all-time favorite hockey cards. Today we'll induct card #245. The card I selected is one of two that I purchased using the money I ended up with from parting with a few David Krejci cards a week or two ago. Before we get to the winner though, let's look at the two runners-up...

Coming in third place is this Johnny Bucyk Lady Byng Trophy card, which is #245 in the 1974-75 Topps set. Bucyk would certainly be a worthy player to include in the set, and I have a feeling one of his cards will make it in someday, but I'm not wild on the design of the 74-75 trophy winner subset. A small, blurry photo and way too much orange means I'm passing on this one.

The runner up is another Bruins card, this time from the 1979-80 Topps set. As I've said again and again I'm a huge fan of vintage team cards. The Bruins were nothing special in 79-80 though (in all fairness I wasn't even alive yet in 1980), losing in the second round of the playoffs to the eventual Stanley Cup Champion New York Islanders. Not only that, but I've already chosen the Gretzky and Gordie Howe cards from this set as selections for this franken-set and I'd like to keep it diverse where possible.

Alright, I've kept you hanging long enough. Here's the winner, one of the most exciting recent additions to my hockey card collection:

2008-09 Upper Deck - #245 - Steven Stamkos (RC)

After a solid first season in 2008-09 (23 goals, 23 assists), Stamkos became an absolute star in 2009-10. He lit the lamp 51 times, tying Sidney Crosby for most goals in the league. His 95 points were good for fifth in the scoring race. Last year was no different, as Steven recorded 45 goals (second in the NHL behind Corey Perry's 50) and 91 points (again good for fifth in the scoring race).

So far this year things have basically been the same for Stamkos. He's currently sixth in league scoring and is just a single goal behind Phil Kessel (who should be cooling off at any moment now) for the league lead. He's got as good a shot as anyone at capturing another Maurice Richard Trophy this season. Without question Stamkos is one of the new faces of the NHL.

Aside from being one of the game's most prolific scorers, the Lightning's sniper is also one tough hockey player. The fact that he returned to game 7 of the Eastern Conference Finals against Boston after catching a vicious puck to the face earned him more respect in my book than any of his many highlight-reel goals.

Steven Stamkos is truly a superstar and a class act. He's got top-end talent, is a dedicated hard worker, and plays the game the right way. I think we all have those players who we root for any time they're not playing our favorite teams, and for me Stamkos falls into this category. I would love to see this kid (remember he's still just 21) win a Cup someday. In the meantime, I'm psyched to have his rookie card in my collection.

The Ultimate Hockey Card Set, which is now up to 10 cards and counting, can be viewed here.

17 Wax Packs of 1983-84 O-Pee-Chee Hockey

2011-11-27T11:57:00.000-05:00

First of all, it was high time I retired the Whalers header that's graced the top of this blog for the past couple of months. Instead, you'll be looking at a random assortment of goalie cards for the foreseeable future. Now, onto the post...

Just over a year ago I scored a whole slew of 1982-83 and 1983-84 O-Pee-Chee wax packs from the local hobby shop. I really enjoyed ripping the packs slowly, and managed to stretch them out for quite some time. I finished opening and sorting all of them a few months back, but am only just getting to scanning them in and updating my collection on Zistle now.

I'll post the best of the 1982-83 packs in another post, but for now here are some of the highlights from the 17 packs of 1983-84 O-Pee-Chee hockey:

#2 - Denis Potvin - Highlight

The cards are for the most part sorted by team. First there is the statistical leaders card for the team, then a Highlight card depicting one player, like the Potvin above, followed by the base cards for that team. This Potvin card may be my single favorite card from the 17 packs, a great Stanley Cup photo indeed. This one will get some serious consideration for induction into The Ultimate Hockey Card Set.

#3 - Mike Bossy

Bossy came out of the first couple of packs.

#13 - Ken Morrow

#16 - Denis Potvin

#24 - Glenn Anderson

I'll spoil the suspense right now, I didn't pull base cards of the four Oilers I'd want most (Gretzky, Messier, Kurri or Coffey).

#27 - Grant Fuhr

I did get Fuhr's second-year card...

#37 - Kevin Lowe

#43 - Boston Bruins Leaders - Rick Middleton

Here's what the leader cards look like. Definitely not my favorite of the team leader designs from the 80s...

#60 - Buffalo Sabres Leaders - Tony McKegney

#61 - Bob Sauve - Highlight

Awesome pads, Jofa helmet, and Titan stick.

#65 - Phil Housley (RC)

The rookie card of one of the greatest US-born players of all-time. Housley's 1,232 career points have him in the United States Hockey Hall of Fame and the Buffalo Sabres Hall of Fame. Unfortunately for Phil, despite playing in 1,495 career games he never captured a Stanley Cup.

#67 - Gilbert Perreault

Sal from Puck Junk recently pulled a very cool Perreault card...

#75 - Lanny McDonald - Highlight

#86 - Rejean Lemelin

I think I've mentioned this before, but I love the Molson practice jerseys sported by many of the Flames in this set.

#96 - Denis Savard - Highlight

#105 - Steve Larmer

I pulled both sides of the infamous Larmer/Ludzik error, Steve Larmer's card that actually depicts Steve Ludzik...

#106 - Steve Ludzik

...and Steve Ludzik's card that actually depicts Steve Larmer...

#114 - Doug Wilson

#116 - Corrado Micalef - Highlight

I'm not that familiar with Micalef but that mask is awesome.

#135 - Hartford Whalers Leaders - Blaine Stoughton

Did you know that Stoughton had four consecutive 40+ goal seasons with Hartford? It's true, in fact two of those four were 50+ goal seasons.

#138 - Ron Francis

Second year card of Francis, sporting some fantastic early-80s Whalers garb. Glad those Cooperalls didn't stick around. I picked this one up already from the quarter box at the local hobby shop, but I needed another one for my Whalers collection so it was a welcome double.

#139 - Marty Howe

#147 - Blaine Stoughton

#152 - Marcel Dionne

Great detailed look at the crown from the old Kings sweater on this card.

#163 - Dave Taylor

#181 - Bobby Smith

#215 - Wayne Gretzky - Goal Leader

I didn't end up with Gretzky's base card, but I was lucky enough to pull this NHL Goal Leaders card featuring the Great One. What a different game it was back then, seven different 50 goal scorers in 1982-83!

#219 - Paul Gardner/Al Secord - Power Play Goal Leaders

#220 - Randy Holt - PIM Leader

#221 - Pete Peeters - GAA Leader

#226 - Mel Bridgman

An airbrushed nightmare. That helmet looks like something out of Star Wars. I immediately recognized this one from a Puck Junk post a while back.

#251 - Rob McClanahan

My first card of one of the key members of the 1980 Miracle on Ice US Olympic hockey team. Rob scored 5 goals in that tournament, including the game-winner in the Gold Medal game.

#260 - Bill Barber

#268 - Pelle Lindbergh (RC)

Probably my best pull from these packs. I actually pulled two of these Lindbergh rookies, although I traded one away a while back.

#272 - Darryl Sittler

#287 - Quebec Nordiques Leaders - Michel Goulet

#288 - Michel Goulet - Highlight

#290 - Dan Bouchard

#293 - Dale Hunter

#302 - Anton Stastny

Didn't get Peter, guess Anton is good enough.

#308 - St. Louis Blues Leaders - Brian Sutter

#309 - Mike Liut - Highlight

This one would make my top 5 from these packs, another awesome mask.

#310 - Wayne Babych

There are two things that make this card great. The helmet, and the uni-brow.

#324 - Rick Vaive - Highlight

#325 - John Anderson

#343 - Rick Vaive

#366 - Bob Carpenter

#369 - Mike Gartner

#372 - Doug Jarvis

#373 - Al Jensen

#380 - Dave Babych

That's a wrap. While I did strike out on the two big cards from the set (Gretzky's base card and the Gretzky/Messier Highlight card), and also experienced some centering issues, these were a ton of fun to rip. For less than the cost of a blaster I ended up with over 170 different cards to start hand collating a set with. I got a lot of the mid-level cards including the Lindbergh and Housley rookies, second year cards of Francis and Fuhr, and a bunch of other Hall of Famers.

In the next few days I'll try to post the results of the 20 packs of 82-83 O-Pee-Chee. I like that set much better and had more success with those packs than I did these.

Card of the Month - November 2011

2011-11-26T12:32:00.000-05:00

For the fourth straight month now I've managed a Card of the Month post...I'm really on a roll! Every so often I browse the hockey or baseball card auctions on eBay just to see if there are any real bargains about to end that I can snipe at the last minute. This month's card is the result of one of those last minute bids, and in my opinion it was an absolute steal for the price:

2008-09 Upper Deck - #235 - Claude Giroux - Young Guns RC

Claude Giroux has emerged as one of the top two-way forwards in the league over the past couple of seasons. When he first broke into the NHL I always thought his game was very similar to David Krejci's, in that he had amazing puck possession skills and that every touch of the puck seemed to have a purpose. In fact, I believe Krejci and Giroux played together for Gatineau in Juniors. Fast forward a couple of years and I think most everyone can agree that he has become a better player than Krejci. If I were an NHL GM and had to select one of those two players to build a team around, I hate to say it but I'd be going with Giroux.

With very few exceptions, it seems to take the game's young stars a season or two to get comfortable at the NHL level. We've seen it with Steven Stamkos, who had more goals in his second season (51) than he did points in his rookie campaign (46). Tyler Seguin is another example, as he's currently sitting just a point out of the top 10 in league scoring, and just 21 games in has already surpassed his goal total from his rookie season. I would put Giroux in this same category. After about half a season of action in 2008-09, Claude registered 47 points in 2009-10, his first full season. Last year he really broke out though, crossing the 25-goal and 50-assist plateaus and falling just short of a point per game scoring pace (76 points in 82 games). Those 76 points were good for 11th place in the league's scoring race.

2011-12 has been even better for Giroux so far. Thanks in large part to great chemistry with linemate Jaromir Jagr in the early part of the season, Giroux's 13 goals and 16 assists in 22 games have him second in the NHL in both goals and points at the time of this post (just one point behind Toronto's Phil Kessel for top spot). Claude is generally successful regardless of who's he's paired with though. Even with Jagr missing some time lately, Claude has racked up 2 goals and 5 assists in his last 5 games. The Canadiens suffered at his hands just last night, when he scored two goals himself and made an amazing stick-handling play on the game-winning goal by Jakub Voracek.

After an off-season where the Flyers made some controversial moves including signing Jagr, and letting both Jeff Carter and Mike Richards go, Giroux has really answered the call and stepped up his game. Aside from being one of the league's top scorers so far, he consistently plays 24+ minutes a night and hasn't missed a game in over 2 1/2 seasons.

Given what the Young Guns rookies of some other top stars go for, I was amazed that I was able to win this auction for just over $7 ($10 shipped)! Giroux is definitely one of the game's future stars and I think this card has the potential to be worth much more than $7 someday.

I'm Just Not a Player Collector...

2011-11-22T16:38:00.000-05:00

Lately I've been spending some time really analyzing my collecting habits, looking at where my collection is currently at, at where I want it to be, and at what the best way is to get there. One thing that I came to a realization on is that I'm just not a player collector. I'm a set collector at heart. As much as I feel an affinity towards certain players, I just don't have what it takes to keep up with a player collection. Constant eBay searching, scouring every new checklist that gets released...at some point it feels more like a chore than a hobby.

So, going forward I will continue to be a player "accumulator" for Tony Esposito, David Krejci, etc. This means that I will gladly accept any cards of these players and will pick them up myself when I see them on the cheap, but will not be pursuing them as a top priority or trying to track down every new card that comes out.

As luck will have it, just as I was making this evaluation I was contacted out of the blue by a reader who was interested in a few of my David Krejci cards. We went back and forth and ultimately I decided to part with 8 of my Krejci's at a price that we both found fair:

I had no problem sending these away knowing that they became part of a Krejci collection that was far superior to mine (over 135 unique Krejci cards and counting!). While a couple of these were among my better Krejci cards, I've still got over 40 left including some great rookies and autos that I don't plan to part with.

The best part is that I used the funds from this transaction to add two awesome cards to my hockey collection. Both cards that I picked up are superstar rookies, and one has been on my "white whale" list for quite some time. I will be showing them here as soon as they arrive, and you can decide how you think I did.

Are you a player collector? Have you ever given up on a player collection? If so, what did you do with all the cards?

Panini Dominion Brass Bonanza - The End!!!

2011-11-19T19:49:00.000-05:00

I've added quite a few new cards to the collection lately that I'm anxious to show off, and have a couple of other posts in the works that I've been meaning to get to as well, including the remainder of my Top 20 Under $25 countdown. Before I get to those though, it makes sense to close out the Dominion Brass Bonanza posts. Here's the tenth and final card in the set:

#1 - Bobby Hull (#'d/24)

I guess this may have been an obvious choice to some as the final card in the set (in fact 1967ers correctly guessed in the comments a few posts back that Hull was included). While Bobby played only 9 games with the Whalers (the final 9 of his career), his is one of a very select group of former Whalers in the Hall of Fame (along with Gordie Howe, Dave Keon, Paul Coffey, Ron Francis and Mark Howe).

610 career goals in the NHL, and another 303 in the WHA, yet the elder Hall-of-Fame Hull scored just 2 while wearing a Hartford sweater. A cool card nonetheless, and the signature itself is my favorite out of all ten cards in the set. I knew this one would be the toughest to track down at just 24 copies, but I am extremely pleased to have Bobby represented in my autograph collection.

So that's a wrap for the Panini Dominion Brass Bonanza auto set. Here are all 10 cards in order for your viewing pleasure:

#1 - Bobby Hull (#'d/24)

#2 - Brendan Shanahan (#'d/24)

#3 - Keith Primeau (#'d/50)

#4 - Nick Fotiu (#'d/50)

#5 - Paul Coffey (#'d/50)

#6 - Ray Ferraro (#'d/50)

#7 - Tiger Williams (#'d/50)

#8 - Daryl Reaugh (#'d/50)

#9 - Ron Francis (#'d/50)

#10 - Pat Verbeek (#'d/50)

This set is definitely a cornerstone of my Hartford Whalers collection. I'll enjoy these for years to come, and in total the entire set cost me less than I would have paid for a single box of Dominion. I hope you enjoyed the cards, I'll be moving forward with some non-Whalers posts later this weekend...

Panini Dominion Brass Bonanza - Pat Verbeek

2011-11-15T21:52:00.000-05:00

Time for the penultimate card in my Panini Dominion Brass Bonanza set. Today's card is none other than the great Pat Verbeek:

Mr. Verbeek here is truly a worthy subject for this set. It may sound odd, but I think I was more excited to add Pat's auto to my collection than almost any other from this set. Verbeek was always one of my favorite Whalers, in fact he was my younger brother's all-time favorite Whaler. In my opinion he is one of the under-rated players from the 80s/90s era, if not of all-time. He's got a pretty nice autograph as well, complete with his number 16 inscribed inside the 'P' in his first name. Throw a mullet into the mix and this is a pretty sweet card indeed!

Pat was drafted by the New Jersey Devils in the 1982 entry draft. After appearing in 6 games in 1982-83 he became a mainstay with the club, playing in all but a handful of the Devils' games over the next 6 seasons. 1987-88 was without question his best season in a Devils sweater, as he scored a career high 46 goals while helping New Jersey to its first playoff berth. Those 46 goals were a team record at the time, although that has since been bested by Brian Gionta who tallied 48 in 2005-06.

After the 1988-89 season, Pat was dealt to the Whalers for Sylvain Turgeon. This was one of the very rare trades where the Whalers actually came out on top, and it's also the reason for this airbrushed disaster from the 89-90 set. It didn't take Verbeek long to become a fan favorite in Hartford. In his very first season with the club he played in every single game, and led the team in scoring with 44 goals and a career-high 89 points! The next season he would again log 40+ goals and 80+ points.

The best part about Verbeek was that he could not only score goals, but he was an absolute annoying pest to play against. He logged a whole lot of penalty minutes just about every year. In his first two years with the Whalers, he not only surpassed the 40-goal mark both times, but he accumulated more than 200 penalty minutes in each of those seasons as well. All told, Pat would spend over 5 years with Hartford, including some time as team captain, before the team dealt him to the Rangers during the 1994-95 season.

After a couple of seasons with the Rangers he would go on to win a Cup with the Dallas Stars in 1999. He would even play a couple of seasons with Detroit towards the end of his career.

While with the Wings, Verbeek surpassed both the 500 career goal and 1,000 career point milestones. He would return to Dallas for one final season in 2001-02 before hanging up the skates for good.

Pat Verbeek is the epitome of a hard-nosed, grind-it-out hockey player. Years of pretty much injury-free, scrappy play combined with a goal-scorer's touch resulted in an amazing career. Over 1,400 games played, 500 goals and 1,000 points when all was said and done. His 522 goals rank 33rd on the all-time list. In total he had 13 20-goal seasons, 8 30-goal seasons and 4 40-goal seasons.

If you asked the average hockey fan who the only player in NHL history to record 500 career goals and 2,500 career penalty minutes is, how many would correctly guess Pat Verbeek?

The final card in the Brass Bonanza autograph set is coming later this week!

My Set:

#2 - Brendan Shanahan (#'d/24)
#3 - Keith Primeau (#'d/50)
#4 - Nick Fotiu (#'d/50)
#5 - Paul Coffey (#'d/50)
#6 - Ray Ferraro (#'d/50)
#7 - Tiger Williams (#'d/50)
#8 - Daryl Reaugh (#'d/50)

#9 - Ron Francis (#'d/50)
#10 - Pat Verbeek (#'d/50)

Another Card from Casey's Contest

2011-11-12T15:40:00.000-05:00

I guess the prize package that I received a few weeks back from Casey at Drop the Gloves will be revealed slowly over time here. A couple of weeks ago I showed the few football cards that were included. Today I figured it was as good a time as any to show another card from the bubble mailer:

2010-11 Pinnacle City Lights Auto - #82 - Zach Hamill (#'d/100)

Thanks in part to what appears to be a nagging injury to forward Rich Peverley, and in part to Daniel Paille's smashed nose, Zach Hamill was able to crack the Bruins lineup for the first time this season on Thursday night in the game against the Oilers. Hamill recorded an assist in 9 minutes, 27 seconds of ice time. This was his 5th career NHL game, and his 3rd career assist. Seems he makes the most of his limited opportunities at least...

I'm not sure if Zach will be in the lineup again tonight against Buffalo, but I think it's likely. In any event, thanks for the card Casey!

The Ultimate Hockey Card Set - Card #211

2011-11-10T18:46:00.000-05:00

I haven't done an entry for The Ultimate Hockey Card Set yet this month, so it's about time I got around to one of these. Today I'm selecting card #211. Like the Steve Yzerman rookie that made the cut last month, today's selection wasn't too difficult, at least based on the 11,000+ hockey cards I've got sorted, scanned and added to my collection on Zistle so far.

There was one particular card that I had in mind from the outset, in fact it's the reason I chose to select card #211 next for the set. In the end, that card did indeed win out. In fact, it had only one serious competitor:

1974-75 Topps - Quarter-Finals Bruins vs Maple Leafs

I'm a huge fan of 1974-75 Topps. I've been working on accumulating all 264 cards for at least a couple of years now, and after the quarter box haul I posted the other day am now just 27 cards shy of finishing it off. This particular card came into my collection back in the summer as part of my COMC Hobby Box (in the same "pack" as a card of the Fonz!).

Great photo that I believe depicts Don Marcotte of the Boston Bruins and Ron Ellis of the Toronto Maple Leafs in a struggle for the puck (can someone confirm this?). Truly a worthy runner-up.

As I said though, in the end I ultimately chose the card I had in mind to begin with:

1995-96 Upper Deck - #211 - Martin Brodeur

"The Championship to New Jersey! The Devils Win the Stanley Cup!"

1995-96 Upper Deck is all about the photo, with very little going on in terms of design element. With Upper Deck's quality of photography being so high though, this doesn't bother me like it does some collectors. In fact, 1995-96 may very well be my all-time favorite flagship Upper Deck set.

This particular photo is among the best in the set. Actually, it may be among the best photos used on any hockey card in my collection. I think the expression on Martin's face really conveys how difficult (and ultimately rewarding) a journey it is to actually come out on top of the NHL playoffs. Talk about a great shot of Lord Stanley's Cup too! Hoisted above the ice in all its sparkling glory, you can see a reflection of the crowd in the stands, the ice, and even Brodeur himself within its rings. Hands down this is the best trophy out of the four major North American sports. I don't see how you could even make an argument against that? The Commissioner's Trophy? The O'Brien trophy (I've held this thing in hand in a suite at a Celtics game a couple of years ago, and I think it's the worst of the four)? Even the Lombardi Trophy, like the first two I just mentioned, is recreated each year for the winning team. This card belongs in The Ultimate Hockey Card Set for its depiction of hockey's ultimate prize alone.

The other thing I really love about this card is that it captures a significant and identifiable moment in time. I love the history of both baseball and hockey, in fact I think it's the primary reason I collect cards. To me, my collection is like a history of the game, written out on cardboard and stored in monster boxes in my office closet. Some "chapters", like the late 80's and early 90's, are fairly robust and deep. Other chapters, like the 1950's...not so much, but that's where there's the room for growth that makes collecting so much fun. Okay, I'm straying off topic here, but you get the point.

This photograph represents the end of the 1994-95 season, but it also represents a return to normalcy for hockey. A lockout had caused fans to go without NHL hockey deep into the 1994-95 season. In fact, maybe I should just call it the 1995 season, because by the time things got settled and the first game was played it was January 20th, 1995. After a shortened, 48-game season the playoffs commenced in the standard format and a few weeks later the New Jersey Devils managed to beat a stacked Detroit Red Wings team for the championship. Pretty impressive given that the Red Wings managed 70 points in the 48-game regular season, with a record of 33-11-4!

The Devils swept the Wings, Marty lifted the copy, and hockey was back...

This brings The Ultimate Hockey Card Set to 9 cards, which can be viewed here.

'70s Hockey and the Quarter Box

2011-11-07T17:46:00.000-05:00

For the first time in a couple of months I stopped off at the local hobby shop late last week. Boy was I glad I made the stop too, as the 1970s hockey monster box had been loaded up with fresh cards since I had been there last. I kept my cost in check by sticking mainly to quarter cards. I'll save the rest of the goods for another post later this week, but here is the entirety of my quarter box haul, over 60 cards in total...

The majority of the cards came from the 1973-74 Topps set. 1973-74 has long been ignored in my vintage hockey collection, I think I had less than 20 of these beforehand, with quite a few of them in poor condition.

#5 - Penalty Minute Leaders Jim Schoenfeld/Dave Schultz

The first 6 cards in the set are these league leader cards, but with names like the Esposito brothers, Bobby Clarke and Ken Dryden on the others this was the only one available for a quarter. The goons never seem to get much collector love.

#13 - Keith McCreary

I chose the 50+ 73-74s I ended up with largely based on condition. While I'm not actively chasing this set yet, I'd eventually love to complete all of the 70s and 80s Topps sets. With few exceptions the cards I grabbed are crease-free, gum stain free, wax stain free, have four good corners, decent to perfect centering and good overall visual appeal. These are cards that will go into my set binders and for the most part never need to be replaced or upgraded. Can't complain for a mere quarter!

#14 - Ted Harris

#15 - Garry Unger

Unger's card was one of those "few exceptions" I just referred to as far as condition. Its only flaw is that it's badly mis-cut, I couldn't leave it behind just because of that. Interesting perspective used in this photo, that's got to be one of the largest hockey pucks on any card I own.

#19 - Andre Boudrias

I think I've said this before, but to me the 73-74 set has always been one that is either hit or miss. Some of the staged, posed shots bore me to death, but there are some really great horizontal cards featuring in-game action photos that are just fantastic. I love that the average kid opening this pack 30+ years ago had no way of telling which player Andre Boudrias even is in this crowded photo.

#23 - Ed Johnston

#28 - Cliff Koroll

#29 - Rey Comeau

#30 - Barry Gibbs (All-Star)

The All-Star cards are one of the things I like most about this design.

#33 - Henry Boucha

One of my favorite things about cards from the 1970s is looking at the impact that culture and fashion had on the athletes. Just look at the transformation undergone by Henry Boucha between his 1973-74 Topps card above a his 1974-75 card from just a year later:

#35 - Bobby Schmautz

#47 - Barclay Plager

Interesting shot of Plager making his case to the ref.

#48 - Mike Corrigan

This photo is pretty close to the one used on Corrigan's card the following year.

#53 - Richard Lemieux

#63 - Fran Huck

#65 - Gary Bergman

#67 - Ed Westfall

Ed's was one of the few cards I picked up that I already owned, but it's definitely an upgrade over my other copy:

#69 - Don Tannahill

#78 - Fred Harvey

#86 - Jim Schoenfeld

One of the tough guys featured on the PIM Leaders card that led off the post.

#98 - Los Angeles Kings

Pretty badly off-center but I was sold when I saw Rogatien Vachon staring at me from the lower right corner.

#99 - Minnesota North Stars

I believe that's the one and only Gump Worsley in the first row far right. Doesn't get much better than vintage team cards.

#105 - St. Louis Blues

#109 - Tom Reid

#111 - Don Lever

#117 - Bob Leiter

#124 - Tim Ecclestone

#125 - Jude Drouin

#129 - Dale Tallon

What an airbrushed mess. Isn't there supposed to be a 'Hawks logo somewhere on that sweater?

#131 - Randy Manery

It might be a bit off-center, but this is much better than my previous, significantly more wrinkled copy of this card:

#134 - Bob Plager

#137 - Jacques Laperriere

#142 - Jocelyn Guevremont

Another cool action photo. Is everyone airbrushed in this one?

#152 - Curt Bennett

#158 - Bill Collins

#167 - Gary Dornhoefer

#168 - Steve Durbano

#169 - Jacques Richard

#173 - Dennis Kearns

#174 - Red Berenson

#177 - Dennis O'Brien

#179 - Rick Kehoe

#180 - Bill White (All-Star)

#183 - Andre Dupont

Had this one already, but again this card is a gigantic upgrade condition-wise. My former copy had some serious wrinkling going on:

#184 - Gary Sabourin

#185 - Larry Romanchych

#188 - Gilles Marotte

#190 - Mickey Redmond (All-Star)

In addition to the huge chunk of 73-74 Topps cards, I also had my want list handy and managed to knock a handful of cards off towards my 74-75 and 79-80 Topps sets. For 1974-75 we have...

#13 - Syl Apps

#128 - Ken Hodge (All-Star)

#209 - Quarter-Finals Flyers vs. Flames

#217 - Joe Watson

Joe's card is pretty significantly diamond-cut. Oh well, good enough for now.

#229 - Bob Pulford

#247 - Prince of Wales Trophy Boston Bruins

Here are the 79-80s:

#12 - Rene Robert

#122 - Jim Rutherford

#212 - JP Bordeleau

#218 - Orest Kindrachuk

Admittedly not the most exciting four cards from 1979-80 Topps, but I'm four cards closer nonetheless. That's not all though, I saved my favorite 8 cards from the box for last:

1973-74 Topps - #151 - Phil Roberto

It's not everyday that you get a quality scrum captured on cardboard.

1974-75 Topps - #132 - Gilles Gilbert (All-Star)

Any card with a great mask like that in the quarter box is coming home with me.

1973-74 Topps - #103 - Philadelphia Flyers

This team card is especially significant as the Broad Street Bullies would win their first of two consecutive Cups in the 1973-74 season.

1979-80 Topps - #180 - Gilbert Perreault

A Hall-of-Famer from one of the greatest vintage hockey sets ever released for a quarter? This is where it started to feel almost like stealing...

1973-74 Topps - #135 - Rick MacLeish

Easily one of the better cards in this lot, great stuff.

1974-75 Topps - #9 - Emile Francis

I love the coach cards from 74-75 Topps, and Emile Francis' card is particularly nice since he went on to work in the Hartford Whalers organization. I picked these cards up last Thursday, and the very next day Michael over at Collecting for Kicks posted his own Emile Francis card, a sweet auto if I do say so myself.

1973-74 Topps - #132 - Darryl Sittler

I know it's off-center, but for this card to be in the quarter box is absolutely criminal. If there were ten of these in there I would have grabbed all ten. Finally, the absolute steal of the day...

1973-74 Topps - #149 - Dave Schultz (RC)

I had to do a triple-take when I came across this one in the pile. The rookie card of one of the decade's top enforcers. This card doesn't even belong in a dollar box much less a quarter box. If my extremely old Beckett can be relied on, this one's got a book value of $12.

All said and done, that's 53 1973-74 total Topps cards, better than 1/4 of the 198-card set. On top of that, I knocked 8 cards off of my 1974-75 Topps want list and got another 5 towards my 1979-80 set. 66 cards total, for what should have come to a total of $16.50. Because it had been a while though, and because the shop owner is just that kind of guy, he gave me the lot for $10. $10!!! That may have been my all-time best raid of the quarter box!

A Trade Post...and a Baseball Post Nonetheless!

2011-11-07T11:12:00.000-05:00

I don't do all that much trading compared to many of you, but as usual I find myself behind on trade posts. I do like to make an effort to properly thank everyone that sends me something, even if it does take a few months sometimes. A couple of months back I exchanged some cards with Chuck of the blog Lifetime Topps Project. I sent him some 2011 Gypsy Queen and a big chunk of 1990 Topps cards. Here are a few highlights from the return package:

Included were a few dozen cards off of my Gypsy Queen want list. On the one hand, I think this is the set that soured me on set building and changed my buying habits over the last few months (for the better). After getting hooked on the set through retail rack packs, they disappeared almost overnight. I was "forced" to buy a hobby box in order to continue my ripping, but at over $200 I wasn't thrilled with the return and I'm still so many cards short of even the base set.

On the other hand though, when I look at this Thurman Munson card I can see why I kind of got swept up in this set. That's everything a good baseball card should be right there! Some other Gypsy Queen highlights included...

#1 - Ichiro

A fitting selection to lead off the set...

#4 - Jackie Robinson

#18 - Christy Mathewson

#62 - Red Schoendienst

Can you tell I'm more of a fan of the retired players in this one? Another fine looking card.

#74 - Tom Seaver

#95 - George Sisler

Those cards all came from the short 300-card base set, but there were a handful of short prints included as well (cards 301-350):

#301 - Alfonso Soriano

#317 - Justin Upton

#340 - Miguel Olivo

#FS7 - Ike Davis

I'm two inserts closer thanks to this package...

#HH11 - Andruw Jones

In addition to the Gypsy Queen cards, there were two more sets on the want list that got whittled down a bit...

#118 - Tim Wakefield

I've been working on 1993 Flair for a while. Well if you consider "working on" to mean ripping a wax box, sorting them, updating the want list and then forgetting all about them that is.

#138 - Barry Bonds

#148 - Matt Williams

#211 - Lou Whitaker

#297 - Devon White

I've now got 225 cards out of 300 for this set, putting me at exactly 75% complete. Also inside the package were a few cards from a set that I'm tantalizingly close to finishing, 2008 Upper Deck baseball:

#778 - Joe Mauer - Twins Team Checklist

#797 - Magglio Ordonez - Season Highlights

I'm now just 22 cards away from finishing this 799 card monster of a set! It's only taken me 3 years and counting. Closing things out were a couple of much-appreciated Diamond Anniversary parallels from this past year's Topps flagship set:

#123 - Mike Lowell

#235 - AL ERA Leaders (Hernandez/Buchholz/Price)

I'm missing only one Red Sox Diamond Anniversay parallel from Series 1 now, #278, Marco Scutaro.

Thanks for a fantastic trade Chuck! I'll be sure to look you up when I get the rest of my 1990 Topps cards sorted out!

Panini Dominion Brass Bonanza - Ray Ferraro

2011-11-04T18:39:00.000-04:00

Time for the 8th card in my Brass Bonanza set, we're nearing the end here. Today's card is none other than Ray Ferraro:

Ray is another fitting choice for this set in my opinion. Great looking signature as well, uniform number is always a nice touch. The Whalers organization drafted Ferraro in the 5th round (88th overall) of the 1982 entry draft. He spent 7 seasons in Hartford, scoring 157 goals, 194 assists, and 351 points in his 442 career games with the Whalers. His most successful season with the team was 1988-89, when he would appear in every game and top the 40-goal plateau for the first of two times in his career. The Whalers did what they always seemed to do with actual talent though, and dealt him away at the beginning of the 1990-91 season for this guy:

This was a classic crap Whalers trade. If you're like me you remember Crossman more for his time with the Philadelphia Flyers than the Hartford Whalers.

Maybe that's because he would play just 41 relatively uneventful games with Hartford before they dealt him away to Detroit in February of that very same 90-91 season. The return was this guy:

Houda would stick around with Hartford for the rest of the 1990-91 season as well as the next two full seasons.

He was a stellar -19 in the 1992-93 season. He was dealt to Los Angeles just 7 games into the 1993-94 season for Marc Potvin:

Why is Marc in a Red Wings uniform here? Because they had just dumped him off on the Kings the season before the Kings convinced the Whalers to take him. Anyway, after an impressive 2 goals and 3 assists in 51 games with Hartford, Marc became a free agent and signed with Boston for the 1994-95 season. For the Whalers, it was the end of the horrific Islanders/Red Wings/Kings Ray Ferraro trade debacle. Another outstanding job by Hartford's front office.

Meanwhile, what did Ferraro go on to do?

He had some great seasons with the Islanders, including his second 40-goal season in 1991-92 (he also had 40 assists that year for a career high 80 points). In 1992-93 he had a hell of a playoff run with 13 goals and 20 points in 18 games. Two of his goals were overtime game-winners against the Washington Capitals, and he assisted on the series-winning game 7 overtime goal against Pittsburgh as well. He'd score 238 regular season points in an Islanders uniform.

After spending most of a season with the Rangers, he'd go on to play with the Kings for three more seasons, the Thrashers for three seasons, and even a handful of games with the St. Louis Blues to end his career.

All said and done, Ray would finish with 408 goals, 490 assists, and 898 points in 1,258 career games. As I said, a fitting choice for this set, if for no other reason than the fact that this card symbolizes Hartford's notoriously bad trades.

#9 - Ron Francis (#'d/50)

2011 Top 20 Under $25 - #18 - 1954-55 Topps Ray Timgren

2011-11-03T16:00:00.000-04:00

Coming in at #18 in my countdown of 2011 pick-ups that have been neglected on the blog is one of my oldest hockey cards:

What is it? A 1954-55 Topps Hockey Ray Timgren, graded an EX-MT 6 by PSA.
When and where did I get it? Won it on eBay, way back in January.
How much did it cost me? $22.50 (plus $3 shipping).

This is one of the higher priced items in the countdown, in fact I guess if you want to be technical about it I actually went over the $25 limit by .50 cents if you count shipping. Still, for little more than a blaster I was very excited to add this card to my collection.

Ray Timgren wasn't exactly a stellar player, in fact he appeared in just 251 total NHL games over 6 seasons. He was far from an offensive threat, as is evidenced by the fact that his 7 goals, 18 assists and 25 points in the 1949-50 season were all career highs. He was a part of two Stanley Cup winning Maple Leaf teams though, in 1949 and 1951.

Obviously the fact that this is a Ray Timgren card is not what excited me about this purchase. I just thought it was great to add a hockey card to my collection that's now well over 50 years old. Even more so than that, this one is significant because the 1954-55 set was Topps' very first foray into the world of hockey cards. The set contains 60 cards in total, consisting only of players from four of the Original 6 teams (the Canadian teams, Montreal and Toronto, were left out). Even though O-Pee-Chee became the gold standard for vintage hockey cards in the following decades, the Topps sets were the ones I always collected as a kid, so to own a card from the inaugural set is pretty damn cool.

I think the 54-55 cards look fantastic in terms of design. Along the bottom are two colored bands, a blue one containing the team name within, and a red one containing the player name and position. Each card has the team's logo in one of the upper corners, leaving plenty of space for the illustrated/colorized/whatever-you-call-it player and facsimile signature, which are overlaid on a plain white background. The backs are slick too (click for a larger image if it's difficult to read):

I'm a big fan of the hockey stick with TOPPS HOCKEY on the blade that is used to divide the personal info from the small paragraph write-up on the player. Plenty of room is left at right for a decent sized cartoon as well.

I think there is only one other Ray Timgren card in existence, from the 1951-52 Parkhurst set. I guess if I can pick that one up I'd be considered a Timgren super-collector?

Panini Dominion Brass Bonanza - Ron Francis

2011-11-02T17:30:00.000-04:00

As promised, here's card #7 from the Panini Dominion Brass Bonanza set:

As 1967ers predicted after the Nick Fotiu card I posted last, Ron Francis is indeed featured in this set. This is one selection I certainly can't argue with, in fact I think Ron would be the obvious first choice to include in any set that pays tribute to the Whalers. All-Star, Hall-of-Famer, Stanley Cup winner, second all-time in career assists, third all-time in career games played, fourth all-time in career points, and winner of the Selke, Lady Byng, and King Clancy trophies. He holds the Hartford/Carolina franchise records for career games, goals, assists and points, and on top of all that is a true gentleman.

All of that being said, there is one thing that bothers me about this card. Those of you who check in regularly may remember that I picked up my first ever Francis auto a few weeks back. The card is from this past year's The Cup set by Upper Deck, and I posted it on the very same late September night that the Red Sox completed their historic collapse. Here's the card:

Notice anything?

If you haven't picked up on it, give it another few seconds, you'll see what I'm referring to...

Tell me that's not the EXACT same photo of Francis on those two cards, and I'll tell you you're wrong. I spent a good ten minutes looking over every detail in those two photos and I'm convinced they are one and the same. Obviously the background is cropped out in the Upper Deck card, and the Panini card seems to have some color enhancement to make the jersey a more alarming shade of green. I've looked over every detail though, down to the wrinkles in the jerseys and it's definitely the same photo.

So there you have it, two Ron Francis autos, one photo. Bummer.

Ron's card is also numbered to 50 copies. At least we get a different photo on the back, where we also learn that Francis was one of 10 captains in Whalers history. Hmm...sounds like a post idea.

Next up will be post #18 in the 2011 Top 20 Under $25 countdown...

My Set:

#2 - Brendan Shanahan (#'d/24)
#3 - Keith Primeau (#'d/50)
#4 - Nick Fotiu (#'d/50)
#5 - Paul Coffey (#'d/50)
#7 - Tiger Williams (#'d/50)
#8 - Daryl Reaugh (#'d/50)

#9 - Ron Francis (#'d/50)

Get it Together!!!

2011-11-01T18:44:00.000-04:00

The Bruins are just a few minutes from face-off here, and at this point I'm praying that this game goes differently than basically every other game has so far this year. The team has looked absolutely horrific thus far, and is dangerously close to ousting Columbus for the worst record in the NHL. David Krejci has been no exception, in fact other than Tyler Seguin (and Brad Marchand on occasion) the entire team has just looked flat and unmotivated on the whole. I'm hoping that by posting another addition to the Krejci collection I can bring the guys some much needed luck as they face a very hot Senators team this evening.

This card is from the 2007-08 Upper Deck Ultimate set. It's numbered to 200 copies, and certainly sports a fairly large piece of Bruins sweater. It will look good next to my much nicer card from the same set. I actually won this card on eBay well over a year ago but have only gotten around to scanning and cataloging it this evening.

Let's get it together B's! The trade rumors are swirling on sports talk radio around here, and Krejci's name seems to be mentioned more than any other. I'd hate to see him go, after all what would I do with all of his cards if that happened?

I'm keeping this short because I want to sit and watch the game without the distraction of my laptop. Coming tomorrow, when I've got a bit more time, is the next card in the Panini Dominion Brass Bonanza set!

Card of the Month - October 2011

2011-10-30T21:14:00.000-04:00

For the third straight month I've actually managed a Card of the Month post, this time sneaking it in with just one day to spare in October! I'm glad I waited to make a selection though, because this month's card just arrived in the mailbox yesterday. For the second straight month, the card featured is a Hartford Whalers autograph:

2008-09 Upper Deck Legends Masterpieces - #MB-HO - Mark Howe Brushstrokes Green Auto (#'d/35)

What a beauty! This card looks even better in person than I thought it would. I loved the Legends Masterpieces hockey set when it came out, but despite completing it just over 2 years ago I had no idea this particular card existed until recently. When I stumbled across it on eBay I knew I had to have it. The Brushstrokes autographs are still fairly popular with collectors and the numbered colored parallels don't seem to pop up all that frequently anymore, so I was more than happy to pay the $26 I ended up winning this for. The green border on this particular parallel looks fantastic when matched up with Howe's early-80s road uniform.

Mark was with the Whalers franchise for 5 seasons (2 in the WHA and 3 in the NHL). Playing alongside his father for the first 3 of those 5 seasons, he recorded some remarkable numbers and was generally regarded as one of the best two-way defensemen in the league. In his two seasons with the New England Whalers of the WHA, Mark recorded 91 and 107 points! He scored 80 points the following year, Hartford's first in the NHL. Perhaps his best season came later in his career with the Flyers though, when in 1985-86 he tallied 82 points and led the league with a +85. +85?!?!?!

Howe always seemed to be overshadowed and under-rated. For example, in the same 1985-86 season that I just referenced, Howe's incredible year was lost behind Paul Coffey's record-breaking 138-point effort. It wasn't the only time Mark would finish runner-up for the Norris Trophy.

This past summer Howe finally got some well-deserved recognition when it was announced that he would be inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame. That just makes this card even greater, it's truly a welcome addition to my growing Whalers collection.

Football Sunday

2011-10-30T15:42:00.000-04:00

Football cards seem to keep finding their way into my collection lately. With the 5-1 Patriots squaring off against the 5-2 Steelers in a few minutes, I figured it was an appropriate time to show off the latest few, which were part of a great prize package from Casey at Drop the Gloves. I was lucky enough to be paired up with Tyler Seguin in his contest, and thanks to his assist on the first goal of the season I received a healthy stack of cards from all four major sports. I'm working on a much larger thank you post for Casey, but in the meantime here are the four football cards that were included in the package. A couple of guys who will see action today against Pittsburgh, and a couple who won't. For starters there were three rookie cards from this year's Topps football set:

Taken by the Pats in the third round of last year's draft after falling much farther than originally predicted (6 other QBs were taken before him). Currently the third stringer behind Brady and Hoyer.

The team's second round pick from the 2011 draft, just before Mallett. Vereen's been in the lineup for the last three games, but has yet to get a carry. Will today be his day?

Stevan's gotten touches in 5 of 6 games so far this season. Without question his best day was a 97-yard performance (with a touchdown) against Oakland in week 4.

The fourth and final card is this Devin McCourty rookie from last year's Panini Prestige set. After an impressive Pro-Bowl rookie season, McCourty has cooled down quite a bit this year. Hopefully he doesn't get scorched today...

I'm checking out to go watch the game with a few cold ones, but check back later tonight for October's Card of the Month.

2011 Top 20 Under $25 - #19 - 1961 Topps Red Sox

2011-10-28T18:46:00.000-04:00

Continuing my countdown of 2011's neglected items, here's #19...

What is it? A 1961 Topps Boston Red Sox team card.
When and where did I get it? In mid-February on eBay.
How much did it cost me? $8 (plus $3 shipping).

In retrospect, I should have slated this card in at #20 and placed the Bob Feller auto ahead of it in the countdown. Don't get me wrong, I love vintage team cards/team checklists. On top of that, I'm a total sucker for the old school "Red Sock" logo. The thing is, after the biggest late-season collapse in the history of baseball, the manager and GM leaving town, and all the complete BS that has come out in the weeks since the season ended I just haven't been in the mood to collect or discuss anything related to the Boston Red Sox. I mean how can you root for a team of guys that don't even seem to care about rooting for themselves?

I know that as winter progresses I'll warm up to baseball again. When the trees and grass start turning green after another cold New England winter I'll probably be as excited for Opening Day as I have been every season since I was a kid. For now though, I'm just all set. In fact, I don't really have anything else to say about this card...