Monday, July 13, 2015

a small hiatus

Hi readers and fellow bloggers. I am writing a post not about hockey cards and not about hockey but rather about me. I have been blogging for a number of years now and have managed to string together enough words for 700+ posts. I have met many people and made many friends and even more trades. I have loved every moment of my blogging experience and I never want it to end.

Over the past 5+ years I have seen bloggers come and go, some have taken breaks and others have packed it in. There are a number of OG bloggers who have been there before me and are still going strong and regardless of who they were I have enjoyed something from everyone. It used to make me sad when I would see someone take a break or step away and in many cases I don't know if I truly understood why.

Well this past year since I developed carpal tunnel, had surgery, severe knee contusion, two bouts of bronchitis and two bouts of pneumonia. In addition there are some other life factors and it just seems that I am spread out far too thin to handle everything. I don't write this for any reason other than to share a small piece of my life to by boys when they read this and to my friends to explain that I am not ignoring anyone but rather trying to just get by :)

I will be doing a couple of things, first is I will be back and when I am, I will be posting back at my usual pace. Secondly, despite my hiatus from blogging, I will still be collecting. I always have time to flip through cards and stay in touch with my hobby so I will still be collecting and lurking behind the scenes and comments on all your great posts people.

Before I sign off for my break, I want to thank Jeff from 2x3 Heroes and Shane from Shoebox Legends for two great PWEs. I promise my first posts back will be to share your generosity. In the meantime I will be looking for ways to hit you both back! Thank you guys, you are great. I also want to thank Sal from Puck Junk not only for being an inspiration for getting me into blogging and collecting but also for a package he tried sending and hopefully will be able to get to me now that I sent him my address (sorry about that curve ball buddy).

Sports card collecting isn't just for kids and I hope each and everyone whose out there collecting is still there when I return. Thank you all for the page visits and comments over the years, I am truly humbled by the amount of people who check my site on a daily basis and have an interest in my adventures to the flea markets, swap meets and LCS.

Good night all, and see you back very soon!

Dave Harrison

Saturday, July 4, 2015

08-09 OPC Premier Cory Schneider Auto Rookie /299

As we all know, life goes on. Still its tough to see a fixture of an organization leave and in the past couple years the Devils have had two mainstays step aside for the next generation with both Marty and Lou moving on to some degree. The amazing thing, is I just need to say their first name and chances are you know who I am talking about. Well the future is now, or so they say and lets start collecting in that direction



08-09 OPC Premier Cory Schneider Auto Rookie /299
Cory is not new to the organization and I have added a couple of his cards to my collection over the years. I had two autographs to this point, one numbered to 99 and another to 25. But as far as rookie went, I only had one lowly rookie and it was from 08-09 OPC which I pulled from a pack. So I wanted to rectify the situation a while back and I was able to do so by acquiring the above card. 

Nice on card auto with actual game-used event used swatches. What a shame they say game on the front and event on the back. I'm sure many have already gripped about this so I will move on to the nice on card auto and decently low print run of 299. I've said this before and I'll say it again for value, it's hard to beat OPC Premier and Sweet Shot when their Young Gun counterparts are far more plentiful and far less cool in my opinion. 

Friday, July 3, 2015

14-15 Artifacts Gold Spectrum Evgeny Kuznetsov Patch Auto Rookie /3

Let's file this under reasons why you should ALWAYS go to your LCS on a regular basis. I stopped by a while back and just went to chat with the owner about this and that and as we were talking I spotted the below card in the showcase:


14-15 Artifacts Gold Spectrum Evgeny Kuznetsov Patch Auto Rookie /3
I was awestruck. The patches were fantastic, the signature is good and numbered 1/3!! That's pure ebay 1/1 gold! So to top it all off, he's a decent prospect and a rookie I've been looking to possibly add to the collection. The price....less than 2 packs of Artifacts! I know that's a lot of exclamation points but truth be told, they were totally warranted!

What to do with this card? I know I can sell it and make a handsome profit, I know I could trade it and probably do well there too. But for the meantime, I think I'm just going to enjoy it. I asked the owner how he came across this card and he said that the guy who pulled it buys packs all the time and usually just leaves stuff behind in exchange for more packs. I guess there are collectors like that out there but given the cost of the card, he probably wouldn't have been able to trade it for much which boggles this blogger's mind.

Kuznetsov had his first full NHL season this year and finished up with 11 goals, 26 assists and 37 points in 80 games. He then put another 5 in the net during this past post-season and was electric at times. While his numbers seem small, taking time to adjust to the NHL is expected and of all the top 10 players in rookie scoring, Evgeny had the second fewest average time on ice per game behind Kevin Hayes. But towards the end of the season, Kuznetsov put up a very respectable 13 points in his final 16 games. I believe there will be a bright future in the NHL for this particular Russian and hopefully Ovi will help him blossom into a superstar.