Hockey cards, collectibles and culture
Herb Brooks will forever be remembered best as the coach of the 1980 U.S. Olympic Hockey Team that accomplished the “Miracle on Ice” and won a gold medal. He almost won a gold medal as a player, too, with the 1960 Olympic squad. However, it was not meant to be, as explained by this 1991 trading card… Continue reading “Card of the Week: Herb Brooks”
Today we take a look back at the career–in cards–of Hall of Fame right wing Mike Bossy. In 10 seasons, Bossy scored 50 or more goals in all but his last one, which was cut short by injuries. A bad back forced him to retire at age 30.But he accomplished more in 10 seasons that what most players do in 20. Continue reading “Career in Cards: Mike Bossy”
A few days back, I purchased some hockey cards at Target. Like DFG, I too have been trying to swear off the retail packs this year. And I remember Card on Ice, saying the product wasn’t all that. But I had a 10% coupon on Target, and I was deeply intrigued by this 3-pack blister pack of 2009-10 Black Diamond Hockey cards.
Three-pack blister? That’s a pack of packs! Just the sheer novelty of that would be hard for me to pass up.
Including sales tax–but minus my discount at Target–it came out to $10–a cool $3.33 per pack. Worth it? Probably not. But then again, Jonathan Toews of my Chicago Blackhawks is on the card wrapper. Would “Tazer” steer me wrong?
These shiny, foil-y cards never look good when scanned, so I only scanned what I deemed the “best” card from each pack:
Pack 1
Krejci gets “best card status” from this pack because I know some guy who blogs about him.
Pack 2
A Triple Diamond card seeded 1 in every 4 packs, I beat the odds by getting one in the 3 packs I purchased. Plus, it is always great to get a card of a retired great like “Ducky.”
Pack 3
Hmmmm….none of these guys really stand out to me, so I’ll arbitrarily pick Abdelkader as the best card in the pack because it is colorful.
The backs of each card are actually pretty well laid-out. I guess I’m a sucker for symmetry.
The back accommodates up to 5 lines of stats. As much as I prefer complete statistics, I almost expect these kinds of sets to only show a few years.
I don’t know if this is a set that I will collect. Retail packs suck, and a hobby box goes for $90 to $100–but their only upside seems to be jersey cards or parallels, neither of which I am particularly fond of.
1979-80 was an epic year for hockey for so many reasons. It was a changing of the guard, with Wayne Gretzky playing his first NHL season, and Gordie Howe playing in his last. It was also the first season after the NHL absorbed four WHA (World Hockey Association) teams. And it was a year that a team of Americans would pull off one of the biggest miracles on ice. But that’s another story.
Like the year it represents, the 1979-80 Topps set was a landmark release, and still remains popular among collectors today. Continue reading “Review: 1979-80 Topps Hockey”