2024 trade package #15: Sports Cards From the Dollar Store part 2: hockey

It's been a nice sports weekend for me as Michigan Football beat a lesser rival plus the Yankees are down two games in the World Series. So with that positivity in mind, let's continue on with the mountain of cards sent to me by Doug of Sports Cards From the Dollar Store back in August. (Reminder: part 1 is here.)

We're in one of the busiest sports months of the year as all four major sports are in action plus some of the college versions. Relevant tonight is that both the Red Wings and Michigan Hockey have dropped the pucks on their seasons. As a matter of fact, I got to enjoy the latter in person last weekend!

Doug sent me a big stack of cards of both teams in this box,

and those are what we'll look at tonight!

Let's start with the local pro team, one which features four players from my alma mater, all of whom appear in this post! But we'll get to the WolverWings later. Datsyuk and Fedorov are both team legends and I'm glad to bump up their collections a bit. Meahwhile, Edvinsson is a former #6 overall pick going into his third season in Motown as a good defenseman prospect.

Next, LaPointe and Lidstrom are the most familiar names here. Marty won a pair of Cups with the Wings after they took him 10th overall in 1991, and he went on to play for the Bruins, Hawks, and Sens before hanging 'em up. Plus his son currently plays for Michigan Hockey! Lidstrom, meanwhile, is a HOF defenseman who won four Stanleys with Detroit, playing his entire career in Hockeytown. He's definitely a top-five team player of mine in franchise history.

Ozzie is the biggest name here for me, another '91 draft pick who went on to success with the team. He backed up vet Mike Vernon in the playoffs in '96-'97 before getting his turn with the repeat champs the following year, then came back in 2007-08 and '08-'09, helping the team win another Cup and then coming up just short the year after. Primeau's also pretty well known as a former #3 overall pick who put up some good numbers for the team but was part of the trade that brought Brendan Shanahan to Detroit, which worked out quite well! Raymond's a much more recent guy, chosen #4 overall in 2020, and he's coming off a 31-goal campaign, so he looks to be a big part of the future. Rutherford's a goalie from way before my time--drafted by Detroit in 1969, he found his way to Pittsburgh before a trade back to Detroit (twice!) and appeared in goal in parts of 10 seasons as a Wing.

German D-man Mo Seider leads off this scan and he comes into his fourth season as a key player on the blue line. I already mentioned how Shanny joined the team, and he was a star on a team filled with them that won three Cups. Soderblom is a Swedish winger chosen in the sixth round back in 2019 who hasn't been up with the parent team since 2022-23 but remains a prospect. Veleno was a late first-rounder way back in 2018 that hasn't yet parlayed amateur success into NHL production just yet.

The last of the Wings are represented with these horizontals and one odd-sized issue. Draper's probably the best player $1 ever bought as he brought plenty of grit along with key goals to four Cup-winners. The previously seen Seider looks good on a shiny UD insert. The Captain's NHL career coincided with some great 90s stuff like Collector's Choice's Stick-Ums. And Shanny gets one more appearance courtesy of a Pacific mini.

Now we switch over to the guys in maize & blue. Boston center Johnny Beecher makes his collection debut here thanks to Doug, and the 2019 first-rounder is in his second year with that team. Beniers and Bordeleau are both relative newcomers to the NHL and it's nice to see their collections get a small bump. Cogliano (who's also seen in the next scan) won a cup with the 21-22 Avalanche and then retired after last season, his 17th in the NHL!

Three-year Wolverine Compher was a teammate of Cogliano's with Colorado and also part of that Cup team, and now I'm happy to say that he's one of four Wolverines on the Red Wings! Jets sniper Kyle Connor has been lighting the lamp since 2016 and looks primed to hit the 30-goal mark for for the seventh time in eight seasons. As for Copp...

...he's another WolverinWing, as seen in the first two cards here. It's fun when the former Ann Arbor guys head to Detroit but even better when it's captured on cardboard. Another Team Canada card of Hobey-winner Adam Fantilli gives me two of him with that team to go with a pair with Columbus. Hagelin, who won a pair of Cups with the Pens, nears the 40-card mark as well as the top-10 of my Michigan Hockey PCs. Sitting 10 cards behind him is

Canucks D-man and last year's Norris Trophy winner Quinn Hughes, whose six cards here include a very cool playing card-style item from OPC. Defenseman Matt Hunwick is next, and this trio shows him with two of his six career franchises. Then we have former Leafs winger Zach Hyman who

joined the Oilers after six seasons in Toronto and steadily put up career highs until reaching 54 goals last year plus another 16 in the playoffs for runner-up Edmonton (though he's yet to score this year). While there are no Wolverines named Jones in this package, Doug had me keeping up with the Johnsons. One is Jack, another '21-'22 Avalanche Cup-winner who's now back in his second go-round with Columbus in his 19th(!) NHL season. The other is his new teammate Kent, the 2021 fifth overall pick who's in his fourth season in the league, and has five cards to his name in my collection as opposed to almost 60 for his elder fellow Wolverine.

Wings captain Dylan Larkin was one of the most common names in this package and I loved to see that. I'm grateful that the team has his leadership as he's become somewhat similar to the guy currently in charge, Steve Yzerman, so you'll imagine how much I grinned when I noticed that my collection totals for both players are very close! He's posted 31, 32, and 33 goals the past three seasons so we'll see if his incremental improvement continues, though more importantly I'm hoping for a return to the playoffs--something he hasn't experienced since his debut in 2015-16. Madden, meanwhile, won trophies both in college and the NHL, and missed the playoffs just twice in his career, with one occasion being a cup of coffee in his league debut. Oklahoma City native Jon Merrill also played for the Devils like Madden, though their careers didn't overlap. He was a Red Wing for 36 games in 2020-21 and is now in his fourth season with Minnesota.

I don't think I need to say much about Morrison as he's long been a blog favorite and I've talked about him plenty, so I'll just mention that he's #2 in my UM hockey PCs and the only other player besides Marty Turco to hit the century mark. Next, it's fun to have a shared PC with Doug like Nystrom, who's both a Michigan alum and 2/14 baby! A guy that's not too far behind Morrison is Max Pacioretty, a well-traveled winger who's with his fourth different team in as many seasons. 

My collection of Max is what it is because of folks like Doug who send me so many of his cards, like the ones in the previous scan, the few you see here (two of which are numbered!) and even more below. Palushaj barely had an NHL career to speak of but I still happily collect him. '21 #1 overall pick Owen Power is still fairly new to my collection but, again, thanks to Doug my small collection is growing. Tambellini was a favorite of mine while I had student season tickets. And as you'll see between this scan and the next,

My collection of Trouba got a nice bump as well. The sometimes overly aggressive D-man rests comfortably in the top 10 with just shy of 50 cards, in large part thanks to the guy who sent me these. One of the two Turcos helping to keep him #1 by a large margin can be seen here while there's one more below. Next, we have three of six Werenski cards representing yet another ex-Michigan guy that headed down to Columbus as a pro.

The other three sit atop this scan, including a typically excellent UD base plus the usually very cool (no pun intended) UD Ice. Two of the best looking cards in the entire box aren't even hits, but instead super thick cards of young Flyer Cam York. Both are '21-'22 SPx issues, with the first being a Finite inserted #d /399 and the other being a gorgeous Shadow Box card that has to be seen in-person to be appreciated.

We'll close out this scan (but not the post, oddly enough) with some beautiful hits. First is a beautiful RC auto of J.T. Compher, who's had his named called today already and will have the honor one more time. That's out of 2017-18 Ultimate Collection and the signature /399 is my third autograph to go with one relic. Tyler Motte, meanwhile, represents WolverWing #4 in this post, and that SPx Blackhawks jersey (/235) is relic #5 out of nine total hits. The former Chicago center joined Detroit as his 8th NHL team. Well represented PC guy Max Pacioretty is next with an SPx jersey representing one of his four seasons with Vegas. He's up to 12 hits including nine relics like that above average jersey swatch. And last up is a Panini Rookie Anthology card of Travis Turnbull that I swore I already had until I realized Doug had sent me the Patch version that comes with two excellent pieces of a Sabres jersey to go with Turnbull's signature. Besides the swatch upgrade, the card is #d /99, and that becomes my third hit of a Buffalo player who scored a single goal in three NHL games.

Like I said above, we weren't quite done yet because we still have some horizontals and other oddities that I decided to scan after the hits. Compher, Jack Johnson, and Patch all get some cool X-axis cards, and once again I love UD's flagship look. David Oliver isn't as common of a name around here--that's just my fourth card of his--so I appreciate the deep cut. The trio of goalie cards starring two of Michigan's best--Shields and Turco--has me wishing Pacific and its die-cut Crown Royale were still around. I love that he sent a base and two different parallels to give a nice look at the range of colors that set offered. Compher makes one last appearance thanks to a Panini sticker. And then we have one last player: David Shand. Like Oliver, he's not a very common name and actually only has 12 cards catalogued on TCDb. I now own three of those thanks to this 1979 sticker also made by Panini which may be the oldest such issue in my collection.

Once again I hope the fact that I had to give in and split up this package into two posts goes a long way towards indicating just how generous Doug can be when it comes to trading. Not only did he bomb me with quantity, but there was an absolute ton of quality across these two posts, and rest assured that I don't take such effort for granted. Thanks for being one of my favorite trading partners, Doug, and I hope to close out the year with a Christmas package that shows my appreciation!

Stay tuned for another August trade package coming up soon!

2022 trade package #9: Sports Cards From the Dollar Store

When today's post is in the books I'll be able to say I'm finally caught up with blogger trade packages, at least temporarily! And given the sender, Doug of Sports Cards From the Dollar Store, is one of my most prolific trade partners, it's no surprise that this one is a doozy. All four major sports, sweet inserts, autos and relics, and more! Let's get down to it:

The baseball and non-Michigan hockey portions were small but of high quality. Miggy's 2021 Stadium Club card, a nice reminder that Detroit opens up the season in just a couple days, is an image variation from 2021, a horizontal issue of him sliding into a base as opposed to a vertical shot of him standing safely on base holding his helmet. I hope he reaches 3000 hits early in the season to get the pressure off himself early!

Moving to the ice we have two Wings, whose season is bad enough that the less we talk about it the better. Besides a very nice OPC base of supremely talented Swede Zetterberg I was surprised to find a lovely signature from his countryman, defenseman Gustav Lindstrom, out of 20-21 UD Allure. Doug's sent me other cards from this product and they all 100% live up to the name! The young D-man played a bit the past couple years with the Wings before becoming a regular this season and we'll see what his future is for a team that can't seem to win a damn thing right now. Beautiful card, though!

Representing the UM basketball team, which did well to make it to the Sweet 16 after an inconsistent season, we'll start things off with some great looking cards of one of the longest tenured NBA Wolverines in Crawford, who finally retired this year, and current head coach Juwan Howard, bookending a new base of THJ. Crawford appeared in at least one game (which happened only in his final season, 2019-20) every season starting in 2000-01 and suited up for nine teams. And that Howard insert in the bottom row's center spot looks great, right out of the 90s!

Continuing on the court there's one more Howard to enjoy along with some 90s love for vets like Tarpley, Vaught, and Webber. But the recent Hoops trio is definitely where it's at thanks to a nice base of 3-point wiz Duncan Robinson and RCs of Isaiah Livers and Franz Wagner. Livers was fun to watch as a four-year Wolverine who became a key contributor over his last two seasons, and then the local guy (Kalamazoo) was taken by the Pistons, which was very cool. Wagner followed the trail his brother Mo blazed from Germany to Ann Arbor for two seasons and then was a first-round pick for Orlando last year, teaming up with his bro and another Michigan alum in Ignas Brazdeikis.

After two more cards of recent HOFer Webber, we start to get into the real goods with some hits out of basketball and football. Old man Jamal Crawford represents the former with a pair of 2016-17 Panini-branded relics. On the left is a Select Swatches relic from Select and to the right is a Catalysts jersey from Spectra. Both cards are from his 2012-16 run with the Clippers and each includes a bold red swatch. The Spectra card is also numbered on the back to 149. Jamal now has nine hits in his collection, good for fourth place among basketballers as he attempts to join the double-digit club.

The gridiron card count was small but definitely no worse for it with two high quality pieces! First up is a 2018 National Treasures jersey of new Patriots defensive weapon Jabrill Peppers. He was of course taken by Cleveland in the first round of the 2017 draft and is now free of the tire fire organizations there and in New York with the Giants. His brown jersey relic is numbered to 99 on the front and it marks hit #3 for him. Fellow versatile "weapon" and new member of Michigan's recruiting staff Denard Robinson gets an even cooler card to add to his tally, a 2013 Triple Threads Ruby parallel numbered to just 15 that includes three Jags swatches--one of which has three colors and some stitching--plus an autograph, making it one of the best cards in the envelope. It sure is sweet and I'm very happy to have it as hit #53 of the newly employed Robinson.

Now we head to the ice as Michigan Hockey prepares for its record 26th Frozen Four appearance tomorrow evening against Denver in Boston. The Wolverines still have the most national titles with nine but Denver and North Dakota loom nearby with eight each, and UM hasn't won it all since 1998. This team with a plethora of first-round NHL picks has me hoping for a new banner hanging in the rafters of Yost this winter.

Anyway, on to the cards. Cammalleri, Connor (among the league leaders in goals this year), Wings captain Larkin, and Pacioretty are all well known names while Hagelin and both Hunwicks (unrelated, as always) are guys I got to see play live in Ann Arbor. While the Larkins look great and I do love adding to his collection, I was the most excited for the Mirror Emerald parallel of Shawn Hunwick's 2012-13 Certified RC. It looks terrific and includes that same shot of him playing for Columbus in his Michigan gear that I've seen a million times, but even better, it's numbered 4/5, making it the rarest card in his collection that isn't a plate. It was a huge surprise and I'm thrilled to knock another one off his wantlist!

Fellow Blue Jacket Zach Werenski, who's put up some good numbers with the team this year as a defenseman, sews up the base and inserts with a nice pair--those OPC Platinum cards sure are sharp, aren't they?

And lastly we'll look at a quartet of big hits. We're going alphabetically here but the first one is about as good as it gets: a Yellow Printing Plate of former Duck Andrew Ebbett that was inserted in super high-end product 2008-09 Upper Deck the Cup. The plate was used to produce the former Wolverine's SP Game Used base card that year, and I love what Upper Deck did back then in kind of framing the plates they inserted, making them look even cooler. What a great addition!

Card #2 stars the previously seen Pacioretty, a guy I got to see play a bit in his one year in Ann Arbor before jumping to Montreal. He's put up over 300 goals in parts of 14 seasons and is a key piece on the Golden Knights when he's healthy. What you see above is a jersey relic from 2020-21 SP Game Used celebrating his appearance in 2020's NHL All-Star Skills competition. It's hit #9 for his collection and one of the newest ones I own of him.

Single-year Wolverine defenseman Jacob Trouba is the subject of the last two cards tonight. #1 is a draft banner jumbo relic from the year he was drafted by the Jets #9 overall, 2012. The card would have been pulled from 2019-20 SP Game Used and I believe it's my second banner-related relic from the sport, which is not something you see every day so I think it's pretty cool! Joining that is my eighth card that includes his signature, hailing from 2019-20 Upper Deck Chronology's Franchise History Autos. It's a very classy looking card of a guy whose current count of 10 goals has equaled his career high established in 2013-14, his rookie season. This outstanding pair puts him up to an excellent 17 hits, good for a fourth place tie with Shawn Hunwick among the 59 subjects in my hockey PC. These are a great way to close out another banger of a mailer from Doug!

Given the abundance of goodies you can see above, many of which are of such high quality that I'm happy I've worked as hard as I have recently to hit him back, I'm happy that I've finally done a show and tell post to share them with those of you that follow me. After a few more items arrive I'll be sending my first salvo of 2022 to Doug and look forward to his reaction. In the meantime I may just be able to start getting caught up on my TCDB trades. But before then, in honor of my favorite Canadian (or just in general?) trade partner...

And there you have it!

2021 trade package #24: Sports Cards From the Dollar Store

Dollar Store dude and Canadian buddy of the blog Doug of Sports Cards From the Dollar Store recently sent me a nice fat envelope for the fourth time this year and it was another doozy! As is often the case when he sends me stuff, all four major sports get hit so there's potentially something for everyone here. And most importantly, everything is for me! Let's look at the contents this time:

The baseball and basketball portions were limited but very strong. We get a look at two Cabreras: future HOFer Miggy plus potential future Tiger Daniel, an OF Detroit took in the second round out of LSU last year. Former Wolverine and sure-fire future star Jordan Nwogu, like the latter Cabrera above, came out of this year's Topps Pro Debut, which seems to be using a mix of designs, and that's always a plus. And the package's biggest hitter is also from that product: an autograph of one of the Tigers' cream of the crop prospects, Riley Greene. The fifth overall pick in 2019, Greene has as much upside as anyone else selected in that first round, and the outfielder tends to slot in just behind Spencer Torkelson atop the team's farm rankings. Doug pulled this bad boy, numbered /50 on the back, himself, and was nice enough to flip it to me for future considerations, which I'm still working on. Just another reminder of his legendary generosity.

Getting back to Wolverines, from a different sport, take a look at the recent-ish due of THJ and LeVert. It's crazy to me that the younger Hardaway will be going into his ninth season this year while Vert will be appearing in his sixth once he's healthy.

Heading over to the gridiron, Michigan's 6-0 start has surprised lots of fans including me. This here group mostly leans towards the rookies but has some vet representation as well. Alexander and Kenn appear on cards made after their first seasons while older Wolverines Brooks and Foote RCs bookend two of this year's newest NFLers in Collins and Evans out of Chronicles Draft, meaning best helmet in college football shows up front and center. And the two biggest items of the bunch come up next: twin (but not identical) autos of former RB Karan Higdon out of 2019 Contenders. The main differences between the variations are the photos and team logos used. The pair doubles my count of Higdon hits to four.

And of course the bulk of the package comprises hockey, with the Wings of Hockeytown dominating the count over the Wolverines. There was a great mix of old and new and I decided to lead off with the players I remember watching growing up along with some guys that starred for the franchise's dynasty in the late 90s/2000s (and a bit beyond). Almost all of these guys won Cups with the team aside from Racine, Sheppard (card #6), and Ysebaert (#7), and the latter are players I remember well from playing EA's super-fun NHL games in the mid-90s. It's fun to be a fan of a franchise with such a great history, and one with some decently recent success too!

Here we have mostly recent players with the exception of one-year Wing Crowder and Gallant, whose Wings career ended a bit before I was really following them. He's since carved out a solid coaching career. Hirose's cards are from UD's pretty cool Allure product, and better yet the back of the die-cut parallel tells you exactly what it's called: White Rainbow. More of this, please!

And we end tonight's post on this scan with a mix of Wings and Wolverines, but no Wolverwings this time. The erstwhile Nyquist and Tatar parallels are 2016-17 OPC Ice Blue Traxx cards, and I know that because once again Upper Deck told me exactly that on their backs. They're cool looking parallels in my book!

As for the alumni of the #1 team in the NCAA right now, we'll start with Connor's card which is a Puzzle Back from last year's UD MVP (part of an image that forms Brent Burns of the Sharks). Sharks draftee and current Sen (Doug's team!) Josh Norris makes his debut in my collection with a 2021 UD Synergy inserted called Rookie Journey Draft, which is numbered /999. Patch is much more represented in my collection due to his stardom resulting in a lot of cards made, like the insert above from 2020-21 UD called Ripple the Twine--a cool hockey term I'd somehow never heard before. And last up is a nicely designed jersey relic starring Jacob Trouba, a defenseman drafted by the Jets who now plays for the Rangers. I like how the swatch forms the blade in the hockey stick design they've got going on. I also like that it represents hit #15 of the former first-rounder in my collection.

And speaking of interesting numbers, which I don't feel like I've done much lately, it's time to celebrate yet another collecting milestone for my Michigan alumni hits collection: 2400 cards! 2401 to be exact, thanks to the three here from Doug. One of these days maybe I'll go through some older posts to try to calculate just how integral he's been in that collection, especially the 300+ from hockey alone, but even without looking I can tell you he's contributed a LOT.

So for the 42nd time on this here blog alone (not including those posted on Too Many Manninghams), I have to extend a huge thanks to Doug for the effort and generosity he put into a fantastic trade package. I look forward to seeing your reaction to the package you just received from me recently (finally!) and trying to up my game to pay you back for these latest goodies, especially that Greene autograph.

This was obviously a typically big trade package but I'll be back soon with a much smaller one courtesy of TCDB.

2021 trade package #19: Sports Cards From the Dollar Store

While I'm continuing to sort the stuff from the boxes I teased in my last post, I'm finally giving myself a break today to make sure I give Doug from Sports Cards From the Dollar Store his due for another generously packed trade envelope stuffed with goodies that I'm excited to share.

Let's start off with some cards of my favorite baseball team, which has turned things around quite a bit in the season's second half (a.k.a. since DFAing Nomar Mazara, just sayin'). My favorite Canadian helped me getting into this decade with a bunch of Tigers out of flagship, Gallery, Stadium Club, and more, and there's some very good current names here (and one from the distant past in Cobb, of course). The Cabrera cards are nice as he zeroes in on 500 HR and eventually 3000 hits as well, but I'm more interested in the pair of Mizes, including a Refractory Bowman's Best insert, as he's done quite well this year after his 2020 cup of coffee went worse than expected.

Rogers was teaming up with the versatile Eric Haase to give the team a surprising boost at C this year before his injury, so maybe someone from the Verlander deal will turn out to be useful after all! Skubal's had some struggles but I'm glad to see him continue to get experience as I can still see him as a useful rotation arm in the future. Jones' card has a typically awesome Stadium Club photo. And JV gets an honorary place with the Tigers here even though his Diamond Kings base there shows him with the Astros.

I believe National Hockey Card Day was around the time I got the envelope that included these legendary Wings, so that was a nice fit as Doug's country celebrated one of its favorite sports. The Pacific and UD cards here look great and are a nice palate cleanser after mostly staring at Topps stuff above. All four of these guys were a blast to watch during the Hockeytown heyday of the mid-90s through the aughts. While I love the Wings uni cards, the numbered Team Canada of Yzerman is awesome too. While we Detroiters wait for the results of the Yzerplan, I highly suggest that y'all head over to Doug's posts on his ultra high-end 2015 Team Canada Master Collection break. Beware: there's some absolutely sick nasty patch and signature cards in that series!

Those guys weren't the only Wings in the package, though. I can't say I wasn't happy to see the Applicator gone after the 2019-20 season--the fewer MSU players on the team, the better! Fischer is a bigtime throwback to the teams starring the guys above. UD's '20-'21 base cards look nice as usual, and I believe all three guys seen here will be back, including another Spartan in Hirose. Svechnikov looks diminutive on an OPC mini but maybe the former first-rounder will have success with another team.

And the big prize here is a sweet jersey/auto of former Slovak prospect Tomas Jurco. The card, which includes a very nice two-color swatch with stitching, would have been found in one of Doug's all-time favorite products, 2013-14 Panini Rookie Anthology. While Jurco is another former prospect that didn't work out for the team--he's since bounced to Chicago, Edmonton, and Vegas--this is a great looking Red Wings hit that I'll be happy to keep!

Moving on to the Michigan stuff, we open things with basketball, and a very appropriate card: a Michigan uniformed Classic issue of current coach Juwan Howard. His Fab Five teammate Chris Webber is next on a Topps base. And lastly we have hit #2 of the package: an autograph of recent Wolverine D.J. Wilson (my first hit of his of any kind) out of 2017-18 Panini Chronicles. This one is the Red version (which you could tell if the foil scanned a bit better) and is numbered /149. Wilson was a three-year Wolverine who went to the Bucks as a 2017 first-rounder, then found himself traded to Houston this past March. Will he become one of the next Michigan Basketball alumni to get paid big time? We'll see!

College football season is approaching fast, much to my excitement, and Doug sent plenty of great stuff to remind me of that fact. Brady and Woodson bookend the top row with some 2021 Score inserts including the base and Purple versions of the Collegiate Champions set. Naturally I love that one since it shows each player before and after they became pros. Yeah, I know Tom played just six games (and 20 pass attempts) between 1996 and '97 as Griese was the starter for the '97 Rose Bowl winners, but he was still part of the team.

Speaking of star QBs, we get player-to-coach #2 with Jim Harbaugh's '91 Fleer base. I wonder if the staff changes he made over the offseason will finally get his team moving in the right direction.

I was a bit surprised to see a Bills card in this package but O'Donnell ('71 Topps RC) was indeed a Wolverine. I can't stop laughing at the cartoon of the lineman next to the team name! A 2021 Score RC of first-round DL Kwity Paye was also a very nice surprise, and I'm glad my first first-year of the future Colts star is a college uni card from that set.

And then we have some very nice hits. The aforementioned Griese gets a new relic added to his collection (24 hits), a 2002 Upper Deck Fourth Quarter Fabrics jersey with a cutout in the shape of a "4". Griese came up with two big fourth quarter plays during the undefeated '97 season: a 2 yard TD pass to TE Jerame Tuman with 2:55 left to defeat Iowa at home, and then a 23 yard score to the same target early in the last period of the Rose Bowl that would keep Michigan on top when Washington State ran out of time.

WR Devin Funchess (who recently put his foot in his mouth big time, but at least did a decent job of apologizing) is the subject of one of the best looking cards of the entire envelope: a 2015 Topps Strata autograph. It's a thick acetate-type card and I can't get enough of those, plus it's a new autograph (and a numbered one at that!) so I'm very excited to add it to his 18 other hits I already had.

Finally, a second signature is part of the bunch in the form of a 2019 Certified auto of RB Karan Higdon. It's the Mirror Teal version and therefore numbered /50. Man, I remember when the Mirror inserts were easy to tell apart! Anyway, I'm not sure if Karan is still hanging around the league after Houston took a chance on him as an UDFA, but he had a pretty nice four seasons in Ann Arbor. This shiny auto is his debut in my football collection, though I have another one to show off soon!

At least we've made it to the hockey content, and as usual there's a lot! Just as you saw with the Wings above there's a good number of '20-'21 UD base here, and a few other recent brands as well, which is much appreciated since I don't really buy much hockey stuff myself. Cammalleri's the winner here with three new cards, keeping him in third place overall in my collection at 78. And the first of two Copps is a '20-'21 OPC Retro Black that's numbered /100 on the back. You'll see one more of those in each of the next couple scans!

I got to see most of the guys in this group play at least one game in Ann Arbor, and hopefully I'll get back to Yost this year to see more future NHLers, such as yet another Hughes brother. The erstwhile Quinn is another subject of that numbered OPC parallel, and I'm happy to see his collection continue to grow, especially thanks to Doug. Larkin, of course, is still my favorite of the bunch as a WolverWing!

The last of the "regular" hockey stuff includes two beautiful Troubas: UD Ice and a Canvas insert, the latter of which continues to be an excellent mainstay for the brand. Turco continues his reign of dominance over the collection at 126 items--the only player currently over 100. And Werenski is the last of the three OPC cards /100, finishing up a very talented trio.

And if for some reason all of that didn't have you thinking that Doug's generosity knows no bounds, how about this trio? The pride of Flower Mound, (clap clap clap clap "DEEP IN THE HEART OF") Texas, Chris Brown stars on an absolutely nasty patch with the relic window cut out to spell his name. Numbered /25, it hails from another of Doug's high-end favorites, National Treasures (also 2013-14). That give him a lucky 13 hits, many of which came from Canada. By the way, he's listed as a member of the Capitals here but I would think that patch came from a jersey when he was with his original team, the Coyotes.

Hit #2 is just my second (also an autograph) of Jets C Andrew Copp, who's slowly increased his production in his six full NHL seasons. This one came out of UD's 2019-20 Overtime product and is from the Gold Foil Autographs set. On my other Copp auto, also a stickergraph, he spaced his name out a little bit more, but that's not uncommon given they were made a few years apart.

And finally, we'll end this evening's post with "Max Patch", or in this case, "max relics", of Max Pacioretty. The dual jersey card you see above, numbered /145, is from Upper Deck's 2020-21 Artifacts Materials Gold set, and it looks like I got a pair of Vegas sweater pieces to represent my eighth hit of the former UM star.

Did I say this was another great envelope or what? Not that my Canadian counterpart has ever sent a dud. I'm slowly accumulating some items for a return in the near future, hopefully one that will live up to the greatness he sends every time! If you want the chance to deal with a trade partner this consistently good, get yourself over to his blog and see what you can do about his wantlist.

2021 trade package #11: The Collector

I follow a pretty large number of blogs, and based on the blogrolls and mentions I see on those I'm aware that they only represent a fraction of what's out there. That's awesome because it's a great sign that both the hobby and this part of it are still doing great.

While I can't claim to pay attention to many of them to the degree I'd like, such as commenting on posts the writers clearly put lots of work into, I do try to make the effort to participate on some more than others. One such blog is The Collector, run by one of my favorite trading partners Chris. He and I are like-minded collectors in several ways so he's always fun to deal with. He also recently reached a very significant milestone: 500 posts! Among those are one of the best series I've seen on any blog: his all-time teams, which definitely required a lot of work but resulted in some great reading.

I mention all that because last week I received a PWE from him which included a note thanking me for reading and commenting to the extent that I do, which is really nice considering he's one of the folks I can pretty much count on to find a comment over here. Oh, and some cards for me too!:

Jeez, anybody still remember 2013 Topps? Two-time Derby winner Fielder didn't take home the crown that season, but he was the 1B for the 2012 squad pictured on card #2 up there, a team that beat Oakland in the ALDS and swept the hated Yanks to reach Detroit's most recent World Series berth, only to get swept by another great even-year Giants run. I still can't believe one of the teams from that era didn't win it all!

Chris apologized for what ended up being a hockey-heavy envelope, as if that's a bad thing somehow. On the Wings side, AA's been gone for a couple seasons while Bertuzzi still has a chance to but into a star. And then we get to three big pieces of Hockeytown's success over the past quarter century: Holmstrom, Yzerman and Zetterberg. At some point I'll get my Wings PCs loaded in TCDB so I have a better idea of what I have of some of those favorites.

Oh yeah, and for good measure Chris included a very Alluring autograph. Kuffner only got a cup of coffee with the Wings in 2018-19 and then was included in the deal with AA above for Sam Gagner, a pick last year, and a second rounder this year, so that could still turn into something. He's one of those Canadians you occasionally see spurn the OHL to play American college hockey, which I love. That and the colorful design makes this one a winner.

He even managed to make an almost even split of Detroit stuff and Michigan cards, which is pretty cool (besides the already impressive fact that there were no dupes in this PWE!). I needed each of Burke and Sauce Castillo (a RC) from the shiny 2014-15 Panini Prizm. 

OLB John Anderson (who also punted in college!) played 12 seasons for the Pack but only made it onto 39 items catalogued by TCDB, with even fewer being mainstream products. Yet Chris was able to send me a third item for his collection, his 1984 Topps second year base--a card with six years of stats on it. RCs are weird but that design is still a classic.

And then there's a quartet of some recent(ish) Wolverines hockey stars. Cogliano has never been a star, but this year he gets to Be-a-Player for the 14th season, and that's awesome. Hagelin is nobody's idea of an MVP at this point but he chipped in 10 goals and 21 points over 48 playoff games with the Pens, winning a pair of rings. WolverWing Larkin has seen the quality of the team around him erode but is still young enough to become an MVP one day. And all Patch has done is score 300+ goals in parts of 13 seasons, never being named the most valuable, but winning the '11-'12 Masterton ("Qualities of Perseverance and Sportsmanship") so there.

(Wait, why was he worried about this being hockey-heavy again?)

Chris, thanks again for a fun PWE as you celebrate 500 posts! Congratulations on keeping up with the blog for that long (and hopefully years to come!) and thanks for being a terrific trade partner. Should things fall in line it's not inconceivable that I could have some card show-sourced items headed to your own mailbox in the next month or two.

And coming up next on this here blog...another trade package? Don't mind if I do!

2020 trade package #31: the Collector

The other day I received an unexpected envelope from Chris over at the Collector, happily tearing it open only to find more surprises in the surprise package: envelopes within an envelope! One PWE held an extra long toploadered card while the other contained a couple of pairs each in their own toploaders, taped together to make another long one. October is a good month for mysteries so let's dig in!

We'll start with the oversized card, which ended up being the '87 Donruss All-Stars Pop-Up of the Iron Man himself, Cal Ripken. These fun oddballs were inserted into packs of the even larger '87 Donruss All-Stars cards, and as the name suggests, you can pop them out and fold a couple tabs to make them stand up, showing them in action against the backdrop of the old Houston Astrodome, site of the '86 Midsummer Classic. I already had one of these (to go along with my lone other example, Lance Parrish, plus an '86 card of Lou Whitaker) so as I don't see it on his TCDB list, I'll likely be sending it over to Jeff, who I know will appreciate it.

Next is a pair of prolific Michigan WRs who enjoyed varying degrees of success in the NFL. Braylon appears on a base card from 2010 Topps Magic, one of the manufacturer's stronger brands in my opinion, (even if it isn't from the all-time great '09 college-themed version!) with a nice design. He's joined by college great, former blog namesaker, and bailer out of gumpy Giants QB Eli: Mario Manningham. This card was a bit of a mystery for me as it's clearly in the style of 2011 Panini Rookies & Stars, but didn't come up on TCDB until I found the checklist and added it myself. It's one of a six-card team set that was produced in conjunction with Pepsi and given away at a Monday Night Football game that year. Very cool!

Lastly, Chris treated me to a pair of cards from a sport we both collect a bit, though him decidedly more than me. Both star sniper Max Pacioretty, who was drafted by Montreal and enjoyed 10 pretty nice seasons with them until moving on to Vegas for the past two. He hit the 30-goal and 60-point marks for the sixth time this past campaign and put up a 5/3/8 line in the playoffs for the Golden Knights. Here you see the former Canadien on some slick Upper Deck cardboard (and more!) from 2015-16 Tim Horton's and 2016-17 Trilogy. Have I mentioned before how much I love it when card-makers print the name of the set on the back so their cards are easier to identify? See what I mean in the next scan.

Here's the backs for completeness. You can see the instructions for Cal's Pop-Up card and what I was just saying about UD's much-appreciated identification on the backs.

Chris, thanks a lot for the fun surprise! I hope you enjoyed the latest package I sent your way and keep piling up the nice pickups from baseballcardstore.ca, which I'm totally gonna try soon.

2020 trade package #22: Sports Cards From the Dollar Store

It's been another good month or so for trade packages, as today's post (and at least one that's upcoming) will prove.

Tonight's mailer showed up this past Sunday, a pleasant surprise to find on my porch a few days ago. What was in it? Even more Canadian bakin' from Doug of Sports Cards From the Dollar Store. Your friendly neighbourhood king of dollar store repacks had let me know about a few cards I could expect at some point, and happily it didn't take him very long to fill out another enjoyable envelope to send across the border:

No baseball this time so we'll get right into the hardwood stuff. Almost everything was from the glorious 90s so there's a huge variety of brands and designs to choose from. Coach Juwan Howard looks radical on one of Skybox's many era-appropriate looks. Brooklyn's LeVert gets a chance to put on a show as the NBA playoffs resume. I remember rooting for "Sugar" Mills as a Piston before knowing he was a Michigan alum. And Rice, Rumeal, and Tarpley are all pretty well known products of the program.

A trio of Loy Vaught and a lone C-Webb close out the basketball content, and then it's on to the gridiron. I needed all three cards of Brady in his old uniform, from 2020 Panini products Legacy and Score. I'm liking the Score base design as usual, and there's a good look at TB12's competitive nature on a Gold parallel of an insert called Game Face. Giants big back Jarrod Bunch also makes a couple appearances out of '93 Stadium Club and '94 Collector's Choice.

A cool horizontal UD Toomer is joined by the highlight of the football content for me: four more 2020 Score Wolverines. Gary's a second-year card so he's with the vets, then there's the trio of Wolverines from the set's rookie class. TE Sean McKeon ("Mc-KYOON") went undrafted but signed with the Cowboys after a solid career both blocking and catching at the position. Transfer QB Patterson's name was well known around the country as the signal-caller, but nobody was surprised when he went undrafted after a not-as-good-as-expected couple of seasons in Ann Arbor. Still, his name was big enough to get him into lots of products this year over others, such as first-round C Cesar Ruiz. Such is the hobby. Talented WR Peoples-Jones rounds out the group after he left for the draft a season early. He too failed to reach his vast potential in college but was explosive at times, and hard work and good coaching could make him a valuable wideout. I'm looking forward to snagging any other 2020 Wolverines as they show up in new products.

The start of the hockey content includes envelope stalwarts Cogliano and Knuble, whom I'm always happy to see, but young star D-Man Quinn Hughes, whom I got to see over his two years in Ann Arbor, is the big highlight here. The card on the left is a foil-y RC (/199) out of UD's high-end Buybacks product, one I saw broken a few times on Phil Hughes' Youtube channel. It's definitely got that super premium Upper Deck shine to it. The other is a cool horizontal insert called Rookie Science from UD Credentials, with the formula for "velocity vector" on the back. That's too much math for my English major brain, so instead I'll enjoy the colorful front. Colors are pretty!

This scan of the rest of the hockey starts out very strongly with two new Dylan Larkins. New WolverWing #1 is a sweet rainbow die-cut out of 2019-20 Allure called White Rainbow, which I know because the back literally tells you! Well done, UD. That's joined by his base card from the previously mentioned Credentials. Patch gets a textbook Ultra insert fro 2016-17 Fleer Showcase (made by UD) called Scoring Kings, which has a lightning background that didn't scan very well. I believe that SPA of Trouba is my first of him with the Rangers since he joined them, but I'll have to check. Werenski hails from the Rainbow parallel of OPC's Platinum product that I always enjoy seeing. Shiny!

And then we get to the three big hits of the package. If you thought I was excited about the two Hughes cards you saw earlier then you'll know I was geeked for Doug to send me my first auto of him as well! I'm fortunate to trade with someone like Doug who pulls so many ridiculously nice cards and is willing to trade them. I'll certainly be working on hard on trying to pay him back for this 19-20 Exquisite auto (/99). That alone would have made the envelope, but then there's also a sweet dual jersey of Patch, whom we also already saw, out of last year's Artifacts. This is basically a numbered (/165) relic version of the base card, and it looks great. And last up is the only non-Wolverine in the pile, but it's a card that looked great with the other hockey stuff. Like Larkin's card above, this one is from UD's Allure, and the back tells me you're looking at a Red Rainbow Jersey. You literally couldn't pick a better color for a Red Wings card, and I'd say the up-and-coming winger Zadina is a player to get excited about too!

Doug, thanks once again for another killer envelope! As I've told you in our usual back-and-forth I have a few things in-hand and elsewhere for you, and I'll keep adding to it until it's worthy of this greatness, and then send it back across the Detroit River. Until then, may your hot hand continue as your personal and group breaks go on!