Jimmy Howard: Trade Pickups

Like I mentioned in the last Silver Script update, the last remaining part of the trade I completed with Brett was all Jimmy Howard stuff. I managed to pick up some nice pieces for the collection including a key rookie and some nice inserts.

Let's start with the one base card of the lot from 2010-11 SP Authentic. I never busted any of this stuff and I didn't feel like overpaying for shipping from ebay on a base card, so this is a nice addition. I love the simplicity of the design, although I think they went a little overboard with the fading. The scan just makes this one look worse for some reason too.

The next on is a retro parallel from 2010-11 OPC. I already have the rainbow version of this card, now I just need to track down the black border and the blank back versions. For some reason, I like the look of this one, especially with the yellow background and text for the team name, it give the card a more bold look.

This one is also from 2010-11 OPC, but this time it's an All-Rookie Team card. To me, it's still hard to think of Jimmy as a rookie for the 2009-10 season, but by league rules he was still considered to be one, despite the fact he played in his first NHL game way back in 2005.

 

Now we're getting to the good stuff. As a player collector, the all-important Young Guns rookie card has been on my want list since the beginning, so it was really nice to finally add this one to the collection. This one would make a perfect candidate for my 'Goaltending Gallimaufry' project, but I think I'll exclude rookies like this from that set.

This is another one I've been wanting for a while now. It's a Masked Men II from 2009-10 Between The Pipes. While I like the Masked Men sets, I still miss the old Mask sets where the mask was cropped out of the rest of the image. The card looks kind of dirty in the scan, but that's because it's got a mirror finish on the front and is impossible to keep pristine.

This one will go nicely with my Hot Prospects Auto Patch RC from a little while back, as they are part of the same set. It's got a nice red swatch, which is cool because it could have just been all white. I will say I do like the look of this set, especially the M-shaped window for the swatch inside the larger H.

Here we've got another nice jersey card, this time it's a First Exposures from 2006-07 BAP. Again, it's a nice red swatch as opposed to a more boring white one. I like that the swatch window is in the shape of the BAP logo, as opposed to a simple and boring rectangle.

The last of the Howard's I picked up was this Certified Potential insert from 2010-11 Certified. It's numbered out of 500 and is the start of another potential 'rainbow' for the PC, as it's the usual Panini parallel hell with this set, just like the base and Masked Marvels sets.

That's it for now. These eight bring the Howard collection total to 73 including duplicates, 71 not counting them. I'm well on my way to 100 different cards now, which will be the next major milestone in the collection. Having only started this collection just under two years ago, on my current budget, I'd say I've done pretty well for myself.