1991-92 Pro Set Platinum Hockey Celebrity Captains

Before I begin my card collecting tale (one of many tall tales of my collecting days and collection) I want to say that the last few months I have struggled a little with my desire to continue to blog about cards, or even blog at all. Mostly it is my desire to keep my posts per month tally current that keeps me going. I don't like seeing gaps in my posting calendar. Now days it is mostly for me as I don't have very many followers and never will have a whole bunch. I can dream all I want, but the fact is I don't produce enough quality content on a consistent basis to gain even a few dozen followers. But there are still a ton of cards I want to post about. Another fact is there just isn't enough time to create all the content I have had planned for the blog. I have some ideas that I have had for years that I hope to eventually blog about, even have the cards in a box somewhere ready to scan. But I digress way too much.

Pro Set Platinum Logo image from Puck Junk blog

OK here is a post about the 1991-92 Pro Set Platinum Hockey set. It is specifically about the Celebrity Captains sub-set. I was going to say while looking through my card collection/hoard hunting for a subject to post about I stumbled upon these cards. Well no I didn't stumble upon them because it wasn't while hunting, or maybe it was and I found one, but remembered I had another and discovered a few I had that I wasn't sure I had, but didn't find the One that I was really thinking about mentioning.

It looks like there are only 12 cards in the sub-set and I have half of them. 

OK so the ones that I have that I wasn't sure I had. I am pretty sure they were from a small Sportlots.com order I made to get some of the cards from this sub-set. are these:

1991-92 Pro Set Platinum Hockey: Celebrity Captains:

290 Burton Cummings - Winnipeg Jets

294 David Wheaton - Minnesota North Stars

298 Gaetan Boucher - Quebec Nordiques

293 Jim Kelly - Buffalo Sabres

The card that I "stumbled" upon that reminded me I wanted to pick up the build for this sub-set again was this Neighborhood Friendly one:

1991-92 Pro Set Platinum Hockey: Celebrity Captains:

297 Fred Rogers - Pittsburgh Penguins

The card I was really wanting to show I couldn't find on quick notice. Not sure where I placed it, but I looked in just about all the places I thought it would be. Anyway the card is from my Homie Washington Capitals and a guy who used to yuck it up with all sorts of celebs before he retired. Yep talk host Larry King: Anyway I couldn't find my copy so I used the images from The Trading Card Database for this card.

1991-92 Pro Set Platinum Hockey: Celebrity Captains:

292 Larry King - Washington Capitals

Images for this card are from Trading Card Database

I think I will add the cards I'm missing to my shopping cart over at Sportlots again. I think I had some of them there but those copies either sold or the seller did something bad and was removed, or the most common reason the cards had been sitting in my cart for way too long and Sportlots emptied them from my cart due to being too old.

A Pair From Sportlots: First Pitch and Name Niche

 

This pair of cards is an oddball combo whose only connection is the Sportlots seller I got them from. Both cards I got for the opening auction bid of 25¢ plus the shipping ($2 for first card 40¢ each additional card = $2.40).

The first card is from 2016 Topps Baseball from the First Pitch insert set: Card number FP-17 Carrie Brownstein Seattle Mariners a musician/actress. If my overall collection was organized I would know how many more cards I need from this insert set. All I know is I have the 2015 First Pitch inserts (I think it is complete maybe I just have series 1) and who knows how many 2016s. I do enjoy this insert set. I think 2015 was the first year they had the insert set and I think they only did it for 2015, 2016, and 2017. OH and there is a 2020 Topps Now First Pitch card for Dr. Anthony Fauchi I probably should try to get that one for cheap, but right now it is super overinflated listing prices. 

2016 Topps Baseball: First Pitch: FP-17 Carrie Brownstein musician Seattle Mariners

The second card of this pair I got simply for my "Name Niche" Collection. It probably should have been posted it separate for my Niche PC post series. If not for the guy's first name being similar to mine I might not collect any of his cards. He does play on the Carolina Panthers and there have been times that I have favored that team. I have a soft spot for expansion teams from time to time. Any how the card is 2017 Score Football: NFL Draft Insert #12 Curtis Samuel Ohio State Buckeyes.

2017 Panini Score Football: NFL Draft: 12 Curtis Samuel Ohio State (Panthers)

Washington Wednesday: Ice Warriors

 DC ICE WARRIORS

As all the various DC sports teams finish their seasons something something something. My blogging is still majorly discombobulated because of the Blogger upgrades. I will try to muddle through but it takes all the fun out of doing it and makes me want to stop blogging completely. Maybe I should try to find another platform that is similar to the old Blogger if one exists. I think I will make (or have made) some kind of similar rant like this on my other blogs just because.

Anyway I decided this time to show off some recently acquired Hockey cards of my Homie DC Ice Warriors. Longish story short on one of the Trading Card Forums I frequent someone held a free group box break, and one of the members of the forum that signed up for the break forwarded The Washington Capitals to me from a couple of the boxes, minus any Braden Holtby cards. Fortunately for me (as the break goes) there were some cards that were not of the Goaltender. Unfortunately for my collection there were one or two Holtby cards in the break overall I did not get.

2018-19 Upper Deck Artifacts Hockey

44 Evgeny Kuznetsov Washington Capitals

100 Nicklas Backstrom Washington Capitals

63 T.J. Oshie Washington Capitals

2019-20 Upper Deck SP Hockey

39 Tom Wilson Washington 

Some 1959 Topps Baseball From Sportlots

 

1959 Topps Baseball from Sportlots Auctions

Another one of these quick posts. Long story short I "won" 4 auctions over at Sportlots.com from one seller each was won at the opening bid of just 25 cents plus the shipping which totaled $4.80. With Sportlots you don't get combined shipping when it comes to the auctions. I forgot about that this time. Oh well.

Anywho I got 4 cards from 1959 Topps Baseball. I will  be talking about 3 of them here and the lone Senator over at my Curly W Cards blog.

The first two cards are from the Los Angeles Dodgers:

We have Shortstop Charlie Neal

1959 Topps Baseball: 427 Charlie Neal Los Angeles Dodgers

And Outfielder Solly Drake

1959 Topps Baseball: 406 Solly Drake Los Angeles Dodgers

Next up Pittsburgh Pirates Pitchers "Buc Hill Aces": 

1959 Topps Baseball: 428 Buc Hill Aces

Ron Kline Bob Friend Vern Law Roy Face Pittsburgh Pirates

Oh I almost forgot the seller included a couple of filler/buffer cards that were in toploaders to further protect the bought cards.

1989 Upper Deck Baseball 494 Al Nipper Chicago Cubs

1986 Donruss Baseball 133 Dick Schofield California Angels

So there we have a nice little recent package of cards one card short of a full hand, well actually 1 card more than a hand or a hand in some other variation of a card game. There are so many versions of poker I'm not sure which one(s) have a 6 card hand. Look for the Hal Griggs card over at my Curly W Cards blog.

Washington Wednesday: RIP Redskins HTTR

WASHINGTON WEDNESDAY:

RIP Redskins: HTTR4LIFE

Redskins Super Fan Chief Zee crying (date unknown)

Well they went ahead and did it. The NFL's Washington Team The REDSKINS gave into the pressure to change their controversial Nickname. I won't go into all the history of the name and the periodic attempts from outside entities to force the team to change the name they have held for 87 years. all that can be found on the interwebs. Along with all the Pros and Cons. Sure some people are now not offended but now a different group of people have been offended and some angered.

I will say that I am far from happy about the whole thing. I've been a life-long fan of the team, growing up with an older brother who was a super true blue fan, even my father who wasn't much of a sports fan enjoyed watching the occasional Redskins game on the telly and kept track of them during the season from time to time (mostly I think to please his fan family). What ticks me off the most is it appears to be that the owners were being blackmailed by FedEx one of their biggest financial supporters, investors and others. The delivery service sent a letter saying basically "Change the name or move to another stadium", they have about 7 more years on the stadium's lease so that isn't really one of the pressing issues. Also several big named merchandise retailers such as Amazon, Target and Walmart to name a few have pulled all Redskins merchandise from their shelves and have stopped selling them.

A couple of weeks after announcing that the name was going to be changed and the old name dropped the team now has a temporary name for the 2020 season "The Washington Football Team". They will keep the maroon and gold colors, but will be logoless. The helmets will be plain maroon with large gold numbers on the sides. Apparently they will have a permanent as yet unannounced new name and logo starting in the 2021 season.

I guess to a non-fan the best analogy would be if the high school you and your siblings graduated from, maybe even one of your parents and their siblings graduated from as well, was forced to change their mascot's name and/or even the entire school name. That is how it has affected me. After several generations of history.  It just "always was the way it was". It is part of the fandom intangibles. You don't know exactly what it is unless you have it. Even then it seems to be different for every fan.

As a fan of the old team I am not in the mood to attempt to become a fan of whatever the new team will be. Collecting cards for this year/season will be bittersweet. I'm not sure what I will do for next season. Do I stay with the team trading group I am a part of once the new team is established and cards baring the new team name and logo are made? A big part of me doesn't want to. 

OK rant over for now here are some historic DC Football cards that are sure to offend some people.

Lets start with one of my fave QBs of ALL-TIME Sonny Jurgensen. This one is from 1991 a special Quarterbacks set. I chose to show it because of it's original old school looks, especially the back pic with the original arrow helmet design (not the 1990s retro version)

1991 Quarterback Legends: 24 Sonny Jurgensen Washington Redskins

These next two cards I picked to show are of the same Player Jim Lachey. Both are very cool photos the first is a portrait from the 1991 Pro Set Football set, 

1991 Pro Set Football: 381 Jim Lachey Washington Redskins

Next Card. Check out the cool up close and personal pic. I picked this card to show because of the peeling of the stripe stickers on his helmet. Thought it was very cool looking.

1991 Upper Deck Football - 102 Jim Lachey Washington Redskins

This next card I chose because of the retro looks with the airbrushing/photoshopping (or maybe it is just unbranded spring training gear). It is also close to what the "temporary" helmets of this 2020 season will look like, with the exception that the new temporary helmets will have the player's uniform number in gold on the sides.

2004 Score Football: 330 James Thrash Washington Redskins

The final card I'm showing is one of the cool retro cards from 2004 Fleer Tradition Football set. Not only is the card design retro but this was the year the Redskins were sporting an anniversary retro uniform with the Arrow Helmet and a retro looking jersey and their return to the mustard colored pants.

2004 Fleer Tradition Football: 196 LaVar Arrington Washington Redskins

*UGH Due to the recent formatting updating changes that Blogger did, on my ancient computer at home I can no longer edit posts on blogger. It just gave me a blank page, well it had part of the editing "frame" of the page but the part where content was supposed to be it was blank. An incomplete page. I think it is because of something with my outdated Chrome browser. I didn't think about checking with Firefox (or Internet Explorer) until after I had shutdown my ancient Windows XP laptop/notebook. I'll try seeing if my ancient Firefox or IE works sometime later. Probably not because I think they had problems ages ago preventing me from using them then. So I won't be able to directly upload from my laptop to Blogger. I will have to use other sites or do what I did this time and transfer the images to a thumb drive and do it old school. Not to mention I will have to use my work laptop to do all the post editing, not just some of the last minute corrections before the scheduled Noontime posting. Yeah Yeah Yeah I need to get a new up-to-date home 'puter/laptop.

Washington Wednesday: R.I.P. Wes "Mr. Bullet" Unseld

R.I.P. WES UNSELD 1946-2020

On Tuesday 02 June of this year 2020 while doing my daily routine of checking out the main page of TCDB (Trading Card Database) for the random card of the day, new forum posts, born on today and then finally In Memoriam I saw the image of a familiar RC. (I don't have the card but am familiar with it). That of perhaps the most iconic Washington Basketball Player of All-Time Wes Unseld. I was beyond shocked another of my childhood sports idols passed from this Earth. I think it was during the years between his playing career (1981) to his coaching career (1988) that I drifted away from being a basketball fan and would eventually stop caring about the sport until a few years ago. Plus I was more attached to football at the time, as the Washington Senators were long gone, and the Washington Capitals were not very good yet.

1969-70 Topps Basketball: 56 Wes Unseld Baltimore Bullets

Image from comc.com

OK so his rookie card was when the Bullets were still the Baltimore Bullets, but the man would play his entire career with the Bullets Franchise, work with the front office and then later return to the court as Head Coach. He then moved onto General Manager for the team on into the transition to the name change to Wizards and a few years after that.

Here are some (but not all) of my Unseld Cards as a tribute to one of my childhood Icons. For the most part I have already shown these cards on this blog sometime previously so I don't need to explain them.

The following items are a few gems in my collection:

Next is a "card" in my collection that is more of a mini poster than a real "card" it is from 1969-70 Topps and they call it a "ruler" it is only 10 inches by 2.5 inches so not a true ruler but hey it is only paper. I got it from Ebay I think some years back for I forget how much I might have mentioned where and when some posts back a few years back.

1969-70 Topps Basketball Ruler: 22 Wes Unseld Baltimore Bullets

Finally here is a photo of an item I have from my childhood, the photo is actually from an image search I did a few years back and from someone's Ebay auction for which they had I think the whole set was listed for of course way too much money. I forget if they sold or not. Anyway as I said this is something that I actually have but not my copy in the image (I haven't scanned or photographed mine). It is a mini poster that was available from McDonald's in 1976. The size is 12" x 16" One of those premium things during the basketball season that year. Each week they featured a new poster that had two caricatures of Washington Bullets players. There are a total of 4 mini posters. This is the one with Wes and K.C. Jones.

1976 McDonald's Washington Bullets mini poster: K.C. Jones and Wes Unseld

Misprint Double Sided Back-To-Back Footzball Y'all

I forget when I got this card probably sometime last year, but I'm pretty sure it was from a Fairfield Football Repacked box I think one of the ones that had 4 packs and 50 non-packed cards or 100 non-packed cards or a 10 pack box with 50 or 100 non-packed cards or just a 50 card box with no packs. I'm not sure which it came from it was that long ago. If I was sure I'd show a scan of the box it came from, I don't even think I have that particular box anymore. It would have been from Target.

This particular card is from 1990 Pro Set Football and is a misprint. It is a double backed card technically it is a wrong front card even though the "front" is a back. I am saving it because the true back (that is the back back) is of a Rams player. The front of the card or the misprinted "back" is a Jet. There is also some green (or blue/cyan) ink smearing/bleeding on the "front". Yes the "back" also has a bit of a printing problem with a vertical white line (or rather lack of ink line) on the left hand side.

1990 Pro Set Football: 166 Jerry Gray Los Angeles Rams

Misprint: Wrong Front 237 Pat Leahy New York Jets back image

When I first came across the card I saw the Jets player and thought it was going to go to my trade stack, but I turned it over saw it was a double backed card and that one of the "backs" was of my PC Rams.

Speaking of trade stacks there are times I have considered doing a trade stack like Chris over at Nachos Grande or a trade pile like Alex at Chavez Ravining. My biggest problem with it though is the low frequency of my blogging doesn't work with the required high frequency of a task such as that and my want list might not be practical for most collectors.

MFTP: A Handful of Rams From 67 and 73

MailDazed From The Pazt:

A Handfull of Rams from 1967 & 1973

OK so for this post I was going to do a Strive For '65 post but the cards I wasn't sure if I had blogged about or not I had blogged about well over a year ago. I don't think I blogged about the cards that were with them, but those 2 or 3 cards are for some other post some other time ...maybe. Right now I want to show off some later vintage cards and some that are more Neo-Vintage cards. All of them are Los Angeles Rams cards. Oh big surprise there huh? I'm pressed for time to get this post in while it is still April so I won't go into details on the players or even the cards specifically. I'll just show 'em. I'm not very good at telling about player's careers anyway.

I received the cards on 31 December 2018 from a Sportlots auction. Apparently they were all part of one single five card lot that I got for 25¢ plus $3.50 shipping. There are 5 cards total, Two 1967 Philadelphia Gum Football Cards and Three 1973 Topps Football Cards.

1967 PHILADELPHIA GUM FOOTBALL

1967 Philadelphia Gum Football: 90 Dave Jones Los Angeles Rams

1967 Philadelphia Gum Football: 91 Tommy McDonald Los Angeles Rams

1973 TOPPS FOOTBALL

1973 Topps Football: 41 Les Josephson Los Angeles Rams

1973 Topps Football: 324 Gene Howard Los Angeles Rams

1973 Topps Football: 365 Dave Elmendorf Los Angeles Rams