Fun with Photoshop

Definitely something I would love to do if I had more time is make my own cards. I used a template for the 88-89 OPC set and I found this nice photo of Crosby online and blammo, he is now a retro card! I always find the hardest part about making your own cards is getting the right font. If you are going to copy a style already in existance you have to make the fonts match in my opinion which can always be tough. I missed the boat a little bit with this card, but I like it anyway.

Some day I would like to try and design my own card from scratch like some of you other bloggers out there...but that I think is something for another day.

Failed Prospects - Angelo Esposito

Flashback to 2005. Sydney Crosby has moved onto the NHL and the QMJHL is looking for its next big name. Angelo Esposito, a 16 year phenom steps in and scores 98 points in just 57 games including 39 goals. Surely this kid is going to be a superstar. Angelo really couldn't do anything wrong during the regular season, he had Radulov on his wing playing for the Remparts. Radulov put up 21 goals and 55 points in 23 playoff games, but come playoff time Angelo found trouble maintaining that same production. Maybe he was burnt-out from too much hockey that season? After all, including international action he was pushing 100 games and Esposito was only 16 years old.

The following season, Radulov departed and Esposito's number dropped as well, he managed a modest 79 points in 60 games as a 17 year old. Remparts didn't last long in the playoffs, but Espo almost matched his previous season playoff total playing in just 5 games. Then comes the draft and in 2007 he is picked 20th overall by the Penguins, clearly this is a steal for a prospect who was once considered a better prospect than Patrick Kane.

However, as an 18 year old his numbers dropped again. He finished third on the Remparts team in scoring behind players Felix Petit and Kelsey Tessier. Esposito scored 69 points in 56 games that season. Esposito's last successful season came the following year in 08-09 with the Montreal Juniors when he started with 24 goals and 42 points in 35 games. However, a knee injury and subsequent surgery ended that season and it seems that he really has never been the same since.

Over the last two seasons, Esposito has put up 5 points; 1 goal and 4 assists in 24 games. In fact, this season with the Chicago Wolves, he has 1 goal in 11 games. Angelo will turn 22 this February so, it is difficult to say his career is over. However, he definitely has fallen from grace especially considering he was an early favourite to be the number 1 pick in the 2007 draft. I am not sure if he was as great of a player as he was fortunate to have been playing with a talented team at a young age, but, Esposito clearly had enough potential to be selected in the first round and his NHL future really looks to be in doubt. Esposito was apart of the trade that brought Hossa from Atlanta to Pittsburgh and as of today he is still in the Atlanta system which is the good news. If he is ever going to crack the NHL it will likely be with a young and inexperienced team desperate for scorers. The bad news for Angelo is since turning pro, his production has been far from desirable and the AHL may be the highest level of hockey he will ever play. There was a time when I was trying hard to see him as a junior player because I wanted to say I saw him as a 16 year old tearing up the junior leagues much like people still speak of Crosby, Lemieux, Gretzky or even Lafontaine. However, it appears that Angelo may have peaked at 16 and the fall from grace has continued from that point on.

I guess it goes to show that drafting NHL talent is a difficult process and there is no such thing as a "sure thing". While it isn't over for Angelo, it is a long way from the prediction many people had for Esposito.

Here is a photo I found of a Heroes and Prospects card from ITG of Angelo Esposito. You can buy this card on ebay for less than $10.00. I wish him all the luck in the future and I hope he can make it to the NHL someday, but I have a feeling he will likely have a similar fate experienced by Kory Kocur another successful junior player who couldn't turn a first round pick into a single NHL game.

Prospects with Potential - Matt Taormina

Something I really wanted to do with this blog was to find time to "prospect" the prospects. I like most hockey fans, I have an interest in the young kids and like to make predictions on how their careers will turn out. I have had some hits and some misses. Finally, I will put into print, what I think and possibly make a huge ass of myself in the process. I am not going to always choose the obvious choices like Crosby (I think most knew he would do fine), but at the same time I am not too delusional to think that Jordan Smotherman is going to be a HOF player.

Matt Taormina is the first player I am going to go out on a limb on and I think for good reason. This kid was never drafted and very much reminds me of another undrafted diminutive defenseman with a knack for putting up points.....Brian Rafalski. Matt signed with the Devils last season and then proceeded to tear it up for the Lowell Devils finishing third in team scoring with 50 points. He moves the puck well and though he isn't the strongest defensively he for the most part isn't a liability either. Currently he is a minus 2 on a team that really is playing bad hockey and apart from a minor injury it doesn't appear that he will be leaving the NHL anytime soon. He is smart with the puck and passes it well on the PP. I believe when the Devils get their offensive issues worked out, he may put up about 30 points this season. I think he has much too learn much like Brian did in Europe but give him 2-3 years in the NHL and Matt will easily be a 40-50 point d-man in the NHL and for a kid who was never drafted that is quite an accomplishment.

Here is his 10-11 UD Young Gun RC. Currently I do not have any of his cards, but I am always looking, so if you have one to trade let me know and we can try and work out a deal. I see big things for Matt and maybe he could end up as good as Rafalski and should he miss that mark, the very least he will be a quality #3 or 4 defenseman for years to come.

Parkhurst Project Cards 2 and 3

What do George Sullivan and Benny Woit have in common? Well they were both played in NHL All-Star games. They both have RC's in the 1951-52 Parkhurst set and they both were purchased by me for $13.00 including shipping from Ebay.

Let's start with Benny. He was born in Fort William which joined Port Arthur in 1971 to make Thunder Bay which is where I was born. Benny won 3 Stanley Cups over 7 seasons all with the Red Wings. Benny was an original Dustin Byfuglien in that he was a winger and defenseman. He was a pretty big player for his era standing 5' 11" and weighigng 195 lbs. He only managed 7 career goals and 33 points in 334 games but with 3 cups he was successful in the NHL. After a failed stint with the Blackhawks, he played in the minors for a number of years including a team called the "Jersey Devils". How can I not like him! Hometown boy and mention of the Devils (no affiliation though).

The card itself is #58 in the set and has a couple light creases with some rounded corners. The colouring is excellent.


George "Red" Sullivan was a centre who played in Boston, Chicago and New York (Rangers). Sullivan was a left handed shooter and was 5' 11" just like Benny and was 155lbs or 40 lbs less than Benny. Offensively Sullivan was a little more prolific than Woit in the scoring department with 107 career NHL goals and 346 points in 557 games. One of his best seasons was with the Hawks when he put up 61 points in 70 games and lead the 54-55 Hawks in scoring. Red would top that amount with 63 points and was second in Ranger scoring in 58-59. Red never managed to win a Cup and was most famous for being nearly killed by Doug Harvey. A priest was apparently brought in to read him his last rites and somehow managed to pull through. He would stay in hockey and was the first coach in Penguins history and found himself coaching in 74-75 for the Washington Capitals (worst coaching position ever) and was 2-17 with the Caps in that season.

The card like Woit has been weathered! There are some light creases and the corners are rounded as well. The colouring is excellent on this card as well. In all I didn't spend much for these cards and they do get me closer to completion.

Progress:

Card #27 and 58 and 2+3 of 105 for my set.

Percent Completion:

2.86%

Cost of Cards:

$13.00

Total Cost of the Set to Date:

$20.95

1910-11 Imperial Tobacco Reprint Set

100 years ago, the first hockey set was created. ITG is doing a tribute set to honour the 100 year anniversary of the C56 by creating their Ultimate 10 to look like the original Imperial Tobacco cards. The cards were designed much like other tobacco cards of the time to help protect the cigarettes from being damaged. PSA offers a really neat article on the origins of the C56 set here. I am a fan of vintage cards which is part of the reason why I am working on my own Parkhurst project. After reading the PSA article online and seeing an article in the Aug/Sept Beckett I thought about looking for a reprint set of the C56 series. Sure enough, I was able to find a decent set that was done by the Lancaster Company. I am not too sure about the details of this reprint job, but I was able to purchase the set for $4.95 plus $2.50 shipping on Ebay. Other people are selling it for a bit more but the dealer who sent me this set mailed it pretty quick and the quality is decent. I looks like the cards where hand cut much like the original set was so a couple cards are off-centered. The ink of the back is brown much like the original set so all in all they did a pretty good job maintaining the feel and authenticity of the old cards.

Two of the biggest names from the set were Art Ross and Newsy Lalonde.

Art was famous for his donation of the trophy for the leading scorer and Lalonde was one of the first superstars of Ice Hockey. As you can see from the back of the card it is listed as a reprint. The fronts of the C56 are in colour and with the exception of a few are portrait shots.

My favourite card in the 36 card set is Fred "Cyclone" Taylor.

In this photo Fred looks rather menacing and during this time frame he was one of the most paid athletes in sports and the highest paid player in hockey. He made $5250 for a two month season.

Taylor, Ross and Lalonde along with many others from this set would make it into the HHOF. Each card in the original set is considered to be a RC of each player and for some reason both Jack Marshall and Art Ross end up with two cards a piece in the set. Someday it would be nice to buy a card or two from this set, but for now I will have to settle for the reprint version.

The Parkhurst Project Card 1

The first card I purchased, was from Ebay, and it was Bert Olmstead. Definitely the best player of all the cards I have bought from this set so far. Bert was an all-star 4 times and lead the NHL in assists twice. His best season was a 70 point performance in the 55-56 season. Bert was an early power forward who could hit with the best of them earned the nickname "Dirty Bertie". Bert eventually made it into the Hall of Fame in 1985 while finishing with 5 Stanley Cups in 11 appearances.


The card itself isn't in the greatest of shape. The red ink has a little fading, and there is some shiny glue marks on the back. The front isn't horrible, there are not major creases or damage to the front, you can see the reflection of a little glue on the front as well. This scan looks worse than the card does in person.

Progress:
Card # 1 of 105 and #5 in the set
Percent Completion: 0.95%
Cost of Card: $7.95
Total Cost of Set to Date: $7.95

The Parkhurst Project

Ever since I have begun collecting cards, I always preferred the older cards over the newer one. Since I started collecting in 1990, it was a good thing as I didn't spend ALL my money on 1990 junk wax and spread what little money I had around a little bit. My collection does have 90's stuff don't get me wrong, I was young and poor and it was often all I could afford. But I do have some older cards in my collection from the 50's, 60's, 70's and 80's. The set designs over the years are pretty darn cool and I definitely have my favourites much like everyone else does I am sure. My all-time favourite is 1951 parkhurst. There are other iconic sets out there like 67-68 topps, or 71-72 OPC or even 79-80 OPC. But it was the Parkhurst set that ushered in the modern card collecting era for hockey cards and the set was the largest ever produced at the time at 105 cards. My life goal in collecting will be to get this complete set. Like most people I can't just drop 15k on a completed set so I will build this set one card at a time. I hope to share my collecting of this historical set. Over the years I have really only ever seen a couple completed sets for sale so I know my goal is challenging but with auctions every day on ebay and thousands of these cards still available it is by no means difficult. The hardest part will just be saving and buying the cards for a price I think is reasonable. To help keep this project reasonable I plan on buying cards that may not be in the best condition especially in cases like Howe, Sawchuk and Richard rc's. But with that being said I do have SOME standards.

1. The card must be a complete card (Not pieces of it)
2. There can not be any handwriting on the card (I don't like it when they have been defaced)
3. The card is obvious (The card shouldn't look like it went through the wash in someones pocket and you can't make out what it says anymore)
4. I want to get a wrapper of the packs from 1951

So with those things in mind I hope to build the 105 card set before I meet my end. Maybe I should make provisions in my will in case I die that my estate finishes the purchases? I wonder if that has ever been done before?

Here is a picture of what the orginial 1951 Parkies came out of. Once in a while I see them on sale but they are much more rare than some of the cards themselves.

I found this picture online as well. It is a picture of 100 of the 105 cards from the set. Can you pick out which ones are missing?

So there you have it. I think it is do-able but of course with time just about anything is I suppose. In the coming weeks I will share with you as I make my attempt and if you wish to help out I am willing to make trades or barter to try and get more cards.

07-08 Sweet Shot

So maybe it was the lack of sleep due to a newborn, or maybe I convinced myself it was a good idea by watching too many box breaks on youtube. But I decided to drop 65 dollars (shipping and tax included) on the 'bay to get a box of 07-08 Sweet Shot. I told myself hey, about 6 bucks, 5 cards, 3 hits and the payout could be really cool!!! In fact, with the deep rookie pool from 07-08 I am bound to get someone decent right?

So the ride begins with Sir Patrick

A neat little tin, inside the cards are in a see-through package so looking right up at me as I open the box is a base card of....

Zetterberg. Base cards design is pretty nice, I don't mind them at all. At 65 bucks a tin I don't believe I will try and build the base set. The base set consists of 100 cards, mostly stars and Beckett lists the value between 20-50 bucks. Definitely don't see the value in trying to build this one!!

Next in the pack was base card number two and it was Dion Phaneuf. Both stars in their own right but nothing I was really in love with yet.... Now on to the hits. The first hit was..

Not a bad card. The puck signings are silver on a black rubber insert. The card isn't numbered but I love the penmanship and it is his rookie year so it means a little more to me than a regular auto of a third line player. The next hit was..

Dany Heatley. This card was numbered to 299, many fans will remember Dany was involved in a motor vehicle accident that almost ended his career and did end the life of Dan Snyder. He did bounce back from the accident and tragedy to have himself a good career so far. I was not excited about this one because there are much better cards out there including many current HOFs. So at this point I am telling myself, one card to go and it is going to be a rookie! Rookies are my favourite part of collecting so I know this last card could be good. Kane, Toews, Backstrom heck even Andy Greene would be fine...

Jared Boll....sigh.....Well it is a rookie....that is what I wanted....but Jared's skills are likely more appreciated in an octogon than an ice rink. He is a fighter, he isn't a scorer...in fact he has compiled 13 goals in 218 games over 3 seasons. He is a regular NHL'er so it isn't the end of the world but I would say that I got a dud as far as rookies are concerned. (the card is white, it just for some reason scanned a little goldish)

So did I get 65 dollars in cards here? I don't think even a Sens fan would agree here. I do have a nice Patrick Roy Tin, there must be some value there! In the end I think it was a bad idea especially if I used the 65 dollars for I used the money for this. If I pulled something numbered to /25 or /15 then I would say it was a success or even one of the better rookies I would have a smile on my face. This is likely the last Sweet Shot tin I will ever buy which is good because they also have stopped manufacturing this product after 07-08 season. Have you ever bought a tin? Would you ever buy one?

Diversions

Ok, so the ruling didn't go the way I hoped it would. Now the waiting game continues, so I thought I would share a box I opened a little while back of 09-10 UD Series 2. I usually don't mind this product because of a couple of reasons. First of all, you get a crack at the Victory versions of the rookies you missed from Series 1, you get a shot at a Rookie Memorabilia card and finally it completes the series. I must say, before I opened this box, I knew it could only get better! My Series one box best card was a Brodeur game used and the best rookie was Ryan O'Reilly. That was a dud box to say the least. I usually like the feeling I got what I paid for, but I was left unsatisfied and disgusted because all 6 of my pathetic young guns had roller marks all over them. SO here we go, this time around I feel I got it right, the young gun pool is much shallower, but I did alright...

The highlight of the rookies was Logan Couture who saw some action at the end of the season and looks to be a rather promising star. THN has him projected to score 36 points this season. Brad Marchand and Lars Eller were the other two notable pulls and they are projected to be full-time NHL'ers this coming season according to THN.

My Victory Gold rookie for this box was good old JT. Since I missed him in Series 1, this is the equivalence of the Ms Congeniality prize. I don't mind Victory rookies as much as others, I love rookie cards so the Gold parallel is better then the regular base one, which I pulled two of him as well.

The Exclusives are inserted 1 for every two hobby boxes and I was lucky enough to pull my buddy Gio. A former Devil, he will always have a place in my heart especially after his magical 48 goal season. He will never be able to repeat it, but I wish him luck in Montreal.

After opening most of the packs, this little surprise was found toward the bottom of the box. I have never pulled a victory black in my life and Van Riemsdyk isn't a bad one to start a collection on. I had pulled a regular Victory Rc of him earlier in the box was well and also lucked into a Ultra redemption rc of my new best friend James. He was born in NJ so maybe this is fate.

I almost fell off my chair when I opened this one. If all these Van Riemsdyk cards can't turn me into a fan then I don't know what will. A black swatch is always better than a white one, but beggars can't be choosers because the other GU from this box I pulled was a JP Dumont which if I didn't already have another GU of him might have been mildly exciting....But alas I have a SP Game Used of him already so now I will try and find a Preds fan who would be remotely interested in it and trade it to them for some commons of a set I am sure I don't collect.

The final thing I have to say about this box is why did I pull two "ice dancer" cards? Since when did hockey and ice dancing go together? Worse yet, one of them has never even won a real event like the olympics! I think they won some crappy USA junior title or some shit like that? There are probably two people in the world that wanted this card printed...Him and His MOM. So why did UD think it was a good idea? I can't wait for Panini to print some cards and give me an option to not buy UD.

The waiting game

Well as I write this, a decision from Richard I Bloch has yet to come. The 48 hours was extended over the weekend and a ruling regarding the infamous 17 year contract will come sometime today. I have read on many websites on how the Devils are "losers" in the free agent market and how the signing is absurd. Well if the signing goes through LIKE IT SHOULD, I believe Lou has once again proved that he is the best GM in the NHL. There is nothing wrong with the contract except that people are hung up on the length. There are no length rules, there are no stipulations on age in the CBA so I think it is funny that people immediately call foul when the Devils organization has following the contract to the letter and found a creative way to spread the wealth. No one can predict what Kovalchuk will do once he gets into his 40's. Igor Larionov played into his 40's and is one of the greatest Russian players of all time and someone who Kovalchuk looks up to. I believe we need to cut the kid some slack, he isn't all about the money because he walked away from more. He wants to win and really WHO DOESN'T? The Devils are perennial contenders and with Kovy we have an offense that will grow under Johnny Mac and here is hoping Marty gets to hoist another cup in the next year or two.

As Homer once said "the waiting game sucks. Let's play Hungry-Hungry-Hippos!"

SO here are a couple GU Kovys I picked up off the 'bay.