Random Hockey Mix!

How about a random smattering of hockey cards on a Monday?  Sure, why not!

While I don't chase them much any more, there was a time when I was really into the Canvas parallels in the Upper Deck flagship hockey set.  The retired legends are especially cool, and I couldn't resist snapping up this Tony Esposito for just a couple bucks on eBay.  Great shot of Tony's classic mask here.

My love for buybacks doesn't end with the Topps baseball versions, as I'm always on the lookout for good deals on hockey buybacks as well.

The trio in today's post was picked up because I landed all three in a package deal for less than $2.

I usually gravitate towards star players or Hartford Whalers when it comes to hockey buybacks, but in this case these three commons were had so cheaply that I just couldn't resist.

One of the more questionable decisions I've made since my return to collecting was to try chasing the entire 100-card 2009-10 Upper Deck Champ's hockey set in 1-per-box yellow parallel format.  This is one of those maddening chases where a good portion of the cards I need have never surfaced even once that I'm aware of.  Ray Bourque here (who looks particularly good in yellow if I do say so myself) puts me at 56 out of 100 now.  Ugh.

These next six cards are from quarter boxes at my former LCS, sadly I've not been in well over two years now due to a work schedule and other commitments that overlap their hours.

I've still got a pretty good backlog of quarter box cards though from all the time I spent digging through them back then.

I've got an unofficial goal of tracking down all of the different inserts from the first few Ultra hockey sets, so this was a nice score for a quarter.

Couple of legends here courtesy of that wonderful Parkhurst Missing Link set from the mid-'90s.

I'm a sucker for the Authentic Moments subset that has existed for a few years now in the SP Authentic hockey release.  I just love cards with photographs that can be tied to specific, memorable moments.

While not among the more exciting examples in this particular year's set photo-wise, I will add any and all of these that I don't already have to my stack for a quarter.

This one, from the 2016-17 set, is actually a gold parallel, serial-numbered to /99 as you can see along the right edge there.  I grabbed this many months back from an eBay seller because it was only a buck and he offered free combined shipping on another auction I'd already won.  A good example of a purchase I would not make today with my new, more focused collecting mindset.  When I come across this one again in a re-sort or browsing someday I'll probably pull it and send it to Billy at Cardboard History.

This on the other hand is one I'll absolutely hang onto, my very first card from 1961-62 Topps hockey.  This one's basically flat out mint, and was had for $5 with free shipping courtesy of eBay.  Felt kind of like theft to be honest!

If you collected hockey cards in the early '90s like I did, then you may remember these great "Painted Warriors" inserts from Leaf.  I had a couple of these as a kid, though they're long gone.  I'm now making a passive effort to rebuild the 10-card insert set as an adult, and Eddie Belfour here is my second so far.

I'll close it out with my favorite card in the post, a Blue Ice parallel of David Pastrnak's 2014-15 Flair Showcase rookie card.  This one came from the same hobby shop as the quarter cards above.  I remember I wavered on picking this card up on a few different visits because it was a firm $20 asking price which is a lot for me to pay for a modern card.

In the end, I picked it up because it's relatively rare (numbered to /99), and because David was showing some signs of turning into a real star.  Well, fast forward a few years and I have no regrets over dropping a twenty on this one.  Pastrnak has turned into one of the most dynamic players in the entire league, and is in fact leading the NHL in goals scored so far this season.

His Young Guns rookie may be more coveted, but this unique rookie card is certainly rarer.  A really cool addition to my small collection of the Bruins superstar.

Well, that's all for now.  Back to the work week here.  Thanks as always for stopping by!