Online trading community at its finest, NHL expansion, the KHL and a new outlet to funnel my hard-earned money into highlight this edition, so let's get to it.
When Online Trading Goes... Right
A little over a year ago, I got a private message on http://www.tradingcardcentral.com/ from a guy saying he had tons of Steve Sullivan cards for me, but he collected Leafs also. I had to give a few nice pieces from my PC to get these bad boys but it was worth it in the end. Once I got his address I found out he lived just a few hours down a patch of Northern Ontario highway called the 144. After some back and forth chatting, he told me of this other trade site where I might find more Sullies. Sure enough I did, and http://www.ultimatecardboard.com/ is where I now do the bulk of my hobby-ness. A few Leafs for Leafs trades down the road and I get a message one day. The jist of it was:
"If you need this, send me your address, it's yours"
The "this" in question was am 01-02 UD Young Guns Greg Andrusak for my Leafs RC project. Not a huge card but a very nice gesture all the same. Knowing I had to repay him, when an extra 05-06 UD Ice Glacial Graphs Matt Stajan came into my possesion, and it wasn't in his bucket, I knew where it was going. Sure enough, that wasn't the end of it. About a week later I open my mailbox to find a HUGE package which I thought was a book... then I recognized the address. In the package were the 96-97 Leafs Yearbook, 06-07 Leafs Yearbook, and two issues of Chill magazine, one with Eric Lindros, the other, Bob Cole. Oh yeah, AND a photosheet of Bower, Mahovlich, Keon and Horton HHoF pics.
This is what online trading communities like UCB and TTC are all about, commeraderie. We may compete for the better PC, but whenever possible, we help each other out.
NHL Considering Expansion?!?
So there's been some talk about ANOTHER expansion to the NHL, but why? Does the NHL really need more teams in say, Houston, Las Vegas and Kansas City while teams in Atlanta, Florida, Carolina and Nashville are struggling.
My opinion? Fix these prolems by taking the teams out of the cities that rather spend their money on football and Nascar (not that there's anything wrong with that) and bring them to cities that crave hockey. Cities that would pay to watch a game, recession or not, rather than those where only the rich take out their possible investors to "watch them there crazy canucks fight on the frozen water". Move these duds into true marketable hockey towns. Winnipeg, Hamilton, etc.
Speaking of Expansion...
On the expansion front, other talks have been regarding possible European expansion. Honestly, this is completely rediculous. Especially when you have a perfectly good potential partner over in Europe already. Have the two seperate leagues play out their regular season and then do a Challenge Cup, kinda like the current CHL Memorial Cup. Wouldn't that be a nice way for Gary Bettman to tap into the European market?
And Finally...
OK, so I've discovered a new way to expand my Leafs collection. Magazines. I've already gotten about 10 Leafs covers behind me, and today I was passing by the local used book store and had a brainstorm. Why not check there. While there were a few tempting choices, my 7$ budget only allowed me to pick up two titles. An old Scholastic book entitled "Hockey Superstars" with none other than Dougie himself on the cover, and the January 1984 issue of Hockey Illustrated, sporting Mike Palmateer. Pretty sweet...
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Thursday, October 9, 2008
Damn You Private Stock and Your Backwards Hobby/Retail Rules!!!!!!!!!
You hear that? It's rant time! Yay!
But seriously, I'm a little mad at Pacific (specifically the Private Stock brand) right now. The reason? Why on earth would you release two completely different sub-sets for Hobby and Retail release?!?!? Yeah yeah, I know Pacific is WAY out of the game right now, and my little crusade here will likely fall on deaf ears, or actually, no ears at all, but it's still nice to vent some times.
Before we go any further, I'd like to point out at this juncture that I'm not a money-hungry, pack feeling, only care about high BV collector. However, the BV of a card does play a factor in my everyday collecting habits. You see, as a collector of all thing Leafs and Steve Sullivan, ALOT of the stuff I chase books in the 5-10$ range. So, since I do more trading than buying/selling, if I were to pull a 50$ RC, this card can get me anywhere between 5-10 cards from my wants. And to me collecting is all about quantity, not quality. I want my collection to grow in numbers, heck, I'd be just as happy with 20 2$ BAP Autos of Darby Hendrickson and Aki Berg as I would with one 40$ Doug Gilmour GU. And besides, anything in Blue and White is quality baby!
Now where was I? Oh yeah, my beef with Private Stock. This little ditty starts out with one of my usual trips to the Dollar Store. . .
I decided to buy myself 10 packs of 2002-03 Private Stock Titanium. As I got into my car to open them up, I was thrilled to pull A) a Jay Bouwmeester RC! and B) a Jason Spezza Blue RC! among the no-namers and inserts. Once I got home I checked my Beckett and noticed BAM! The Bouwmeester books at 40$ and the Spezza books at 225$!!!!! Then I read a little further down the column. You see, these values where for the HOBBY versions #'d to 99, and what I had was a RETAIL Bouwmeester /1475 and a BLUE Spezza /450. Both of these were valued at .15X Hobby. Bummer. So now my Bouwmeester books at 6$ and the Spezza at about 35$, which of course, is still a great pull from a 2$ pack.
But I shouldn't have been too surprised by this. You see, I've been fooled by Private Stock before. On a prior Dollar Store binge, I pulled a Zetterberg (150$) and Nash (250$). In the middle of my happy dance, which by the way is pretty impressive if you ask me, but you're not, so I digress, I noticed the serial # was off. these weren't the /99 Hobby versions but the /1550 Retail.
Now I get that Retail is meant to attract newcomers to the hobby, so the pulls are less than stellar. And I know that I should've bought Hobby packs if I wanted big pulls. BUT, I am a broke college student (hence the Dollar Store shopping).
In the end, I guess its tomfoolery like this that companies like Pacific aren't in the hockey card biz anymore (that or, the way they saturated the market with product). So like I said, this was kind of a pointless rant. But like I also said, sometimes, it's just nice to vent.
But seriously, I'm a little mad at Pacific (specifically the Private Stock brand) right now. The reason? Why on earth would you release two completely different sub-sets for Hobby and Retail release?!?!? Yeah yeah, I know Pacific is WAY out of the game right now, and my little crusade here will likely fall on deaf ears, or actually, no ears at all, but it's still nice to vent some times.
Before we go any further, I'd like to point out at this juncture that I'm not a money-hungry, pack feeling, only care about high BV collector. However, the BV of a card does play a factor in my everyday collecting habits. You see, as a collector of all thing Leafs and Steve Sullivan, ALOT of the stuff I chase books in the 5-10$ range. So, since I do more trading than buying/selling, if I were to pull a 50$ RC, this card can get me anywhere between 5-10 cards from my wants. And to me collecting is all about quantity, not quality. I want my collection to grow in numbers, heck, I'd be just as happy with 20 2$ BAP Autos of Darby Hendrickson and Aki Berg as I would with one 40$ Doug Gilmour GU. And besides, anything in Blue and White is quality baby!
Now where was I? Oh yeah, my beef with Private Stock. This little ditty starts out with one of my usual trips to the Dollar Store. . .
I decided to buy myself 10 packs of 2002-03 Private Stock Titanium. As I got into my car to open them up, I was thrilled to pull A) a Jay Bouwmeester RC! and B) a Jason Spezza Blue RC! among the no-namers and inserts. Once I got home I checked my Beckett and noticed BAM! The Bouwmeester books at 40$ and the Spezza books at 225$!!!!! Then I read a little further down the column. You see, these values where for the HOBBY versions #'d to 99, and what I had was a RETAIL Bouwmeester /1475 and a BLUE Spezza /450. Both of these were valued at .15X Hobby. Bummer. So now my Bouwmeester books at 6$ and the Spezza at about 35$, which of course, is still a great pull from a 2$ pack.
But I shouldn't have been too surprised by this. You see, I've been fooled by Private Stock before. On a prior Dollar Store binge, I pulled a Zetterberg (150$) and Nash (250$). In the middle of my happy dance, which by the way is pretty impressive if you ask me, but you're not, so I digress, I noticed the serial # was off. these weren't the /99 Hobby versions but the /1550 Retail.
Now I get that Retail is meant to attract newcomers to the hobby, so the pulls are less than stellar. And I know that I should've bought Hobby packs if I wanted big pulls. BUT, I am a broke college student (hence the Dollar Store shopping).
In the end, I guess its tomfoolery like this that companies like Pacific aren't in the hockey card biz anymore (that or, the way they saturated the market with product). So like I said, this was kind of a pointless rant. But like I also said, sometimes, it's just nice to vent.
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