That is, I bought 12 boxes–or 384 hobby packs–of 2012-13 O-Pee-Chee Hockey.
Crazy, right?
I’ve never bought a case of cards before. But yesterday, the 22-pound behemoth you see above was delivered to my front door.
I had to rationalize this expense–as most collectors would. I did put in some OT at my job last month, so these cards are paid for. I waited and waited and found the best available online price from a retailer who offered an additional $25 off. Plus, no tax and no shipping costs.
But I also had to come up with numerous good reasons why I should buy a whole freakin’ case, and not just a few hobby boxes.
I will get a complete base set (and then some)
I will get 192 Short Prints–hopefully one of each of the 100 possible
I will get 384 Retro Variants
I will get roughly 128 Stickers–hopefully at least one copy of 1-100
I will get 24 Pop Ups, which I’ll probably want to keep too
I will get 4 patch cards, and can probably sell those and make back a good portion of my money
I will get the 2 OPC Signatures cards. I do enjoy autographs.
I will get the case hit Team Canada autograph. I would like to have that card too.
I will get all of the box bottom cards, and have more left over to trade
I will have 384 wrappers leftover that I could potentially trade to a Canadian collector for Upper Deck’s “Canada Only” OPC promotion
I will have 96 Rainbow Parallels that I could potentially trade for the Retro Variants or Pop-Ups I still need.
Of course, I may not get a complete set out of the deal, might get shorted on an autograph and get the worst possible “hits” imaginable.
October 5, 2007 was the day I officially launched PuckJunk.com.
That doesn’t seem too long ago. But I feel like I got a lot accomplished in 5 years, including a Masters Degree, a successful career change and maintaining this website (and that other hockey website I also do). So I guess 5 years was a while ago.
My first-ever article for this site was a review of 2007-08 Victory Hockey.
Five years! None of my previous “hobby websites” have lasted that long. My fansite about The Matrix movies lasted about 4 years, though I didn’t update it in the last year. My G.I. Joe fansite only lasted maybe around 2 years. My Transformers website never got off the ground. But my hockey card and collectibles site–FIVE YEARS AND COUNTING.
And counting! That’s the great part. I still enjoy collecting hockey cards and I still enjoy writing about them.
Why? Because of the rest of the blogosphere. My other fansites were islands unto themselves, while Puck Junk is part of a community that enjoys hockey cards. Thanks to everyone who has traded cards with me, and thanks to everyone who’s listened to me prattle on about old cards, new cards, good cards, bad cards, rookie cards and lost cards.
Here’s to the next half-decade.
FIVE YEAR ANNIVERSARY GIVEAWAY CONTEST
To celebrate Puck Junk’s 5th Anniversary, I am giving away a sealed deck of Hockey Hall of Fame playing cards, which uses photos of some of the greatest all-time players.
If you would like to be entered in the drawing, just post a reply saying so by Sunday afternoon.. I will do a random drawing on Sunday night.
Former NHL superstar Jeremy Roenick (right) made a guest appearance on the TV show “Go On” earlier this week. (NBC/Universal)
Jeremy Roenick, one of my favorite former Blackhawks’ players, had a small guest role on the new TV show “Go On” this past Tuesday. The sitcom is about a smug sports radio show host named Ryan King, played by Matthew Perry. However, King lost his wife and is attending group therapy sessions to cope. (Yes, this is a comedy.)
In this week’s episode, King is invited to play in Jeremy Roenick’s weekly pickup hockey game. I won’t tell you anything else about the episode because you might want to watch it online. However, I will spoil the best line:
“Yo, Roenick! Get back on ‘D,’ princess!”
As a longtime hockey fan, it is awesome to see a hockey player–one of my heroes, no less–appear on a TV show. Whenever an athlete guest stars on a show in the U.S., it is always a baseball, football or basketball player. Nice that hockey is finally starting to get its due here south of the border.
My subscription to the Beckett Hockey Online Price Guide (OPG) has grown to become a valuable asset to both my collecting and to my writing. As a guy who blogs about hockey cards, it is great to be able to easily find out how many cards were issued of an obscure hockey player, or what the most valuable cards are in a set, or when a certain player’s rookie card was issued. It is especially helpful when I find some random card and have no idea what it is; I would just go to Beckett’s Online Price Guide, type in the player’s name, the card number, and the OPG would help me figure out what set the card is from.
Yes, the OPG is a great tool for collectors, but Beckett increased the yearly subscription rate from $54 to $81 and that pisses me off. Mind you, this is the yearly subscription rate for just their Hockey OPG, and not the price for “Total Access.”
That’s 50% price increase for what is basically a product that costs Beckett zero in printing and postage because it is a website and not a magazine.Yes, websites cost money to create and maintain–but jacking up the price 50% is some shit that we expect the oil companies to pull.
Or drug dealers. I remember when Beckett started “pushing” the OPG on us pretty hard a few years ago, trying to sell us a virtual price guide subscription while practically killing off their own printed magazine business.
Back then, the OPG was slow and unreliable. The site would be down for hours or even days sometimes. Often it was actually faster to look up card prices in the annual Beckett Hockey Price Guide book than search a computerized database. Go figure.
Like many other OPG subscribers, I was annoyed that I paid for something that didn’t work very well most of the time. I was going to bail out after subscribing to the OPG for a year, but Beckett Media auto-renewed my subscription (which is their default action for the Online Price Guide subscriptions), and would not allow me to cancel for a refund.
Beckett then had the OPG redesigned, but that made things worse, and not better like you would expect when a company redesigns a website. One thing the OPG did back then was use Flash to display checklists or search results–perhaps so you could not copy and paste text from the site.
This also meant that you could not right-click and open a link in a new tab/window. That is a functionality that most website visitors use regularly. It sucked to have to always view the site in the same tab, clicking on a link, determining it wasn’t the set you were looking for, clicking the back button, watching the “Loading” message for 20 seconds while your search results reappeared, then clicking on another link, rinse, repeat.
Subscribers continued to complain that the OPG was slow and hard to use. Beckett redesigned their website a second time–including the OPG–and finally got things right. For the past year or so, the Online Price Guide has been fast, reliable and intuitive to use. Qualities that paying customers would expect. Oh, and it supports multiple tabs and is easy to cut-and-paste from (so as to add to my want list).
It had its ups and downs, but I grew to love the Online Price Guide. Now that love costs me $27 more per year.
QUESTION: Do you use Beckett’s Online Price Guide for any sport? Please post a comment below and let me know your thoughts.
Also, contest coming on Saturday (if I can get it together in time…)
One of my favorite hockey blogs on the interwebs is called Battle of California. Maintained by Earl Sleek, Battle of Cali–as the cool kids call it–focuses on the San Jose Sharks, L.A. Kings and Anaheim Ducks.
What I love about Battle of Cali the most are these hilarious “Cartoon Explosion” stories, written and illustrated by Earl, that depicts personified mascots from each team battling for the Stanley Cup. Think “Muppet Babies” crossed with “Super-Friends” crossed with “Peter Puck”…but awesome-r.
Anything with silly cartoon animals amuses me–but these are silly cartoon animals fighting for the Stanley Cup. I love these stories so much that I collaborated with Earl in a new story called The Legend of the Seal. It recounts the tumultuous existence of the Oakland Seals / California Golden Seals…but with silly cartoon animals.
Lies! Intrigue! Cannibalism! Spray paint!The Legend of the Seal has it all. Check it out, and please leave a comment and let me know what you think.
Anyone who has seen my hockey card collection knows that it is a pretty equal amount of both order and chaos. I have neat, orderly shelves filled with binders, and then I have random boxes and piles of cards everywhere else. I bought these five 1953-54 Parkhurst cards way back in March, but they got filed into a box with other cards I wanted to blog about–and then completely forgotten until I “found” them last week.
So here are the cards that I’ve had since March but finally got around to putting away:
14 – Fern Flaman – “Fernie” passed away earlier this year. He was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1990.
19 – Bert Olmstead – Another Hall of Fame player, Olmstead played with Chicago, Montreal and Toronto.
7 – Theodore “Teeder” Kennedy – Yet another Hall of Fame member! Ted Kennedy, as he is best known as, broke into the NHL at age 18 and was the first player to win the Stanley Cup five times.
22 – James “Bud” MacPherson – MacPherson played 6 seasons for the Montreal Canadiens and won the Stanley Cup with them in 1953.
12 – Harry Watson – Watson played 14 seasons in the NHL. His rookie season was spent with the Brooklyn Americans in what was their last season (1941-42) before folding. He was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1994.
These 5 cards bring me up to 42 cards in this set, or 42% since it is a 100-card set.
Today, I completed my 2008-09 Victory Hockey Set. Claude Giroux was the last card needed to finish this one off. I did not start building this set until April 2010, when I found a 36-pack box for dirt cheap. Since then, I’ve picked away at it here and there. I won this Giroux card on eBay for $1.78 and did not get hosed on shipping because I bought a bunch of other cards from the same dealer.
I also finished my 2007-08 MVP Hockey set. This one was five years in the making, and was quite a challenge. In addition to the short-printed rookie cards, there were other rookie cards that you could get only through redemption.
Nick Foligno and Devin Setoguchi were two of the “redemption rookies” that eluded me the past five years. I acquired both of these in a trade.
Like I have said all along, collecting is a marathon and not a sprint. Sooner or later, I find the cards I need, either for trade or for a price that is reasonable.
On Day 3 of the Chicago Blackhawks Convention, I had to go it alone as Shellie had made plans for Sunday long before we knew that someone was giving us free passes.
I got to the convention at 8:15 AM, thinking that I could get a wristband for a Daniel Carcillo autograph. But some extreme Twilight Blackhawks fans were lining up outside of the convention (which was held at a hotel) as early as 3 AM. Even though wristband distribution was not for another 15 minutes, they had already cut off the lines for Carcillo, Brent Seabrook and Viktor Stalberg
So, I did what any sensible Blackhawks fan my age would do; I got another autograph from Michel Goulet. There were less than 100 people waiting to get a wristband for him, and he’d start signing at 9 AM, so that suited me just fine.
Instead of getting another card signed, I decided to get an 8″ x 10″ photo autographed. This one is going up on the wall at home.
One of the convention workers told me that there were still wristbands if I wanted yet another autograph from Goulet. I was tempted, but I decided instead to get a wristband for 3 former ‘Hawks who’d be signing at the same table together later that day: Pierre Pilote, Eric Nesterenko and Ab McDonald.
I got 1968-69 O-Pee-Chee cards signed by McDonald and Nesterenko.
I also got a stick blade signed by Pilote for my dealer friend–I wouldn’t be at the show without her generosity, and she loves Hall of Fame players.
Some things I bought on Sunday:
The Convention only went until 1 PM on Sunday, and there were not many players signing. Between autograph sessions, I was able to pick up a few things I wanted. This autographed 1990-91 Pro Set card of Stan Mikita cost me $15. I heard that Mikita–while he attends conventions and such–does not sign as often as he used to.
Starting Lineup “Pro Action” figures of Jaromir Jagr and Joe Sakic. I still need a few of these, and actually did not know that they made a Pro Action figure of Jagr.
An 8″ x 10″ photograph of Frantisek Kucera. Because every hockey collection needs an 8″ x 10 photograph of Frantisek Kucera–especially if it is only $1.
A few team photos, including this 1933-34 Chicago Blackhawks team photo. That was the first year they won the Stanley Cup.
I also picked up a few signed insert autographed cards from the 1990s, which I will eventually post on my other blog.
Final Thoughts
The Blackhawks organization actually gave fans enough things to do. There were usually 4 “regular” autograph lines, 2 “VIP” autograph lines, 1 photo line and 2 panel discussions going on at the same time. There were a lot of people, but it didn’t feel crowded because we were spread out enough and our attention was diverted.
Autographs of current players and up-and-coming players were in greater demand than players from the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s. People “camping out” for autographs of guys like Brent Seabrook and Andrew Shaw made it relatively easy for me to get ‘graphs from guys like Stu Grimson, Michel Goulet (twice) and Dave Manson. Thus, I had an absolute field day and ended up with 21 in-person autographs for my collection.
Like previous years, there were not that many dealers, but there was enough variety. The more I dug around the more I found cool things for my collection.
Overall, I had a great time. Yes, our passes were free. But even if I paid for them, I still would have had fun.
RECAP OF SATURDAY, JULY 21, 2012 On Day 1 of the Convention (recap here), I scored autographs of Marcus Kruger and new ‘Hawk Sheldon Brookbank. On Day 2, my plan was to get many more autographs.
Saturday is the longest day of the Convention, starting at 9:00 AM and ending around 6:30 PM. This would be the day that most of the players in attendance would be signing autographs. But you don’t line up for an autograph–you line up for a wristband that gets you an autograph of a specified player later that day. Wristband distribution times were usually an hour or two before the player was signing.
Shellie and I got to the Convention at 8:35 AM. I wanted to get a wristband to get Brandon Bollig’s autograph.I had an uncut sheet of Rockford Icehogs (the ‘Hawks AHL team) trading cards, and it still needed Bollig’s autograph on it.
Much to my surprise, by 8:35 AM, all 315 wristbands for a Bollig autograph were gone. We’re talking about a guy with 0 points and 58 penalty minutes in 18 games for the Blackhawks last season.
All the teenage girls wanted Brandon Bollig's autograph
My dealer friend gave me two VIP passes for a 9:00 AM autograph session. They announce who the VIP is 20 minutes before the session. It was Tony Esposito:
I got my 1981-82 Topps Super Action card signed by Tony-O, while Shellie got a stick blade autographed for our dealer friend.
Shellie got me John Marks’ autograph while I went and got a wristband for Dave Manson. Once she was done getting Marks’ signature, she also got a wristband for Manson.
Back in the day, I never had the opportunity to get Dave Manson’s signature. So, I was excited to get two things signed by him.
I got my 1989-90 Chicago Blackhawks Team Photo Album signed by Dave Manson (the Keith Brown signature is from 1989).
An embarrassing conversation transpired between myself and Manson. Manson greeted me in a raspy, whispery voice. I asked him if he was feeling sick.
“I have a paralyzed vocal chord,” Manson said.
“Oh, when did that happen?” I asked.
“From a fight in 1990,” he replied.
Wow, I had no idea. Like I said, I never met Manson or heard him talk before. Unfortunately, Shellie had nearly the same conversation with him 30 seconds later when it was her turn.
I then went and waited in line for Michel Goulet.
“Hey, that’s my rookie card!” said Goulet. “Very cool, what is this worth, five bucks?” he asked while signing my card.
“Well, now it’s priceless to me,” I replied.
Goulet got a laugh out of that one. He seemed like a very cool, very personable guy. Like the kind of guy you’d just want to hear talk about his career over a beer.
Meanwhile, Shellie got autographs from Eric Nesterenko and Ab McDonald. One good thing they started doing at the Blackhawks Convention is putting two players from the same era at the same table. The wait time is only a little longer than if it was for one person, but it is even more worthwhile because you are waiting for two signatures instead of one.
At the same time, I was waiting in line for Stu Grimson. I got an 8″ x 10″ autographed by the former NHL heavyweight enforcer. I’ve had this photo since 1995, so it was neat to finally have a chance (17 years later) to get it signed. Grimson commented on the picture, saying it is one that he had never seen before.
I then showed Grimson this picture of myself and him that was taken in 1990 at the Skate With The Hawks charity event.
Stu Grimson & me in 1990. I was short back then, so I'm probably standing on a chair.
Grimson smiled. “Wow!” That’s a great picture of YOU.”
“It’s a pretty good picture of you too,” I replied.
“Nah,” Grimson disagreed. “You still look good, but I look old now.”
Next, I went to see if I could get a card signed by Jamal Mayers, but they had given out all 315 wristbands for him rather quickly. The whole weekend was like that–the bit players (and minor leaguers) had more people seeking autographs than guys from the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s. That suited me just fine.
So I went to the line for Dennis Hull and Cliff Koroll. The two had already started signing, but there were still plenty of wristbands left. I got in line and got two cards signed.
Dennis Hull is always friendly. “Hey, thanks for waiting in line,” he said. “It must be a pain in the ass to wait in line.”
I assured Hull that it was well worth the wait, and thanked him for his signature. Koroll is always a cheery fellow, but I couldn’t think of anything to say to him other than thanking him.
Meanwhile, Shellie waited a long time to get an autograph from Bryan Bickell.Bickell works with a pit bull rescue organization called Chicago Loves Pits. Shellie created some silk screened patches about pit bulls that she really wanted to give to him. So it was less about getting an autograph and more about giving him some of these handmade art patches.
At first I was going to ask her to get a card signed for me. But Bickell has always signed my TTM requests, so I thought it would be wise to get something bigger than a card autographed. Since we did not have my Aunt’s pet pit bull with us to get autographed (j/k), Shellie got an 8″ x 10″ photo signed by Bickell and gave him her artwork.
At this point, Shellie informed me that there were still wristbands for Stu Grimson. I hurried to try and get another autograph from him, but by the time I got back to his line, he was gone. I guess he left after a few minutes of no activity.
I met up with Sean (another blogger) and we waited in line for Steve Larmer‘s autograph.
I got Steve Ludzik rookie card signed by Steve Larmer. Even though the card says Steve Ludzik, it picture Larmer, whereas Larmer’s rookie card pictures Ludzik. (More about that here).
Shellie went and got me autographs from Eric Daze and Steve Poapst.
The line for these two guys was really short, so after getting Larmer’s signature, I was able to get a wristband for Daze and Poapst and get two more things signed:
Between Shellie and I, we ended up getting 17 autographs. Not bad for a day’s work.
Biggest Surprise of Saturday: Andrew Shaw
Andrew Shaw has become some sort of cult hero in Chicago–especially among teenage girls. A longtime hockey fan told me that this felt more like a Twilight convention than a Blackhawks Convention, with all the teenage girls and mobs of people waiting for autographs from Shaw, Bollig, and the other Icehogs in attendance.
People started camping out for a wristband for Shaw at 11 AM–and wristband distribution for Shaw didn’t start until 4 PM! “Must have been those 12 goals he scored last year,” I jokingly said to fans in the various lines I waited for that day. To me, I’d much rather have autographs from Larmer, Goulet, Daze, Poapst, Grimson, Koroll and Dennis Hull than a relatively unproven player like Shaw.
My best purchase on Saturday: Bobby Hull Autographs
Using the $20 I got for, ahem, unloading that Patrick Sharp autograph ticket on Friday, I purchased two cards autographed by Bobby Hull. I bought them from a reputable dealer who I’ve dealt with numerous times before. Each card was $10. I am happier with these than with the photo I would have gotten signed by Sharp, so it all worked out in the end.
Last weekend was the 5th annual Chicago Blackhawks Convention. Like last year, I had absolutely no intentions of going. In fact, I practically forgot about it.
That all changed when a couple of dealers–literally, a married couple who are also hockey memorabilia dealers–called me last Thursday and told me they had two passes to the show they wanted to give me. I’ve known these two for a few years now. They are the same dealer friends who hooked me up with some VIP autographs at the 2010 show, and I always buy from them when I go to the Sun-Times card shows in March and November.
So, I now had two passes to the show. I made a few quick decisions on what I’d do:
Focus on autographs of my heroes from the 1990s
Not camp out extra early to get an autograph–or rather, a wristband to get an autograph. No 3 hour waits for me!
Skip the panel discussions and focus on getting autographs. Honestly, the panels are getting a little stale (life on the road, goalies, stuff like that)
Not be Mr. Super Blogger. That is, I did not take any pictures, shoot any video or Tweet from the show. All I wanted to do was focus on being there and getting autographs.
RECAP OF FRIDAY, JULY 20, 2012
Shellie and I got there just a bit before 5pm. We perused the dealer room for a bit, and then lined up to get autograph wristbands. We met up with with Sean, a blogger from the Chicago area, and talked hockey for a bit. Shellie and I grabbed some hot dogs (only $4.50 each, but they were big and included chips).
We then decided to get in line for autographs.
Shellie got me an autograph from Marcus Kruger. That was kind of a mistake, because all she did for the rest of the night was talk about how hot Marcus Kruger is. When I told her he is from Germany, she was annoyed that I didn’t tell her–she would have said “Hello” to him in German. (With a name like MARCUS KRUGER, you think his Germanic heritage was obvious, right?) EDIT:Marcus Kruger was actually born in Sweden, not Germany. Now I wish I had told her that he was German. That would have been hilarious.
Meanwhile, I got my 2009-10 OPC Update card signed by Sheldon Brookbank. Some fans and I joked if it would be possible to fit his entire name on my trading card. Well, the answer is he just does some sort of half-assed squiggle that looks like SLB. I hope his on-ice abilities are better than his autograph-signing abilities.
I had a VIP pass to get an autograph from Patrick Sharp. I went to wait in that line, but it was very long. I really did not need another Patrick Sharp autograph, so I tried to trade to someone who had a different VIP autograph pass.
But I had no takers. So I went back into line to get Patrick Sharp’s autograph.
Just then, a chubby guy called out to me: “Hey, I’ll give you 10 bucks for your Sharp autograph ticket.”
Now, most of you KNOW how I feel about selling autographs, it’s wrong MMM’KAY. Even though this was a ticket to get an autograph, it still didn’t seem right.
“Do you have a different autograph ticket to trade?” I asked the man. “I’d rather get a different VIP’s autograph.” Selling is one thing, but trading is another.
“No, sorry, I don’t,” said the guy. “So, how about 20 bucks.”
At this point, I was stunned. What should I do? I looked, and the guy had a Patrick Sharp Winter Classic jersey in his hands that he wanted to get signed. I had a photo that I only kinda wanted to get signed (I got Sharp’s autograph on a nice picture in 2010).
So, I caved in and accepted the man’s $20. He was happy because he could get his jersey autographed, and I was happy because I used the money to buy something I really wanted–more on that tomorrow.
On Friday, I also bought a few cool things…
I found 12 different parallel and insert cards of my favorite player of all time, Chris Chelios. Above is a shiny parallel card from the Cool Trade mail-away set.
A documentary about the Stanley Cup-winning 1961 Chicago Blackhawks, entitled The Forgotten Champs. This DVD came out in 2006, a few years before the team turned things around (and were pretty much all but forgotten in Chicago).
Starting Lineup figures of Chris Chelios and Glenn Hall. Packaging on these are a little rough, but I am going to open them eventually.
Tomorrow, I will post a recap of Saturday, which is when I got the bulk of my autographs.
That is, I bought 12 boxes–or 384 hobby packs–of 2012-13 O-Pee-Chee Hockey.
