Wayne Gretzky is, in my personal opinion, the greatest player ever to take the ice in National Hockey League history. Although I have too many other collecting interests, and too limited a collecting budget, to become an insane Gretzky super-collector, I'm nonetheless making an attempt to pickup much of his 1980s Topps and O-Pee-Chee run in PSA-graded form.
The two cards I have to show today fall just outside of that scope by definition, but are still from the era when Topps was producing a flagship hockey set, and also were cheap enough that I simply could not resist picking them up for my collection of The Great One!
First up, a concept that is very familiar to Gretzky fans and collectors, the League Leaders subset card. Wayne absolutely dominated the sport of hockey for a period of close to two decades, and as a result appeared on so many of these leader cards throughout that time.
#99 earned this particular card in the 1991-92 Topps set by scoring a league-best 163 points in the 1990-91 campaign. That was more than 30 points higher than the next best scorer (Brett Hull), and nearly 50 points higher than third place Adam Oates.
The back gives you a look at the top ten scorers in 1990-91, and to me the most surprising name on the list is John Cullen of the Penguins/Whalers.
How impressive a feat was this 163-point total? Well, not a single player has bested it in the nearly 30 years since. Mario Lemieux came close once or twice, but nobody has eclipsed 163 points since Wayne's '90-91 season. Amazing.
Leading the league in points in '90-91 actually got Wayne a second card in the '91-92 Topps release, as scoring the most points in the league wins you the Art Ross Trophy, of course. Even though Gretzky is pictured in a practice sweater here, I actually like the layout of the card, with the Art Ross hardware super-imposed.
Perhaps the best thing about this pair of cards is that they're actually from a COMC order that I requested shipment for back in the first week of June that finally reached my doorstop this past Saturday! It was a couple hundred cards in size too, so I've got plenty of great content now for posting through the dark and dreary winter months.
Really happy to have this pair of slabbed cards in my Great One collection, commemorating the amazing age-30 season Wayne enjoyed in 1990-91. There are plenty more Gretzky cards out there that I'm still hunting for this project, in fact he was featured on eight cards in the 1991-92 Topps set alone. Yep, I'm going to be at this a while, but I don't mind because I love the thrill of the hunt. Two cards closer after today's post, anyway.
Thanks as always for stopping by, and I'll be back with more great cardboard later this week. Stay safe out there, and mask up!
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3 comments:
I think the majority of hockey fans would agree with you. I don't, but I'm no expert on hockey.
Gretzky was on another level when it came to awards and records. Had to look up his hockey reference page... and noticed he eclipsed the 163 point mark eight times in his career. Sure the game was different back then, but like you pointed out he was 30 points higher than 2nd place and almost 50 points higher than 3rd place. That's next level stuff.
League leader cards provide an instant snapshot into the season, which is really cool. And on top of that, like you mentioned, it's a very affordable way to obtain a card of a superstar. Hard to beat that combination!
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