1997-98 Pacific Paramount Jaromir Jagr #17 Big Number Die Cut

It's a pretty good day to be a Pittsburgh Penguins (like myself) or a Vancouver Canucks fan, as both teams were able to avoid Game 4 elimination via dust pan.

Good to see the Penguins play like the team that they really are and not the team who they've been the past three games in this series.  Winning the next two games will be an uphill battle as only three teams in NHL hisory have overcome the feat of coming back to win a series in the playoffs after trailing 3 games to zero.

As for todays post, I wanted to post a card from my collecion that I really liked but also one that I could tie ino the game last night.  I figured this card was due for it's own post since it's been one of my favorites since I picked it up.

1997-98 Pacific Paramount

Big Number Die Cut

Jaromir Jagr #17

I can't recall how this card landed in my hands .  Pacific seemed to have a thing for die cuts in their productions during the late 90s early 2000s - this card is an insert from their 1997-98 Paramount release titled Big Numbers.  If it wasn't obvious, the insert set is focused around the jersey numbers of some of the top players in the  league at the time.  All the cards from the set were die cut to take the shape of the team sweater and players number.

PressTine Marketing Mystery Tear

For todays post I have for you one of those cheap 'mystery' packs put together by PressTine Marketing Inc. The pack includes a variety of 15 trading cards for a buck; from my previous experience in opening these value packs, the cards inside range from anything late 80s to the most recent releases.

Take a look after the break.

TTM Success from IceCaps Carl Klingberg

I haven't received a TTM return since January 31st, nearly three months ago.  The drought in returns only makes perfect sense since I haven't sent any fresh requests out before last month.  Seems like they're starting to make their way back home.

Sent a letter and a trading card to current St. John's IceCaps forward Carl Klingberg on 03/28/12 and received them earlier today; making it a quick 19 day turn around.  Klingberg has spent the majority of the season helping the IceCaps capture first place in their Division potting 15 goals and 37 points in 66 games.  Klingberg also saw some action in a Winnipeg Jets uniform this season, lacing up his skates for the team on 7 occasions.

Klingberg signed and returned this 2011-12 Score Hot Rookies card as I had requested.

2011-12 Upper Deck Series II Retail Tin Break

With just so many cards from the 2011-12 Upper Deck Series 2 lying around on my desk; stacked and unorganized - I decided that I had to make an attempt at putting together the base set and maybe then some.

After putting away all the cards in their numerical respective order, I was 93 cards away from finishing Series 2.

In hopes of pulling a few cards towards the base I went and picked up this here retail tin yesterday.  The goods from the trove underneath the cut.

1996-97 Upper Deck Collector's Choice Bowman's Winning Formula #290 Wayne Gretzky

Ahhh 1996-97, my heyday of hockey card collecting during my younger years.  Living in a very small community with the lack of the internet, local card shops and card shows; almost everything you pulled was fresh to the eyes.  And the most mediocre hits dropped jaws and had other kids running to your "doorstep" offering up a trade almost instantly.  That's how it was.

1996-97 Upper Deck Collector's Choice

Scotty Bowman's Winning Formula

Wayne Gretzky #290

I'm not sure how I picked this card up as it was about 16 years ago but it was definitely via an elementary school trade.  As you can tell from the corners of the card, it was passed along a few other hands before it eventually landed into mine.

This Wayne Gretzky card from the subset "Scotty Bowman's Winning Formula" is a little different from others I've seen/held - you can't really see it from the scan but the texture on the card is almost like the UD Canvas cards Upper Deck recently released inside their 2011-12 flagship product.  You can see how the surface is oddly textured a little more clearly on the left side of the card, among the dark area.

2011-12 Upper Deck Series II Rip

Just sitting here watching the TSN Stanley Cup Playoffs Preview, stoked on the start of the post season tonight - hoping my Penguins take the Cup home.  Should be a hard fought first round for my boys but hopefully they'll make it out on top.

On the blog today I have a few packs of 2011-12 Upper Deck Series II to show. 

2011-12 Upper Deck Series II

Ryan Miller / Henrik Lundqvist / Tomas Vokoun

351-450 Checklist #450

1993-94 Upper Deck Series 1 All Rookie Team Eric Lindros #280

Several months ago I signed up to an on-line rewards website called Swagbucks.  Has anyone else heard of it?  You basically earn points by doing web searches from their website, answering polls, completing surveys and watching video clips.  In turn you can redeem those points in their online web store to purchase a variety of things, free shipping - trading cards included.

So I switched over from Google to Swagbucks as my search engine for a couple days and pretty soon I had earned enough 'bucks' to order a card.  There wasn't much of a selection to choose from under the hockey card category but I had my eyes set on this:

1993-94 Upper Deck All Rookie Team

Eric Lindros #280

I've always liked the stop frame action against the dark background design to these cards and as I can remember were a hit to pull when I was a kid.  I remember having a Bure All-Rookie Team card like this but I think it was from the year previous.

Anyway story short, I ordered it.

Ryane Clowe PC Progress

I'm pretty satisfied with how my PC is coming along and happy to share it.  Lately it's been my main focus in collecting.  Each month I'll to post a snap of my Ryane Clowe collection and compare it to the previous months photo.  The last freeze frame was taken on March 12th, 2012 and so that monthly date is soon coming up again - I figured why wait another five days.

April 09th, 2012

No duplicates, only parallels.  My player collection grew from 25 to 34 cards within the month and I am expecting to see it double up in the next month or two.  I'd love to see a snap of everyones player collection.

Speaking of Ryane Clowe, lately he's been in the headlines for this move he pulled:

The readers contest is still on until the end of the week; all you gotta do is leave a comment and you're entered to win.

Malkin Captures 2011-12 NHL Scoring Title

2011-12 Panini NHL Hockey Stickers

Evgeni Malkin #141

Congratulations to Evgeni Malkin on winning the Art Ross Trophy as the NHL’s leading scorer – giving the Penguins 14 NHL scoring titles in the past 24 seasons.

Four players have combined for the Penguins’ 14 titles – Mario Lemieux (six), Jaromir Jagr (five), Malkin (two) and Sidney Crosby (one).

Reader Contest: The Little Book of Hockey Sweaters

I hope everyone is having a relaxing Easter weekend and wake up to at least one solid chocolate bunny tomorrow.

Just wanted to show my appreciation to you guys, the readers of this blog - with a readers contest.  The gift is this hardcover book titled, "the Little Book of Hockey Sweaters", written by Andrew Podnieks, Rob Hynes and Anthony Jenkins.   The book is basically about the numbers that the players wear on their hockey jerseys and include a little background informaton on how they were initially assigned it and in some cases a short story on why they decided to wear their number to begin with.  It's more of a bathroom or coffee-table book that is easily picked up and read in 5-minute intervals.

All you have to do to enter yourself  in this giveaway is leave a comment; include an e-mail address for me to easily reach you as well please.

The contest closes on 14/04/2012

I shall update this post on 14/04/2012 with the winner.  All names will be randomly generated and one winner will be chosen.

Random Pack Pulls Recap

Just wanted to post an update on a few cards that I've pulled from packs recently - I've been picking up packs here and there and have opened a couple blasters.  Sometimes lately I find myself in a sea of regret after buying packs because I think about how I could have put the money towards another card in my Ryane Clowe PC - especially with I don't land anything.  It's all - in the cards I suppose, pun intended, har har har.

Everything is up for trade.

2011-12 Panini Certified

Mirror Emerald Parallel #d 03/5

Sergei Bobrovsky #68

I've occasionally picked up a couple 2011-12 Panini Certified at the local hobby store hoping to pull something five star to use as trade bait or if I got really lucky, a PC hit.  This Bobrovsky is just numbered /5 but wasn't exactly what I was looking for.

2010-11 Panini All Goalies

I've seen the 2010-11 Panini All Goalies box several times around the block within the past year; I've always liked the look of them and while at Wal-Mart today, after much inner debate, I figured I'd pick up a box/set.  I've been sending up TTMs again recently and figured even if I don't pull anything hit worthy, they would still make great cards to possibly have signed.

Each box contains the entire 100 card set, 5 "Up Close" parallels and 1 memorabilia card.

Dual Ryane Clowe PC Additions

Some unexpected mail awaited me when I got off work tonight; as it turned out it was a couple of Clowe cards that I had won off eBay several weeks ago that had gotten lost in my recent splurge of purchases, as well as in the back off my mind somewhere apparently.

2011-12 Limited Jumbo Materials Jersey Numbers Prime #24 - Ryane Clowe #ed/10

Another game used card to add to the PC; fact: I've yet to add an auto.  As for this card, being limited to just 10 copies I felt like I had to jump on it before it was too late.  With any cards with a limited pressing under 50 I always feel like if I don't get it now - well who knows, I might never see it again!  In retrospect it's most likely that I'll see it turn up again in the future.  Anyway long story short, bids were placed and in the end I was happily able to secure this one into my collection.

2011-12 Limited Materials #91 Ryane Clowe #ed/99

I've seen this one pop up online quite a few times since I've started my Clowe collection and have put it aside, saving my bidding dough on something else.  Mind you I search up Clowe cards on a daily basis, my watch list is sitting at about 85% Ryane Clowe material.  The card is numbered out of /99 and features a plain grey swatch.  I posted about the Prime version of this card in my last post. 

I've been fooling around with the blog, changed up the header and removed some unnecessary links from the sidebar.

Ryane Clowe PC Pick Ups

I've received a few new Ryane Clowe cards to add to the player collection over the past couple of weeks.  In addition to two base cards from the 2011-12 O-Pee-Chee and Score sets I also picked up a few more limited cards.

I'll start this post up with probably my favorite card I've yet to obtain for the PC; a Ryane Clowe 1/1 from the 2010-11 Panini Dominion set.  My first Ryane Clowe 1/1 and my first 1/1 card ever!  It's a black printing plate .  Although the left corner of the card is marked 'Laundry Tag', I've yet to see any memorabilia cards from Clowe rise it's head online from this Dominion set.

Big thanks to Paul from Cardboarded for aiding in the shipping process with this card - as the dealer would only ship within the United States, I had the card shipped to Paul's address and he was kind enough to receive it and include it with the cards from our recent trade.

The card is numbered 1/1 on the back giving it that true 1/1 feel.

Cards From Cardboarded

I've been neglecting the blog; just haven't been picking up much hockey stuff recently.  The TTM bug has bitten me again so I've been steady motivated to pen out as many letters as my right hand can handle.  And my other collecting hobbies have weaved in and out of my life lately.

I received my end of a trade with Paul over at Cardboarded earlier last week; I sent a few Jimmy Howard cards his way and in return he sent me a few Paul Kariya cards that he had kicking around.

He also helped me out in the delivery process of a Ryane Clowe card that I wanted but could only be shipped within the United States.  But I'll get to those goods in a later post.

My secondary player collection of Paul Kariya has been coming along fairly nicely - for a collection who I decided to put on the back burner several weeks ago I've still been picking up number 9 from time-to-time; I would estimate that I'm now nearing 300 Paul Kariya cards at the moment.

Paul Kariya 2001-2002 Be A Player In The Game 'Team Scoring Legends' - TSL-01

Here's a Kariya game-used jersey piece from a decade ago; it would be considered two colors since there's a smiggion of dark fabric towards the right corner of the swatch.