LINDEN CARD OF THE WEEK - 2006/07 UD Lucky Shot

This is a special Linden card in my collection....just received today.

It represents everything I love about collecting.

2006/07 Upper Deck Lucky Shot #VAN5
Arena Giveaway

These cards slipped by me when they first came out. A 5-card team pack was issued out at a Canucks home game and have been impossible to find on the secondary market.

In fact, I had never seen one single copy over 3+ years until it arrived in the mail.

It's a pretty basic card, meaning that there's no jersey or patch or autograph associated with it. It's not an expensive card (although I'd be willing to bet it would get some fair coin on ebay) and its design is nothing more than the regular UD base card design from that year.

About a week ago, I received an e-mail from a fellow Linden collector. The same one that has helped me out numerous times in the past. He simply asked if I still needed the card. He never mentioned that he had one, or wanting to work out a trade or anything.

Today I came home to find an envelope from this collector and inside was this card. I was thrilled. That, to me, is what I enjoy the most about collecting. A card worth a buck or two gets me that jacked up.

For a fellow collector to offer a card like this and asking for nothing in return is what I truly love about this hobby and my collection.

I have had the great fortune of meeting some awesome people who have a similar passion to my own. It definitely is a highlight to my collection.

Thanks Kevin!

The start of a new collection?

A while back there was a comment about cards showing players raising the Stanley Cup. Within a short time, I tracked down a great looking card of Lanny McDonald hoisting the cherished trophy.


Since that time, I have been thinking of starting a little side collection of players who are raising the Stanley Cup. Here's what I found at the card show I went to last weekend.

Ray Bourque

Dave Andreychuk

What I really like about these cards is that it captures a very specific moment in time - and a darn important one at that. The moment that every player work for and dreams of. I'm surprised they haven't come out with a full set of these yet.

Not a bad start at all. I'm going to keep on the lookout and post my future findings.

I think it's a great idea for a simple collection that's outside the box of player or set collecting.

Current collection - 3 cards

LINDEN CARD OF THE WEEK? - Or to the bike spokes!

Well, I was trying to pick a card for my Linden "Card of the Week" and thought that I'd dip into something from a ways back.

There are a ton of cards to choose from and a lot of them I really like. I was finding it a tough chore. That is until I hit this card...


As soon as I saw it - I knew it would be the next card to make the grade...or would it?

This card comes from the 1997/98 set that Leaf released. They did a 10-card subset called "A Day In The Life". It focused only on Trevor Linden and showed him at various stages of the day - his routines, etc. I thought it was really cool that Linden would be the one chosen for this subset.

The photos however tell another story.

I don't know about you, but a hockey card with a photo of a player at the computer reading a letter isn't what I had in mind for a "must have" card. Some of the shots in the set are downright ugly. There's one where he's sitting on a log at the beach just relaxing, one of him on the phone, one of him golfing (ooohhhh, bad memories) and one of him just reading. I guess that is an accurate depiction of what he does, but c'mon...these are hockey cards.

Still, it was a Linden and I had to have it. What made things even more exciting is that in addition to the 10-card set, there was a 10-card parallel set called "fractal matrix" (which is the one shown above) and is limited to just 1400 sets. On top of that, there was a 10-card "fractal matrix die-cut" set limited to just 400 sets.

That's 30 of these cards in my collection - and it took quite a while to track them all down.

A proud addition to my collection. Maybe I'll take this double and wedge it into the bike. It's a thicker card so it should make for a great sound.

TO THE BIKE SPOKES!!! - Paul Kariya

There are times in the hobby where companies try to inject some unique feature to "spice things up" in the industry.

Insert cards, pieces of jersey, autographs, 1/1's. The list goes on.

There are times though when these innovations create a card that is so undesirable that it makes me say one thing...

TO THE BIKE SPOKES!!!

2002/03 Be A Player Signature Series Golf
Paul Kariya # GS-70

Where to begin....where does it end?

First, let me say that this was an insert set put out by Be A Player. This was one card in a 100 card set. A HUNDRED OF THESE. That's just nasty.

Looking at this card, clearly Paul is posing in some lighted room and I question if he's ever been out on a golf course.

Who wears jeans when they golf - especially if you're an NHLer? What, no golf shoes? Did you leave them at home?

Now I've played a few rounds of golf and I've watched my fair share of it. I gotta say that Paul's follow through on his swing is about as lazy as it gets.

That's right Paul - admire that shot. He looks clueless.

I love the background that he's plunked on. Is that a golf course or a close up of some army fatigues? My 8-year-old nephew could come up with something better than that.

Big beef - using the same pic twice. Gotta love that laziness. And I especially enjoy how the photos are placed so that golf club gives Paul a moustache in the closeup photo. It just looks terrible.

Slap a couple logos on it and call it a day I guess. The back of the card - not much better. This is just an overall swing and a miss.

Did I mention that they made a hundred different ones...A HUNDRED!!

PPHHHHHHHHTTTTTTTTTTTT!!!!!!

LINDEN CARD OF THE WEEK - 2005/06 SPGU Triple Patch

Here is the one Trevor Linden card I have added to the collection over the last month - and it's a doozie!!

2005/06 Upperdeck SP Game Used
Triple Patch (Iginla/Shanahan/Linden) /10

This card came from ebay. I knew as soon as I saw it that it would either be mine...or some guy was going to pay through the teeth to get it.

With only 10 copies of this card out there (and knowing that almost half of them were already in the firm grip of various collectors' hands) I knew that this might be one of the last chances for me to grab this card.

I immediately threw a call out to another Linden collector to see where he stood with the card. I knew he already had one so I was hoping he would lay off on bidding. I was glad to hear that he was not aggressively pursuing the card.

I waited until the last minute to place my bid and was surprised that the final price for the card was a lot lower than what I was willing to spend. It's still one of the more expensive cards in my collection...but if I were ever to sell it, I'm pretty confident I'd make a nice little profit. Not going to happen though.

This card comes from one of the hardest sets to complete for my Linden collection.

There are 2 triple jersey cards /25 (one with Iggy and Shanahan, the other with Modano and Roenick), 2 triple patch cards /10 (with the same grouping of players), a quad jersey card /10 (with Jovonovski, Kesler and Bertuzzi) and finally a quad patch card /5 (with the same group of Canucks).

Insane cards to track down...more insane are the prices.

All that is left for me to pick up is the quad patch /5. Wish me luck on that one.

BEHIND THE MASKS - Quest For The Cup Itech Masks

Well, life is back to some semblance of normalcy. All signs of Christmas are packed away for another year, the World Junior tournament has come and gone (and what fantastic hockey it was) and work has beckoned me to return. I hope everyone had a fantastic holiday season.

While it might take me a few weeks to get 'caught up' with my projects, I thought I'd post a nice little set of cards that came in the mail today.

2003 Pacific Quest For The Cup Itech Masks
**set was pulled from release**

This set of cards were ones on my radar big time back in 2003. I was huge into goalie masks and was grabbing anything and everything relating to them.

I had heard that an upcoming Pacific set would be including inserts based on mask designs from a guy named Frank Cipra, an Itech artist and mask maker for the biggest names in the sport.

It was literally at the last minute that Pacific had to pull the cards from the set as there were legal issues with the showing of the mask designs. Even though an artist painted the masks, I believe that the ownership of the designs belonged to the NHL. Regardless of the issue, I was bummed that there would be no mask cards.

A few years later, I saw someone post the Dipietro card saying he picked it up in a trade. I was shocked to see it. A short time later, I noticed someone had the entire set. Probably the only person to own the entire 8-card set. I was in awe.

Fast-forward to December. I saw an ebay auction for one of the cards. And for (what I thought was) a reasonable price. I soon found out that the seller had all 8 cards. Already knee deep in debt with Christmas coming up, I ignored what my conscience was telling me and snatched them up.

They arrived in the mail today and I can honestly say that I am thrilled to have them.

They are slightly larger than regular hockey cards (they barely fit into a plastic top loader and I'm not able to use penny sleeves). They look like proofs (seeing as the seller had a ton of old Pacific proof cards from when they went out of business).

I really don't care. I've got a rare item for my goalie mask collection and I think they look great.

OPINION: PATIENCE

Life is slowly getting back to normal. I go back to work this upcoming Wednesday and the projects I have been working on for the last couple weeks will get shoved down the priority list a bit.

I have enjoyed my time off (I can't remember the last time I had over two weeks off at Christmas) but I will be happy to get back into a routine.

One routine for 2010 will be this blog.

Looking through the December posts, it's definitely a little thin for content. I'm looking forward to contributing more to this blog that I set up for myself and have some good stuff to post over the next bit. It's all about patience.

Patience though, is something that is severely lacking in the hockey card collecting hobby nowadays. I see it all the time. I peruse trading boards and am constantly bombarded with frustration from posters who are disappointed that instant communication, accessibility, compensation, delivery, satisfaction or all of the above isn't placed on their lap.

Some of the examples that have got me a little riled up lately include people who are not just frustrated about having to wait more than 2 weeks to get their item from ebay, Amazon or another trader - they decide to call the other person out in a public forum. They then play the "feel sorry for me" card along with the "this person is a terrible trader/seller".

C'mon! Just because a person receives a package in less than a week doesn't mean that ALL packages will arrive as promptly. Not every item you purchase online will arrive in record time. And during the holiday season - it slows down even more. Rather than complain about it in an open forum, why not inquire about it an a respectful manner with the other party. Airing dirty laundry in public always stinks.

Another one of my favorites is seeing a person whine and cry about how many cards they have to now collect of their player because the card companies have included him in all of their sets.

Are you crazy??? If you are letting someone else dictate what you are collecting - then you should get out of collecting now. If your collecting is getting out of control in any way, shape or form, you need to take a close look at why you are collecting. This is a hobby, not a requirement.

One that drives me batty is the ebay seller who decides to end his auction early in fear that his card isn't going to sell for what he was hoping it would.

Brutal! If you're going to put a card up for bids, have the decency to let the auction run its course. If you want to save a few pennies by having a low opening bid, then you run the risk of having that item garner little to no interest and therefore might go for said opening bid. If you want all of your cards to sell for big money, then start them off at an amount you would be willing to part with the item for.

On more than one occasion, I have been ready to place a bid only to find the auction ended early. I know for a fact that one reason is the seller wanted to get more money for the item.

News flash.....people often wait until the last few minutes before bidding on an item. I've seen cards go from $40 to $175 in a heartbeat. Sometimes you just have to be patient about it.

Note: I absolutely hate the practice of a person taking their auction down because it isn't selling for a high enough price. If you do that, please let me know so I will never bid on your items.

The one that gets me the most is "I that card - and I need it now!"

Why? Why do you need that card this minute? What will happen if you don't get it? The last time I checked, it isn't a race to finish. And what happens when you do finish?

I'm all for pursuing the cards you need. Heck, the chase is often more fun than actually acquiring the card. But I'm in no rush. I'm looking forward to collecting for a long time. I cringe at the thought when one day I put all of my collecting behind me.

Patience. Enjoy the hobby.