A Pair of Santinis

When the Devils drafted Steve Santini back in 2013 my thoughts immediately went to this guy.



Steve Santini is a magician, escape artist and a collector of the macabre. He was on a show called Deals from the Darkside where he would go and track down rare and unusual items from human history usually dark in nature. For example, torture devices, swords, guns and items tied to tragedies. I for one don't collect these items but I found the show fascinating and the history aspects were pretty cool and Steve did a great job sharing his vast knowledge.

Well safe to say by looking at him, he isn't a 21 year old hockey player. The Steve Santini the Devils drafted is a 6' 2" 208 lb defensive minded defenseman who won a few awards in college and represented Team USA at the World Hockey Championships this past spring. While he won't wow you with his offensive acuity, he is the type of defenseman that all championship teams need. Someone who will chew up 20+ minutes a night and win the battles for the puck in the defensive end. While Steve hasn't seen too much time with the big club yet, he will. These types of defensemen sometimes take a little more time to mature and I look forward to seeing him grow and mature into the shutdown defenseman I believe he can be. I think he has Mark Staal potential which will be a big help to a rebuilding Devils club. In honour of our two Steve Santini's, here are a couple cards I pick up in two separate trades.

16-17 Artifacts Gold Spectrum Steve Santini Rookie Patch /49

 When it comes to the New Jersey Devils in cardboard form, their patches don't get much nicer than these. Two great pieces and the gold foil shines wonderfully with this card. I might have over traded a bit to get this one but it was worth it for the patch quality.

16-17 Artifacts Emerald Steve Santini Rookie Patch Auto /35

This one is similar to the last but we lose one patch for a jersey and gain an autograph. Steve has a pretty unique auto using his S twice with his name. His signature is reasonably legible with it looking a bit like "Steve Satin" which could make for a neat nickname perhaps. I picked this one up as part of a twitter trade and Rene was so kind to send Steve along with a few other cards and some unexpected bonus card which I hope to share on here some day soon.

Thanks for stopping by and visiting the Steves. They wish you a great day and I do as well. The fun thing about a league with 500 players is there are always players like John Madden or Paul Martin who share their names with someone else famous. Does your club have one of these?