My Second Zistle Trade

Not long after completing my first ever trade on the card collecting website/community Zistle, I received another trade proposal from north of the border (Ontario, to be specific). Similar in scope to the previous exchange, for a handful of baseball cards I received a a few hockey singles to plug some gaps in my Wings / Jackets collections.

First up was this nice action shot of Nick Lidstrom on 2007-08 Upper Deck #1.

The design of this set, and for that matter many of the UD main sets, isn't necessarily mind-blowing but they do have a penchant for some great photography.

Even less appealing, aesthetically, are the Victory main sets. This Dominik Hasek #122 from the 2008-09 set illustrates this blah-ness perfectly. Being a budget card, the lack of bells & whistles is more than understandable.

Same goes for this #48 Rick Nash from the 2010-11 set.

Again with a great action shot, this time featuring both of my teams on the ice, is this 2009-10 Upper Deck #115 R.J. Umberger. Awesome photo.

From the 2008-09 Upper Deck set comes this #16 Rookie Class card of Adam Pineault. Of course, by the time this card was issued Adam was no longer a Blue Jacket but was instead in the Blackhawk's farm system. Taken by the Jackets in the 2nd round of the 2004 draft, the Massachusetts native would ultimately appear in only three NHL games - all with Columbus, including his debut against the Wings - before toiling away in the minors and Europe until retirement beckoned after the 2013-14 season.

And finally we have this Steve Yzerman #24 from the 1997-98 Pinnacle Inside set. Does anyone remember this set? The "first-ever hockey cards in a can" set? What a gimmick. I believe this particular card is the only one that I have ever owned from this set. They're cheap, so completing the Wings shouldn't be too much of a burden - so why not?

And there you have it - my second trade on Zistle. I can't say enough how easy trading has been, so far, on this site. If you're not a part of it yet, get on there and let's get trading!

My First Zistle Trade

For those collectors who are in the know, Zistle is a gem of an online collection manager / trading forum. Zistle isn't exactly new to me (I've been a member for nearly 4 years) but until very recently I didn't use for much more than cataloging my collection. Over the past couple of months I've made a conscious effort to get my extraneous singles/inserts posted to my trade list while doing what I could to flesh out my want list. The result - a trade offer from the one and only Captain Canuck (his blogs Waxaholic and Just A Bit Offside are on hiatus, but make sure to keep tabs on 'em). The lesson - make sure your want list is just as fully populated as your trade list! So on to the goods...

Very much a common to get the post going is this 2014-15 Upper Deck David Savard...

A couple of 2014-15 O-Pee-Chee commons to fill in the Wings gaps...

And from the same set, this Mitch Callahan Marquee Rookie...

Besides one NHL game (against the Jackets), Mitch has been a career AHL-er since being drafted in 2009. His physical play attracted the Wings' attention, but over time he's settled in to be more of a goal scorer than tough guy. Unfortunately he's likely to remain a fixture in Grand Rapids unless he moves organizations.

And the prize of the lot... a 2014-15 OPC Rainbow Foil Jack Johnson...

So yeah, this was by no means a blockbuster trade. BUT, it marks my first foray into the trading beauty of Zistle that I am hopeful will continue to bring needed cards to my collection. Now, if only everyone had their trade lists populated!

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.

TTM Success: Nick Foligno

Sent: 24 January 2013
Received: 9 February 2013
Transit Time: 16 days

Traded from Ottawa to Columbus on July 1st of 2012 for blue-liner Marc Methot, Nick is one of several new Blue Jackets taking to the ice for the 2013 "season". Born in Buffalo (where his father Mike played for the Sabres), Nick has had a solid career over five seasons as a centerman for the Senators. So far this season his production is off his recent performances (1 goal, 4 assists), but if Monday night's puck handling exhibition was an indicator of things to come it won't be long before Nick starts racking up the goals again.

I sent this 2011-12 Score #325, the most recent card I have of Nick, just a couple of days after he scored his first goal as a Blue Jacket during the team's season opener against Nashville. Not a bad signature along with his #71 (which is a reverse of his dad's number 17).

Current TTM Stats:

24 Sent; 11 Received; 13 Pending - 46 % Success Rate

Back in Blue

It's been a couple of weeks since my last post, which seems to be a recurring theme on this blog, but to get rolling again I'd like to showcase my latest eBay wins - a couple of Blue Jacket relic cards that I picked up from a seller in Canada for less than $4.25 (including shipping).

The first is this Derick Brassard 2010-11 Upper Deck Game Jersey insert (GJ-BR) from Series 1.

The swatch isn't very exciting (but it was game-used) and the card design, particularly the font, is rather meh, but a jersey card is a jersey card. Brass, who along with Derek Dorsett and R.J. Umberger has become the face of the Blue Jackets since the departure of Rick Nash, isn't having a spectacular year so far. But then again, he's not at all an offensive powerhouse. Although he has only 2 goals this year, his goals-per-game average is actually right on the money when compared to his output from last season.

Next up is this Gilbert Brulé 2005-06 UD Ice Cool Threads insert (CT-GB).

Brulé was a big deal for Jackets fans in the mid 2000's. As the club's first-round pick (6th overall) in the 2005 draft, fans and team executives expected a lot out of the Edmonton native. Instead, Brulé turned in three forgettable and injury-plagued seasons before being shipped off to the Oilers for Raffi Torres (who is also no longer with the team, leading me to consider the G-man one of the worst of the 1st-round busts). The card isn't much more exciting, especially considering that this is a "photo shoot jersey", but as I repeatedly say when dealing with Blue Jackets relic cards - a jersey card is a jersey card.

eBay Score: Jaroslav Balastik

I got this nice on-card auto for just $0.99 from a seller in in York, PA, that I've bought a couple of cards from in the past. He's definitely got some quality items at very reasonable prices (and low shipping).

The design of this Fresh Ink subset of 2005-06 Fleer Ultra is so-so.  I'm not a huge fan of the spilled ink look, but it doesn't do enough to distract away from the player photo so I can live with it. Balastik (or Balaštík) is another of the Blue Jackets' Czech draftees, being taken in the 6th round of the 2002 draft. He emerged from the Czech Extraliga in 2005, playing in 14 games for Columbus' AHL affiliate Syracuse before being elevated to the Blue Jackets for the balance of the season. In 66 games, Balastik was 12-10-22 with 26 PIM, but stood out for his sniping skills during shootouts - 6 of 9 (67% for my fellow math illiterates)! Despite numbers that weren't too terribly off from the team as a whole, the Jackets sent Balastik packing back to Europe where he remains.

The reverse of the card is really rather disappointing. The certificate of authenticity aside, there's really nothing to the back other than the mailing address of Fleer. What the hell do I need that for?

eBay Score: David Vyborny

Sticking with an unintentional Czech theme, I scored this 2008-09 Fleer Ultra Uniformity David Vyborny #UA-DV game-used jersey card (and once more, for the perfectionists - Výborný).  The swatch is rather bland, as are most of the Jackets relics on the market, but the card design isn't too terribly bad. Not necessarily exciting, the subdued wintry accents nevertheless convey a nice hockey "mood".

Originally drafted by Edmonton in the 2nd round of the 1993 draft, Vyborny was a rising star in the Czech Extraliga. He was tearing up the league as a member of Sparta Prague when he joined the Cape Breton Oilers of the AHL for the 1994 season, where he notched up 61 points in 76 games. For reasons that I don't understand, Edmonton didn't keep Vyborny in North America after that season. Although he returned to setting records in the Czech league, it wasn't until the 2000 campaign (the inaugural season of the Jackets) when Vyborny reached the NHL after Columbus signed him to add some offensive pop to the line-up. And pop he did. While not necessarily a superstar, he would set (over the next several seasons) franchise records for plus/minus and consecutive games before eventually returning to the Czech Republic after the 2007-08 campaign - where he continues to play though his numbers have dwindled significantly.

Purchased from a seller in northern Wisconsin for just $0.99 plus a fairly reasonable shipping charge, this pick-up wasn't a bad score.  Booking at $8, there haven't been very many of them on the market lately.

eBay Score: Tomas Popperle

Is it really a "score" when the player is someone that no one (or very few people) have ever heard of? If the card fills a void in your collection, then you bet your ass it is! Which, of course, is the motivation behind my eBay pickup of this 2007-08 SPx #160 Tomas Popperle 573/999 rookie card (or Tomáš Pöpperle, for the perfectionists).

Tomas was a product of the sometimes questionable draft practices employed by the then-GM of the Blue Jackets Doug MacLean. In the 2005 draft, which say the likes of Kris Russell and enforcer Jared Boll become Jackets, MacLean snagged Popperle in the fifth round. While those taken ahead of him in the draft have each laced up their skates several hundred times in the NHL, the Czech native saw action just twice - both times during the 2006-07 campaign. Tomas stayed in the AHL for a part of the following season before returning to the Czech Republic, where he continues to play.

As for the card itself, I'm not a huge fan of the design. Too much of the player is obscured by graphic flourishes, and the "digital" font is just a pain in the ass to read. Yet, it fills a void so the $.099 (plus shipping) I sent to the seller in Quarryville, PA is justified.