Tuesday, December 10, 2019

10 Years of Card Boarded

Today marks the 10th anniversary of my first post here on Card Boarded. Back in 2009 when I started this thing I never would've thought I'd make it this far. Blogging was kind of a foreign concept to me at the time and I really wasn't even sure what I was doing in the beginning. Now its become one of my favorite parts of collecting hockey cards.

Ten years and over 750 posts later, I feel like blogging has really helped boost my collection and kept me interested in the hobby. One of the best parts has been checking out all the other great hockey and sports card blogs I've found through doing this.

In order to mark this special occasion, I thought it would be fun to design a special edition header. It definitely resembles the current header that's been live for years now, but there are some obvious changes, the biggest being a departure from the regular color palette.


Another thing that sounded fun for the occasion was taking a look at some of the numbers related to the posts I've made on here. I use Excel quite a bit for work and really enjoy making tables and charts for this kind of stuff, so I decided to throw a few things together.

Here is a cool little chart showing the numbers of posts I've made each year. As you can see I was quite busy on here back in 2010-12. The biggest reason for that: I was still single and lived in an apartment so I had a lot more free time for collecting and blogging.


My wife and I were married in 2012 and our first child was born in 2013, which actually corresponds surprisingly well with the nosedive in the total number of posts beyond 2013. Having a family and a house definitely took away some of the free time I would use for blogging. Even through everything going on, I still tried to find time when I could. With the exception of 2018, my number of posts has been trending upwards, so that's cool.

Looking back over ten years worth of posts on here has definitely been interesting. While I have stuck to several primary collection projects over the years (e.g. Jimmy Howard, Super Scripts, etc), there are actually quite a few different topics I've covered.

Below is a chart that breaks down the proportions of the most frequent topics I've posted. These are the top ten according to total number of posts for a specific topic. I'm definitely not surprised that my main player collection takes the top spot.


Lastly, I thought it would be neat to see how my two main collection projects, the Super Scripts and Jimmy Howard, have progressed over the past ten years. The exact numbers might be a little off just because I determine them based on simply scrolling back through my posts on here and counting the number of new cards in chronological order.


With the exception of close to 90 Jimmy Howard cards back in 2011, things have been fairly consistent from year to year with these two projects. While it may not seem like all that much being around 20 cards per year, at least its something to keep each project going after all this time. Hopefully I can keep this up moving forward.

I want to say thank you to everyone who has stopped by over the last ten years. I still think its pretty cool that even a few people like to check out what I have going on here.

Most of you have your own blogs that I really enjoy reading. For those of you that do, keep up the great work. For anyone that does not have one, I highly recommend it. I feel like blogging has been one of the keys to my enjoyment of this hobby for the last ten years.

I would also like to give a special shout out to Brett from My Hockey Card Obsession. It was reading his great blog back in 2009 that actually inspired me to start my own. If I hadn't stumbled upon it from an old Puck Daddy post on Yahoo back in the day, who knows if I even would've started this whole thing. Definitely glad I did.

Here's to another ten years of blogging, hopefully...

Monday, December 2, 2019

SCE Super Script Update

Along with my recent run of Gold Scripts for my 1999-00 MVP Stanley Cup Edition project, I was again able to land all of the corresponding Super Scripts.

There was also one outlier that came from a different seller than the one from Sweden and it was just a lone Super Script. The funny thing is I actually lost out on an auction from the Swedish seller for this exact same card as one of their earlier Silver/Gold/Super lots. 

That one outlier would be this Stacy Roest, which is card #70 in the set and is serial numbered 04/25. To this day I'm not sure why he was chosen to represent the Red Wings in this set over names like Nicklas Lidstrom, Chris Chelios, Igor Larionov, etc.


Back to the ones from Sweden now starting with Sergei Brylin of the New Jersey Devils. This one is card #110 in the set and is serial numbered 10/25. While he isn't the biggest name of the Devils in this set, I definitely remember him from their Cup run back in 2000.


Continuing with that 2000 Stanley Cup winner, this Scott Gomez is card #107 in the set and is serial numbered 24/25. If only that had been one number less, it would've made for one of those neat jersey numbered cards. Not sure I have many in my set so far.


Up next is this Scott Young, which is card #166 in the set and is serial numbered 16/25. Is it just me or does it seem like the photo on this card is just a bit to the left? I get it though if they were trying to avoid the MVP logo covering up the player.


Then there was this Jeff Halpern, which is card #191 in the set and serial numbered 12/25. According to the checklist, this is actually a RC for Halpern. I vaguely remember him from back in the day. Gotta love those old Caps jerseys too.


This one featuring current Vancouver Canucks head coach Travis Green is card #141 and is serial numbered 01/25. Its always nice to have the first card of a print run like this. I'd have to look through my set to see how many I actually have.


First we had the beginning, now we have the end of print run. This one featuring Jonas Hoglund of the Toronto Maple Leafs is card #175 in the set and is serial numbered 25/25. I don't think I have many numbered 25 in my set so this is kind neat as well.


The first of four CHL Super Scripts was this Justin Papineau, which is card #216 in the set and serial numbered 17/25. One thing I always liked about the CHL portion of the set was how they used a foil version of the league logo instead of the facsimile signature.


This Taylor Pyatt is card #213 in the set and serial numbered 07/25. For whatever reason my scanner decided to make this one look a little different than the Papineau. The rainbow foil look spectacular in person and you can kind of get an idea of it with this scan.


Of course now that I said something earlier about hitting the last card of a print run, I would do it again in the same post. This Luke Sellars is card #206 in the set and is serial numbered 25/25. This one also shows the nice rainbow foil, especially on the MVP logo.


Same as my last posts, we'll finish thins up with Michael Zigomanis. This one is card #215 in the set and is serial numbered 09/25. Its nice knocking off as many of these CHL cards as I can. Then I'll be able to focus solely on the main portion of the set.


So that's 11 new cards for my 220 card set. Not a bad chunk to knock off the list if you ask me. I believe this is the most I've ever posted on here at one time.

The Green and Hoglund are the two that were not included in my previous Gold Script update. That's because I already had them. For the deals I was getting I would've been happy if all I got was just the Super. The Golds were just a bonus. That being said, I was definitely willing to take on a few duplicate Golds in order to boost my Super Script set.

Super Script Total: 82/220

Sunday, December 1, 2019

SCE Gold Script Update

This year has been great for my collection so far. I've been more active on here than I have the past five years. I've been to more card shows than normal and have been buying things on eBay more frequently. One of the beneficiaries of this has been my long neglected 1999-00 MVP Stanley Cup Edition Gold Script set. While I did just post an update recently, I had nothing new to show for it in almost five years before that.

Thanks to one eBay seller from Sweden, I've been able to knock more than a dozen of these off the want list just in the last few months. While that may not seem like much, I consider it to be some good progress for me. These things are 20 years old now and serial numbered to 100, so they don't exactly show up for sale all that often.

The best I can guess is that this seller had most of if not all of the master set and finally decided to part it out. They've had a ton of listing recently and almost all of them included the Silver Script, Gold Script and Super Script for a given player. Most of them got out of my price range so I had to pass on dozens of them. Some of the bigger names were fetching some crazy amounts, which were even further out of my price range.

The first one I got was this Scott Young, which is card #166 in the set and serial numbered 032/100. I remember seeing a lot of this guy back then with how often the Blue and Red Wings played one another. I miss the days when the Wings were still in the West.

 

Up next was this Sergei Brylin, which is card #110 in the set and is serial numbered 079/100. This one has a cool shot of Brylin appearing to celebrate a goal. I like how he is isolated in the shot other than the random stick from the left.


Then there was this Jeff Halpern, which is card #191 in the set and is serial numbered 037/100. I'm noticing that my scanner really does not like the gold foil on these things. It almost turns black and makes some of the last names pretty hard to read.


Back to New Jersey, there was this Scott Gomez, which is card #107 in the set and is serial numbered 016/100. He is another guy that I will always associate with that 2000 Stanley Cup Championship team. If I remember right they even did a special feature on him being from Alaska on the commemorative DVD (it was actually a VHS for me). 


In addition to those four, I was able to snag a few from the CHL Prospects portion of the main set. The first was this Justin Papineau, which is card #216 in the set and is serial numbered 025/100. Papineau is shown here playing for the Belleville Bulls.


Up next was this Taylor Pyatt, which is card #213 in the set and is serial numbered 077/100. Pyatt was drafted 8th overall by the New York Islanders in 1999 and last played for the Penguins in 2013-14. He is shown here with the Sudbury Wolves.


Then there was this Luke Sellars, which is card #206 in the set and serial numbered 086/100. Sellars was originally drafted by the Atlanta Thrashers in 1999. Unfortunately, he only ever played one game in the NHL and that was with Atlanta in 2001-02.


Last but not least, we have this Michael Zigomanis, which is card #215 in the set and is serial numbered 094/100. He was actually drafted twice, one by the Sabres in 1999 and then again by the Hurricanes in 2001. Apparently there was a typo in his first contract with Buffalo and the league decided he had to re-enter the draft.


So that sums the biggest influx of Gold Scripts I've had in quite a while on here. I'm really glad I've kept these things in my saved eBay searches all these years. They don't come up very often, so it was nice to be able to grab this many all from one source lately.

Gold Script Total: 77/220

Monday, November 18, 2019

Jimmy Howard: Limited Gold Monikers Auto

While this will only be the fourth Howard card I've bought in 2019, it is definitely a nice one. I've always liked a lot of the Panini designs that came out between 2010 and 2014. This was back when Howard was playing pretty well and seemed to be featured in almost every one of their sets. My favorite part of the Panini sets would have to be the parallels. 

Today's card is a Gold Monikers Autograph parallel from 2011-12 Limited. This was one of the higher end sets Panini produced back then. If I remember correctly even the base cards were numbered to 299 or something. They definitely have a higher end look and I would say this was my favorite of the Limited sets they released.

The best part is it only cost me $0.99 plus shipping.


This card goes nicely with the Ruby Spotlight parallel (click here) and the Materials jersey parallel (click here) that I bought way back in 2012. There are still several others I would need to complete the rainbow. Those include the base, Gold Spotlight, Prime Materials and Platinum Spotlight. That last one is a 1/1 so I will probably never see it.

Also, this is one of the nicest looking autos in my Howard collection. If it weren't for the sticker, this would be my favorite. At least here the sticker doesn't distract too much from the design. It is nicely centered and only covers up a small portion of the image.

Jimmy Howard Collection Total: 182

Monday, November 11, 2019

Red Wings: Trade Pickups

It's been a while since I've been able to post a good batch of new Wings stuff on here. The last time was all the way back in September of 2017. I've gotten a few random Wings cards since then, but nothing that gave my hometown team collection a significant bump.

That can change now thanks to Dennis over at Too Many Verlanders. I sent a bunch of Michigan alumni stuff his way in exchange for some Wings stuff. There was no set list of cards coming my way so it was fun opening up the package and sorting through everything.

We'll start things off with my favorite nine cards of the package. It actually took my a while to decide on these as there were a ton of sets and players that I haven't added to my Wings collection yet. I don't buy much of the newer products and stay away from overpriced Wings stuff at the local shows so I don't have many cards of the current team or even former players from the last five seasons or so.


These first nine provide a good mix. My favorite would have to be the Nyquist Young Guns, since I it was my first Wings YG from that set. The Athanasiou and Nyquist Artifacts are pretty nice too. As far as design, I would give a slight edge to the AA.


Going back a few years, there were some great cards from the mid to late 90's. My favorite of these would probably be the Lidstrom from Pinnacle Inside. That was the set where the cards came in cans. I remember getting a few of those cans as a kid and thinking they were the coolest thing. The Larry Murphy in the middle makes me wish Topps would produce hockey cards again. Their sets were a big part of collecting for me back then. 


Lastly we have some great early 90's stuff. The Yves Racine from 91-92 Score and the Yzerman from 90-91 Score bring back memories of collecting Red Wings when I first started in the hobby. Those are two set designs that I will always enjoy having in my collection. There were even a few featuring the current head coach of my other favorite team.


These were an excellent boost to my Red Wings collection. I'm not even sure how many cards I have at this point, so I've decided to start sorting and counting again. I started this in the past, but never finished. That's why the total still says TBD on my collection tracker sidebar. This trade has made me want to get that figured out finally.

Thanks for the trade Dennis! I'll be on the lookout for more UofM alumni stuff for you. I already have a couple more Steve Shields cards set aside that were lurking in my binders.

Thursday, October 24, 2019

Goaltending Gallimaufry: Card Show Pickups

Gallimaufry [gal-uh-maw-free] A hodgepodge; jumble; confused medley.

Finally, I can get back to sharing some new cards for my favorite side project. I've been searching for cards featuring mismatched goalie gear for over eight years now and I'm closing in on 200 total. This was supposed to just be a fun little side project when it started, but has actually become one of the bigger chunks of my active collection.

I love the fact that there is really no limit to the number of different sets and designs that can be included. Initially I thought these were not all that common, but the more I looked the more I could find. Goalies being traded and signing with new teams will never go away, so in theory neither will cards featuring these type of photos.

The first one we have today comes from 1995-96 Upper Deck and features former Islanders goaltender Tommy Salo. He is shown here in an Islanders road jersey, however pads and most notably his mask appear to be from a different team. That would be from his time with the Denver Grizzlies of the IHL. He actually led them to a championship in 1995.


Plus, how can you go wrong with a card that has a beach ball on it as the first one to show? That is something that fits in perfectly with this project.

Up next is another card from the same set, this time featuring Jocelyn Thibault. He is shown here with the Canadiens and your typical 'I just got traded' plain white mask. On top of that, the rest of his gear is still in Colorado colors as he was part of the Patrick Roy trade.


Here's a mismatch that's been shown here before on several cards. This base card from 1996-97 Fleer shows Damian Rhodes with the Ottawa Senators. While his mask and blocker had been updated to the Sens colors, the rest of his gear was still Maple Leaf blue. It's not as obvious here as on other cards because of the team logo and the snow spray.


Up next is one of the more interesting action shots I've found for this project. This 1994-95 Upper Deck base card shows Rick Tabaracci several feet off the ice likely leaping over his fallen teammate. The obvious mismatch here is the black pads and gloves against the red, white and blue of the Capitals old jerseys.


I'm not sure why he was wearing black equipment at this point in time. Tabaracci was traded to the Caps from Winnipeg back in March of 1993. A quick web search shows he was wearing all black pads with the Jets too. Their colors were the same as the Caps, so none of this adds up. I guess he just wanted to keep it simple and stick with all black, which worked out once he was subsequently traded to the Calgary Flames later in 1995.

Last but not least we have Chris Terreri shown playing for the San Jose Sharks. There is some red on his gear that makes for a stark contrast to the teal. This was because Terreri was traded from the Devils in November of 1995. The funny part is that the back of the card shows a picture of him with new gear in Sharks colors. 

 

Technically this did not come from the show. I happened to find it when sorting through my old binders the other day. I must have just missed it when I went searching through them years ago for these things. This is one of my favorite Collector's Choice sets from the 90's.

Unfortunately, that's it for now. Finding these really makes me want to get out and look for more. The cards shows are hit and miss. I spent a good hour sorting through 5000 ct boxes of old singles only to find four. I might have better luck getting some from COMC.

Goaltending Gallimaufry Count: 196

Wednesday, October 23, 2019

Jimmy Howard: Certified Masked Marvels

Back to back Jimmy Howard posts, now that's something that I have not been able to do here in a very long time. It feels good though to finally have some new stuff for my main player collection, even if these addition ares few and far between.

Today's card comes from 2011-12 Panini Certified, specifically the Masked Marvels insert set. It has two jersey swatches on the front and is serial numbered 11/99.


I really like how they used the separate overhead shot on the bottom of the card. Also, the red design elements work well with the Red Wings uniforms. It even has two different colored swatches, the only thing better would be a patch version.

I bought this one on eBay around the same time as the UD Midnight I just posted. The winning bid was just $1.99 and then there was an additional $1 for shipping.

I would've considered this to be another great eBay deal, that is until I actually received the card and it was severely creased all over the front of it. Of course this was another PWE, but I knew that when I bought the card, so I can't really complain too much. It was just more of an unfortunate result of less than adequate packaging. 

I let the seller know the card had been damaged and I waited for their response. In my head I was thinking this would be a difficult process from all the eBay horror stories I've heard over the years. However, I was pleasantly surprised when they refunded the purchase price and let me keep the card. All I ended up paying for was the $1 for shipping. 

Even if the front of this thing is pretty badly creased, it is still a really nice looking card overall and I'm happy to have it. Now I just need to find a copy that is not ruined. Hopefully that one will not be shipped in a PWE.

Jimmy Howard Collection Total: 181

Tuesday, October 22, 2019

Jimmy Howard: UD Midnight

Jimmy Howard has been my main player collection for a little over nine years now. I can't believe its been that long. It seems like just yesterday that I was posting about my first Howard card in the form of his Artifacts rookie. I guess time does really fly and you have to try and enjoy it the best you can. As far as that goes, I'm pretty happy with how my Howard collection has worked out nearly a decade into it.

Despite the fact that I have not acquired many new Howard cards over the last couple of years, I am always on the lookout for new stuff to add to my collection. I would still consider myself kind of cheap when it comes to card buying so I'm especially on the lookout for great deals. Today's post is another good example of one of those. 

This UD Midnight parallel from 2017-18 Upper Deck Series 2 came up on eBay a couple of weeks ago and I was luck enough to get it for just $3. Not bad for a card that is serial numbered 8/25. Even the shipping was cheap at only $1, although it was only a PWE.


This one has a really cool shot of Howard at the Air Canada Center. I'm assuming this is shot from one of those net cams. I really like the low angle as it give the photo a unique perspective. You don't usually get a nice closeup of the goalie gear like this.

This is also the first UD Midnight parallel I've ever had. I'm not really sure what the deal is with them. I've known about the UD Exclusive and the High Gloss parallels, but not these. Anyone know the story behind these? I would love to know more.

Jimmy Howard Collection Total: 180

Monday, October 21, 2019

Golden Knights: September Card Show Pickups

Even though we're in the middle of October now, I've been backed up on scans that need to be posted so I still have some stuff to show from my trip to the Troy show in September.

We'll start things off with my favorite of the lot, this Violet Pixels parallel of Max Pacioretty from 2018-19 OPC Platinum. This will go great with the James Neal that I picked up from the show back in August. Now I just need to work on completing the team sets of these.


Up next is a rainbow parallel from the same set. This one shows Jonathan Marchessault during Vegas' inaugural season as evident by the patch. If you ask me these jerseys tend to look better on cards as they don't blend in as much with the white ice and boards.


This one featuring Marc-Andre Fleury is from the 2018-19 SP Authentic Moments set. It is dated Oct 20, 2018 and describes how Flower moved into 10th place on the all time NHL career wins list. Unsurprisingly, the photo shown is from that very game. Click here for a nice recap of the game by SI. This goes nicely with the other two I posted in September.


Sticking with Flower, here is a profiles card from SP, although it is nearly impossible to tell from the scan. The blue foil appears almost completely black and becomes invisible on the black background. Funny thing is I didn't even realize SP was a separate set in 2018-19.


Last but not least is a red parallel of William Karlsson from 2018-19 SP Authentic. These are identical to the base cards except for the red foil on the SPA logo and the player name on the bottom. This one gives me a full team set of Golden Knights for the red parallels.


These five add a couple new sets and bring my Golden Knights total to 39.I've got a little ways to go before catching my Predators collection, but that's ok as these are more of side projects for me. They give me something cheap and easy to look for at local card shows. 

Now that the 2019-20 card season is in full swing, I'm looking forward to hitting up a few more shows to see how many I can find like this. Since neither of these teams are the Red Wings, they are usually in the $0.10 or $0.25 boxes so it is definitely easy on the wallet.

Golden Knights Collection Total: 39

Friday, October 4, 2019

Predators: September Card Show Pickups

A couple of weeks ago I made it out to the Troy sports card and collectible show. This was the fourth time I've been to that show this year, which is actually quite a lot for me. Each time I've been able to find some cool stuff for various collection projects. This time was no different and I brought home some cool new Preds cards. 

Up first is my favorite of the bunch, this Filip Forsberg Violet Pixels parallel from 2018-19 O-Pee-Chee Platinum. I love these things, even if they are just simple base card parallels.


Both that and this next one featuring Pekka Rinne came from one seller for $1 each. This one is from 2018-19 Black Diamond and is the first card I've owned from the set. Honestly, I didn't even know there was a Black Diamond set last year, this was the first I'd seen of it. Its kind of a neat design, although it is hard to tell from the scan.


After that it was onto the quarter bin where I was able to get my first Eeli Tolvanen card. This Marquee Rookie is from 2018-19 O-Pee-Chee Platinum.


Sticking with Platinum, I was able to get this rainbow parallel of Kyle Turris. I didn't notice until I went to scan the card that there was some kind of black smudges all over the front of the card. Oh well, it still looks cool so I won't complain about it.


The last one is a UD Canvas card from 2017-18 Upper Deck featuring Calle Jarnkrok. Interestingly, Jarnkrok was originally drafted by the Red Wings back in 2010. He played a couple seasons for Grand Rapids, but never suited up for the Wings. He was part of the trade that sent David Legwand to Detroit. Looks like a pretty bad deal now, doesn't it.


That's it for now. Nothing too fancy, but at least it adds some variety to my Predators collection. Now I just really want to get myself some more of the O-Pee-Chee Platinum parallels, especially the Violet Pixels. There are at least a few more Preds in that set.

Predators Collection Total: 84

Tuesday, October 1, 2019

SCE Super Script Update

In my last post I showed off the latest additions to my MVP Stanley Cup Edition Gold Script set. This post is all about the slightly more rare counterparts to those six, plus three others. All nine of these came from the same seller over in Sweden. I was actually surprised at how quickly they arrived. I've had single cards from within the US take longer to get to me.

Up first is my favorite of the bunch from one of my PC guys: Patrik Stefan. I was a big fan of him back in 1999-00 when he was a rookie with the Thrashers. Actually, now that I think about it, I even have a TTM signed copy of this card, so I have an "enhanced" rainbow with the base, Silver, Gold, Super and "Ink" script. I'll have to put them all side by side now.


Moving on to the likely the biggest name of this group, this Jarome Iginla is card #33 in the set and serial numbered 18/25. Anyone else like those old Flames jerseys?


Onto the other team from Alberta. This Tommy Salo is card #71 in the set and serial numbered 14/25. This one is another example of the great photography used in this set.


Up next is card #94 featuring Karl Dykhuis of the Canadiens. This one is serial numbered 16/25. This is yet another good example of the photography. Maybe its just me, but I like when the featured player is the only one visible in the shot.


Super Script number five is card #62 in the set and features former Star Mike Keane. This one is serial numbered 07/25. This is a good example of one of the shots where others in the background slightly distract from the featured player.


Back to Edmonton again. This time we have Ethan Moreau featured on card #76 in the set. This one is serial numbered 22/25. I now have three Oilers with Selivanov and Smyth.


So those were the same six as my previous Gold Script update. The next three are the new ones for which I already owned a copy of the Gold. Up first is card #48 in the set featuring Michael Nylander. This one is serial numbered 03/25.


Up next for the Avalanche is Aaron Miller. This one is card #49 in the set and is serial numbered 14/25. For as much as I was into the Red Wings rivalry with the Avs back in the late 90s, I don't really remember much about Miller.


The last one for today is card #42 in the set featuring Tommy Westlund of the Hurricanes. This one is serial numbered 23/25. This will be the fourth Hurricane in my set joining Ron Francis, Sean Hill and Byron Ritchie. Just need a few more for the whole team set.


Well, this is officially the biggest single update I've made to this set. At the rate I've been getting these over the last ten years I would've never thought I'd be getting nine all at once. I guess you just have to be patient and hope to get lucky sometimes.

Overall I am very pleased with my latest eBay pickups. I spent a little bit more than I usually do at one time, but I felt like I couldn't pass on some of these. I would regret it later on if I didn't. After all, these things are still pretty rare and they're getting older every day.

I'll have to go through everything again to see how many complete rainbows I have now. By that I mean the base, Silver, Gold and Super versions of any given card. I had at least 10 of them completed the last time I checked, which was quite a while ago now. I for sure have at least nine more now with my latest eBay purchases.

Super Script Total: 71/220