Signature Sundays...I Mean Saturdays! - A Pair of Old School Rangers

Got a little ahead of myself this week, so you're getting tomorrow's Signature Sundays post today instead!

With the 2014-15 NHL season now in full swing, it only seemed appropriate to return to my favorite hockey autographs from recent years for today's post.  I've got a tandem of New York Rangers, both of them enshrined in the Hockey Hall of Fame!

First up is a fan favorite in New York, a guy who was always an offensive threat throughout his career, Rod Gilbert!  I love the photograph on this card, and Gilbert did a nice job with a huge signature which includes his uniform number.  Rod played for 18 seasons in the NHL, every one of them in a Rangers sweater.

Despite playing the majority of his career in the '60s and early '70s when there wasn't as much scoring in the game as there would be the couple of decades following, he still managed to rack up over 400 goals and over 1,000 career points (both of which are records for Rangers players).  Rod was an All-Star many times over, and won the Masterson trophy during his career for his incredible comebacks from multiple serious back surgeries.

Gilbert was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1982, and was the first New York Ranger to have his number retired and hung from the rafters at Madison Square Garden.  Lastly, Rod's card is short-printed in this set, so it's nice to have yet another SP auto in the books...

Paired with Rod Gilbert today is another old-timer, Harry Howell!  Harry's NHL career started much earlier than Rod's, as he first appeared in a Rangers sweater way back in the 1952-53 season!  Kind of cool to think that while Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra, Whitey Ford and the boys were racking up World Series championships in the '50s Harry here was plying his trade on the ice across town.

Howell stuck with the Rangers all the way through the late '60s before hopping around to a couple of other NHL franchises, and then ending his career in the WHA.  He was actually the last guy to win the Norris Trophy before Bobby Orr's epic run.  Like Rod Gilbert, his sweater is retired and hanging in the rafters at MSG.

That's all for this week, another pair of fantastic autographs from 2012-13 Panini Classics Signatures!  If my count is correct I've now shown 132 hard-signed autographs from this amazing set here on the blog.  I'm getting near the end of what I've got to show, and hope to wrap up the last few in the coming weeks...