O-Pee-Chee Retro from Amazon

I had heard through the grapevine that you can now purchase cards from the Check Out My Cards inventory on Amazon, so when I received a couple of $25 Amazon gift cards for my birthday a few weeks back I decided to give it a look.  I didn't end up buying anything from COMC, after all one of the aspects I like most about their site is the ability to offer/haggle and I don't think you have that capability when going through Amazon.  I was surprised however at the overall selection of cards available on Amazon.  I decided to search out the cards that have eluded me more than maybe any other over the years, the 2008-09 O-Pee-Chee hockey retro parallels.

To my surprise I hit the jackpot, with one seller (Burbank Sports Cards) having a whopping 21 cards that I needed towards my set, most of which were listed at between $1.00 and $1.50.  I will sometimes go months without seeing any of the remaining cards that I need for this set, so I was elated to find this many from a single seller at a decent price.  I bought all 21, and only had to burn one of my $25 gift cards (plus $10 of spillover to cover the last few cards and some shipping costs).  They shipped amazingly fast, I ordered them on a Monday morning and had them in my mailbox that Wednesday.  Some of the cards were commons, but I did get a few names of note in the lot as well...

Marc-Andre Fleury of the Pittsburgh Penguins.  Every time I look at this set I'm reminded of how much better all future O-Pee-Chee Retro parallels may have been had they continued to use actual vintage designs.  Imagine a 2012-13 Retro parallel based on the '81-82 or '84-85 designs.  Now that I would collect.

Dany Heatley

Scott Niedermayer in the twilight of his career with the Ducks (he still tallied 59 points in '08-09, his second-to-last season).

Peter Forsberg didn't play NHL hockey at all in 2008-09, appearing in just a couple of dozen total games with Modo Hockey of the Swedish Elite League over the course of the '08-09 and '09-10 seasons.  He did attempt that comeback with Colorado in 2010-11 that I'm sure we all remember, but lasted just two games.  Still one of my favorite players from my youth hockey fan days.

Daniel Briere...

Cujo illustrating one of the few (maybe the only?) places where this set missed the mark, the failure to use the "NOW WITH..." designation on cards of players who were traded to or signed by a team other than the one they're depicted with.  A "NOW WITH MAPLE LEAFS" in the upper right hand corner would have made this card complete and more authentic.

Finally, we have Patrick Kane.  There was a lot of buzz on sports talk radio in these parts about the Bruins acquiring this guy last winter.  I'm still not sure if I'm disappointed or not that nothing ever came of it.

Buying hockey cards from Amazon was a good experience this first go-around.  I'll definitely keep the site in mind as yet another resource to use when trying to tackle a difficult set or that impossible-to-find single.  Besides, I've got another $25 to use!  This lot puts me at 591/600 for the '08-09 Retro set, just 9 cards to go and I can put this to rest at last.

Have you ever purchased cards from amazon.com?  If so, how was your experience?