Random Snipes From Beckett

In my last post I mentioned the three new additions to my 1970-71 Topps Red Wings set that I recently picked up from Beckett Marketplace. Well, in order to ensure that the cost of shipping did not eclipse the cost of the cards, I added a couple of quarter-bin cards to round out the purchase.

2006-07 Upper Deck No. 73 Chris Osgood

Yeah, not a whole lot special about this card. Ozzie had returned to the Wings for the 2005-06 season after a couple of seasons away with the Islanders and Blues, but an injury early on sidelined him for most of the year. Even still, he posted a 20-6-0 record.

1990-91 Topps No. 34 Daniel Shank RC

Daniel who? Yeah, pretty much. A promising winger, Shank scored 11 goals for the Adirondack Red Wings in the 1989 Calder Cup playoffs to earn a spot with the parent club for the 1989-90 campaign. He had a decent run - 11-13-24 in 57 games - but, after just 7 games with the Wings in the 1990-91 season, Daniel was traded off to the Whalers for Chris Tancill. After one season in Hartford, Shank would spend the reast of his career in the minor leagues. Have a look at the blurb on the back of his card. Man, somebody didn't have a very high opinion of this guy.

2001-02 Upper Deck No. 54 Rostislav Klesla

I actually kinda dig the design of this set. The colors work well, with just enough contrast, and a lot of space is devoted to the front photo and back text. It would have been nice for the back photo to be more than just a cropped headshot of the front, but whatever. A nice card of Rusty early in his career.

More '70s Topps Goodness

And so I returned to the Beckett Marketplace the other day to continue work on my 1970 Red Wings team sets. How I would love to head down to my LCS to find these gems, but the state of hockey card collecting in the state that I live in is, well, literally non-existent. There are a grand total of two brick-and-mortar card shops within 50 miles of me, and neither stock hockey cards. At all. No packs. No singles. It's tragic. Thus, cherry-picking sites like Beckett is, by necessity, my only means of feeding this addiction.

So on to the cards...

1970-71 Topps No. 21 - Roy Edwards

Ontario native Roy Edwards made the leap from the minors to the Red Wings in the 1967-68 season, where he amassed a 15-15-8 record in 41 games. He had a solid year in 1969-70, posting 24-15-6, but by the 1970-71 campaign Roy's time in net had dwindled a bit and he finished the year at 11-19-7. After spending the following season with the Penguins, Roy would be back with the Wings for two more years before hanging up his skates for good.

1970-71 Topps No. 23 - Ron Harris

After a couple of short call-ups with the Wings in the mid-'60s, defenseman Harris played his first full NHL season with the newly-minted Oakland Seals in the 1967-68 campaign. In one of hockey's most unfortunate moments, Ron was directly involved in a play that sent North Stars forward Bill Masterton hard to the ice, causing massive trauma and, not long after, death. Ron returned to the Wings the following season, where he would stay until being claimed by the Atlanta Flames in the 1972 expansion draft.

1970-71 Topps No. 26 - Gary Unger

Gary may be best known as "Iron Man" Unger, having set the record for most consecutive games played at 914 between 1968 and 1979 (a record long since surpassed). Hitting the big league with the Maple Leafs in 1967, the year in which he was traded to the WIngs, Gary scored a career high 42 goals during the 1969-70 season. His time in Detroit would be brief, however, as he would head to St. Louis late in the 1970-71 campaign.

So there you have 'em. I also picked up a few odds and ends in this same order, but those will have to wait for another post.