Sure, an injury to Jonathan Huberdeau or another of their young kids could seriously hamper the depth-deprived not-quite-Miami-based team, but as long as their goalie keeps them in most games, they'll contend for the 9th spot a lot longer than for last place.
In my season predictions, I mentioned I thought Lou would be ''back in Vezina form'', and I really think he can finish among the official top-3 finalists. He's still elite-level, he did get to play in the 2014 Olympics for Team Canada, he is among the two or three best Canadian goalies with Corey Crawford. The Americans and Europeans (particularly Russians, Fins and Swedes) have caught up to Canadians (and particularly Quebecers, who dominated the 1990s), but Luongo's still in that conversation, definitely top-10 in the league, but what gives him Vezina consideration is his turning an under-average team into one that actually wins more than it loses.
At this point, some 10 games in the season, here is how I rank NHL goalies this season / projecting by the end of the season (some who are famous for their late starts get some slack):
1. Pekka Rinne, Nashville Predators
2. Henrik Lundqvist, New York Rangers
3. Tuukka Rask, Boston Bruins
4. Ben Bishop, Tampa Bay Lightning
5. Jonathan Quick, Los Angles Kings
6. Roberto Luongo, Florida Panthers
7. Jonas Hiller, Calgary Flames
8. Corey Crawford, Chicago Blackhawks
9. Cory Schneider, New Jersey Devils
10. Carey Price, Montréal Canadiens
But it sure feels natural to see Luongo in the Panthers' uniform:
That's card #J-RL from Upper Deck's 2005-06 Black Diamond set, the Black Diamond Jersey sub-set. It shows him wearing the Panthers' black uniform, and features an orange swatch, either from the shoulder of the white or black jersey, or the main part of the red one.
Today, a change of the guard occurs: Martin Brodeur will watch from the bench while Team Canadarelies on Roberto Luongo to lead them to an Olympic medal.
Despite appearances (like, say, unmerited Vezina trophies for career achievements when it should be awarded to the season's best), Luongo has been the best Canadian goalie for the past 5 years. We're talking about a guy who was on possibly the worst team in the league yet managed to lead it in save percentage, breaking records for most shots against and most saves made in a single season.
He was made to carry teams; from his junior years, where he led two different teams to the Memorial Cup, two World Junior Championships (no medal as Mathieu Garon's back-up, silver as a starter), to appearing in 3 World Championships two gold medals, one silver), to being the highest-drafted goalie at the time (4th overall, since surpassed by both Rick DiPietro and fellow Canadian netminder Marc-André Fleury).
He still has a lot of playing left to do, both in these Olympic Games and in the NHL, so I'll leave it at that for now.
This card (#52) is from Pacific's 2000-01 Private Stock set and Authentic Game-Used Gear sub-set, and includes a swatch of a game-worn white jersey from his New York Islanders jersey, although the card lists him as a member of the Florida Panthers - he was traded on draft day by 'Crazy' Mike Milbury right after announcing their picking DiPietro; Luongo was sent to the Panthers along with the team's eventual captainOlli Jokinen in exchange for second-rate sniper Mark Parrish and Oleg Kvasha.
Luongo was quoted as saying:
"I didn't expect it at all. One day they're telling me I'm the goalie of the future, and the next day I'm gone. I didn't really appreciate that. The good side is that [the Panthers] wanted me."
Whether you see it as one franchise or separate theAtlanta Flamesfrom the Calgary Flames, the greatest goalie to have ever worn a flaming letter on the front of his jersey is undoubtedly Miikka Kiprusoff. He had the best glove hand of his era (post-Patrick Roy), the best reflexes and agility after Dominik Hasek in his prime, and may have made the most ''paddle saves'' in the history of the NHL, as can be attested by this highlight reel:
That last sequence in the video is part of a three-minute ovation Flames fans gave him during his final game in Calgary, a 3-1 win against the Anaheim Ducks in which he stopped 32 of 33 shots, as usual. Kipper managed to win a well-deserved Vezina but also a Jennings trophy on what was arguably one of the worst teams in the league during his 10-year, 9-season tenure as a starting goalie.
He was my favourite goalie post-Roy, a position now held by Jaroslav Halak. Both also care about their fans enough to send them autographed cards, which has been my case.
Here he is in the Flames' red (home) uniform, in two cards from Panini's 2013-14 Titanium set (card #GG-MK of the Game-Worn Gear sub-set), with different-coloured swatches:
I could have easily ended this post here, but that would have been too easy. For too long, Kiprusoff's gone underrated, and I felt I needed to set the record straight about just how good he was, so I decided to analyse every goalie since the year I was born 1981-82 (when the Vezina stopped being awarded to the lowest GAA), and compare three things: who actually won the Vezina (and the runners-up), who I felt deserved to be named the best goalie, and the three best in the playoffs. If all goes well, I'll be able to separate the goalies as ''best of their eras'' afterwards:
1981-82: Vezina: Billy Smith; ahead of Grant Fuhr and Michel Dion.
Best: Smith; ahead of Fuhr and Dan Bouchard.
Playoffs: Smith; ahead of Richard Brodeur and Tony Esposito.
1982-83: Vezina: Pete Peeters; ahead of Roland Melanson and Murray Bannerman.
Best: Peeters; ahead of Andy Moog and Billy Smith.
Playoffs: Smith (Conn Smythe); ahead of Moog and Peeters.
1983-84: Vezina: Tom Barrasso; ahead of Réjean Lemelin and Pat Riggin.
Best: Barrasso; ahead of Lemelin and Bouchard.
Playoffs: Fuhr; ahead of Steve Penney and Smith.
1984-85: Vezina: Pelle Lindbergh; ahead of Barrasso and Lemelin.
Best: Lindbergh; ahead of Barrasso and Riggin.
Playoffs: Fuhr; ahead of Lindbergh and Smith.
1985-86: Vezina: John Vanbiesbrouck; ahead of Bob Froese and Fuhr.
Best: Clint Malachuk; ahead of Froese and Vanbiesbrouck.
Playoffs: Patrick Roy (Conn Smythe); ahead of Mike Vernon and Greg Millen.
1986-87: Vezina: Ron Hextall; ahead of Mike Liut and Fuhr.
Best: Hextall; ahead of Liut and Eldon ''Pokey'' Reddick.
Playoffs: Hextall (Conn Smythe); ahead of Brian Hayward and Fuhr.
1987-88: Vezina: Fuhr; ahead of Barrasso and Kelly Hrudey.
Best: Fuhr; ahead of Vernon and Roy.
Playoffs: Fuhr; ahead of Lemelin and Sean Burke.
1988-89: Vezina: Roy; ahead of Vernon and Kirk McLean.
Best: Roy; ahead of Vernon and Peeters.
Playoffs: Vernon; ahead of Roy and Hextall.
1989-90: Vezina: Roy; ahead of Daren Puppa and Moog.
Best: Roy; ahead of Liut and Lemelin.
Playoffs: Moog; ahead of Bill Ranford (Conn Smythe) and Don Beaupre.
1990-91: Vezina: Ed Belfour; ahead of Roy and Mike Richter.
Best: Roy; ahead of Belfour and Beaupre.
Playoffs: Barrasso; ahead of Jon Casey and Moog.
1991-92: Vezina: Roy; ahead of McLean and Bob Essensa.
Best: Roy; ahead of Vanbiesbrouck and McLean.
Playoffs: Barrasso; ahead of Belfour and Ranford.
1992-93: Vezina: Belfour; ahead of Barrasso and Curtis Joseph.
Best: Félix Potvin; ahead of Belfour and Joseph.
Playoffs: Roy (Conn Smythe); ahead of Potvin and Joseph.
1993-94: Vezina: Dominik Hasek; ahead of Vanbiesbrouck and Roy.
Best: Roy; ahead of Hasek and Vanbiesbrouck.
Playoffs: Richter; ahead of McLean and Martin Brodeur.
1994-95: Vezina: Hasek; ahead of Belfour and Jim Carey.
Best: Hasek; ahead of Vanbiesbrouck and Carey.
Playoffs: Brodeur; ahead of Vernon and Hextall.
1995-96: Vezina: Carey; ahead of Chris Osgood and Puppa.
Best: Hextall; ahead of Guy Hebert and Carey.
Playoffs: Roy; ahead of Vanbiesbrouck and Barrasso.
1996-97: Vezina: Hasek; ahead of Brodeur and Roy.
Best: Roy; ahead of Hasek and Moog.
Playoffs: Vernon (Conn Smythe); ahead of Roy and Garth Snow.
1997-98: Vezina: Hasek; ahead of Brodeur and Barrasso.
Best: Hasek; ahead of Barrasso and Belfour.
Playoffs: Olaf Kolzig; ahead of Osgood and Joseph.
1998-99: Vezina: Hasek; ahead of Joseph and Byron Dafoe.
Best: Ron Tugnutt; ahead of Hebert and Arturs Irbe.
Playoffs: Roy; ahead of Hasek and Belfour.
1999-00: Vezina: Kolzig; ahead of Roman Turek and Joseph.
Best: Roy; ahead of Jeff Hackett and Kolzig.
Playoffs: Belfour; ahead of Roy and Joseph.
2000-01: Vezina: Hasek; ahead of Roman Cechmanek and Brodeur.
Best: Cechmanek; ahead of Burke and Hasek.
Playoffs: Roy (Conn Smythe); ahead of Turek and Joseph.
2001-02: Vezina: José Theodore; ahead of Roy and Burke.
Best: Theodore; ahead of Roy and Burke.
Playoffs: Irbe; ahead of Roy and Patrick Lalime.
2002-03: Vezina: Brodeur; ahead of Marty Turco and Belfour.
Best: Turco; ahead of Roy and Cechmanek.
Playoffs: J.S. Giguère (Conn Smythe); ahead of Brodeur and Lalime.
2003-04: Vezina: Brodeur; ahead of Miikka Kiprusoff and Roberto Luongo.
Best: Kiprusoff; ahead of Luongo and Theodore.
Playoffs: Kiprusoff; ahead of Nikolai Khabibulin and Evgeni Nabokov.
2004-05: NHL lockout. Booooooooooooooo!
2005-06: Vezina: Kiprusoff; ahead of Brodeur and Henrik Lundqvist.
Best: Kiprusoff; ahead of Lundqvist and Tomas Vokoun.
Playoffs: Dwayne Roloson; ahead of Ilya Bryzgalov and Cam Ward (Conn Smythe).
2006-07: Vezina: Brodeur; ahead of Luongo and Kiprusoff.
Best: Kiprusoff; ahead of Niklas Backstrom and Lundqvist.
Playoffs: Luongo; ahead of Giguère and Turco.
2007-08: Vezina: Brodeur; ahead of Nabokov and Lundqvist.
Best: Giguère; ahead of Backstrom and Kiprusoff.
Playoffs: M.A. Fleury; ahead of Osgood and Lundqvist.
2008-09: Vezina: Tim Thomas; ahead of Steve Mason and Backstrom.
Best: Thomas; ahead of Vokoun and Luongo.
Playoffs: Fleury; ahead of Osgood and Jonas Hiller.
2009-10: Vezina: Ryan Miller; ahead of Bryzgalov and Brodeur.
Best: Miller; ahead of Nabokov and Kiprusoff.
Playoffs: Jaroslav Halak; ahead of Antti Niemi and Michael Leighton.
2010-11: Vezina: Thomas; ahead of Pekka Rinne and Luongo.
Best: Thomas; ahead of Rinne and Luongo.
Playoffs: Thomas (Conn Smythe); ahead of Jimmy Howard and Luongo.
2011-12: Vezina: Lundqvist; ahead of Jonathan Quick and Rinne.
Best: Lundqvist; ahead of Halak and Brian Elliott.
Playoffs: Quick (Conn Smythe); ahead of Lundqvist and Mike Smith.
2012-13: Vezina: Sergei Bobrovsky; ahead of Lundqvist and Niemi.
Best: Bobrovsky; ahead of Craig Anderson and Lundqvist.
Playoffs: Corey Crawford; ahead of Quick and Tuukka Rask.
2013-14: Vezina: Rask; ahead of Semyon Varlamov and Ben Bishop.
Best: Rask; ahead of Bishop and Lundqvist.
Playoffs: Quick; ahead of Lundqvist and Rask.
2014-15: Vezina: Carey Price; ahead of Rinne and Devan Dubnyk.
Best: Dubnyk; ahead of Price and Fleury.
Playoffs: Crawford; ahead of Bishop and Lundqvist.
Honestly, before starting with this exercise, I thought the one-hit wonders would be more numerous and would help determine which one goalie stood out in an era, with two to five sub-contenders per, but a far cry behind. For example, when Patrick Roy had his coming out party in the 1986 playoffs, I was under the impression that he relegated Grant Fuhr and Mike Vernon to second-tier status - which he did - but the podium didn't just have two spots, as John Vanbiesbrouck, Tom Barrasso, Réjean Lemelin and Andy Moog also put in a good number of strong seasons, well into the 1990s for all except Lemelin.
And let's be honest: while I did my best to ignore Ed Belfour's milestones and achievements while he was playing, he was a definite top-10 goalie most times, and could have runs where he was top-5. Same thing for Dominik Hasek; there were years when the Buffalo Sabres' system protected him so well his job was almost too easy, but there are others where he was leading the elite by too wide a margin to ignore.
And while many claim the same about Martin Brodeur, this was a worthwhile exercise to show that GMs (who vote for the Vezina) can and do make mistakes, as can be attested by his run of 1998-02 where his save percentage was .906 three of four years and still he finished in the top-5 for voting, on a team so well defended that he saw less than 25 shots per game, none of them from the slot. That was followed by 4 Vezinas in 5 years and a runner-up in the middle, usually with a save percentage 15 points below that of the league leader.
Which leads, using 5 points for a first place, 3 for second and one for third, plus 5 for extra NHL Awards not counted here, to the following aggregated results of 29 goalies with over 10 points:
Patrick Roy: 117 points
Dominik Hasek: 60 points
Martin Brodeur: 40 points
Tom Barrasso: 37 points
Grant Fuhr: 34 points
Ed Belfour: 32 points
Miikka Kiprusoff: 31 points
Mike Vernon: 30 points
Tim Thomas: 30 points
Henrik Lundqvist: 29 points
Billy Smith: 28 points
Ron Hextall: 27 points
Jonathan Quick: 21 points
John Vanbiesbrouck: 19 points
Jean-Sébastien Giguère: 18 points
Carey Price: 18 points
José Theodore: 16 points
Andy Moog: 16 points
Roberto Luongo: 16 points
Corey Crawford: 15 points
Pelle Lindbergh: 13 points
Pete Peeters: 12 points
Chris Osgood: 12 points
Tuukka Rask: 12 points
Olaf Kolzig: 11 points
Réjean Lemelin: 11 points
Curtis Joseph: 11 points
Marc-André Fleury: 11 points
Devan Dubnyk: 11 points
I guess it's safe and fair to say anyone with over 30 has had ''their era'' (damn you, Brodeur!), and that Lundqvist and Quick will likely get there as well. Crawford, Rask and Price could, although Price will need to repeat his 2014-15 many times for that to happen.
What I get from this is that Billy Smith and Fuhr owned the early-to-mid 1980s, that Barrasso almost had the mid-80s were it not for Roy, whose success was constant from 1988 until 2003, though he had to share the glory with Hasek, mostly, from the mid-1990s on, with Brodeur often the third wheel, but far behind.
Tim Thomas had an almost unprecedented level of success in a three-year run, but the early-to-mid-00s saw a Kipper dominance, and Lundqvist has held the mantle almost alone since, save for Quick in the playoffs and Rinne as this generation's third wheel.
Gotta love Pacific's craze for jersey cards in the first half of the 00s. It saturated the market with game-used collectibles and brought the price of many previously-rare items to an affordable low... until Upper Deck lost patience and struck back-room deals with the NHL and NHLPA for exclusive rights to NHL merchandise.
Still. This beautiful black patch of the Florida Panthers' third jersey (despite the card depicting Roberto Luongo in the team's white jersey) can often be had for around $10 on Ebay, despite its 'value' nearing $35. It's from the eponymous 2004-05 Pacific set (#16 in the Authentic Game-Worn Jerseys sub-set) and is numbered 424/850, a relatively high number for a limited edition.
I sent Roberto Luongo the following three cards (of him wearing the Florida Panthers uniform, explaining I was trying to gather cards of him in different jerseys) and a fan letter, care of the Vancouver Canucks, on November 29th, 2010:
I got them all back on February 2nd, 2011, unsigned, with a printed letter saying he'd enclosed an autographed picture to thank me for writing. Which would be this one:
I looked around the web to see if others had had the same picture, trying to find out if it was a real sig or an autopen; 150 Google Image pages later, I've come to the conclusion that it's real, based on the fact that there are tons of different of such pics, mine being the only one I've seen of his glove-hand catching the puck and the signature overlapping on his left-leg pad.
If anyone can attest to the contrary, I'd be glad to know and correct the post.
I must admit I was surprised when Twitter showed #RIPKirk trending among Vancouver Canucks fans with one man specifically asking Canucks fans to tweet a farewell to his father "Kirk", who had "just passed away". It turns out it's either a hoax or just someone sharing the same same name, not the guy featured wearing the team's beautiful 1985-1997 black uniform on card #16 from Donruss' 1995-96 Donruss set:
You might not be able to see it, but Kirk McLean signed it for me in fading black sharpie via snail mail to the Canucks a few years ago. I was a Brian's man myself, but I'm hit with a bit of nostalgia looking at those Vaughn pads and glove (I could do without the brown blocker).
McLean to me is part of the trifecta of Best Canucks Goalies with Roberto Luongo and Daniel Bouchard, not quite the Hall Of Famer Luongo was, but a two-time Vezina nominee nonetheless, the guy who stopped 52 shots in Game 1 of the 1994 Stanley Cup Final to lead Vancouver to a 3-2 win over destiny's New York Rangers.
He won the Molson Cup (most Three Stars selections) honours three times at a time when Pavel Bure and Trevor Linden were on the team, which says a lot about the weight he carried on the ice. He's also participated in the 1990 and 1992 All-Star Games and played for Team Canada at the 1990 World Championships, finishing in fourth place.
In ten and a half years in Vancouver, he got to write a lot of the team's record book, and most of the enviable ones (wins, shutouts) were beaten by Luongo in some 70 fewer games, but he still has those for games played, playoff games played (68 vs 64), playoff wins (34 vs 32) and losses.
he's also played for the New Jersey Devils, Florida Panthers and New York Rangers, but he'll always be Vancouver's Goalie In Black to me. With this regular-sized card, he knocks Luongo's 4x6 picture off my Canucks Numbers Project for #1.
(team and product links go to sponsored Amazon products, player links go to related pages on my blog, news links go to source pages)
Just like last year, I decided to purchase two boxes of this year's lower-end product, the 2011-12 Score set by Panini. I've liked Score since its late-80s baseball sets and became more of a fan when they made the move to hockey in 1990-91 with all the other manufacturers.
After their initial season, however, their designs weren't as fun, their featured rookies were awful, and my interest waned. History seems to be repeating itself.
This year's set contains 550 cards: 35 ''highlights'' cards, 465 regular cards and 50 rookies. Additionally, there are 20 ''short-print'' rookie cards, which happen to be the best ones - from Ryan Nugent-Hopkins to Gabriel Landeskog, with Alexei Yemelin and Sean Couturier thrown in for good measure - and a flurry of sub-sets. View the complete checklist here.
At a buck per pack, 36 packs per box and 7 cards per pack, these are the most affordable hockey cards on the market, even though very few cards will ever be worth the 15 cents average you're purchasing them at; what you want are the inserts, preferably the autographs. I managed to get a redemption card for one, which will be a rookie to boot (just like last year's Jordan Eberle, only this time, a player I have no clue about, Carson McMillan). Most of the rest will be used to gather autographs, although I'll probably try to sell the Alex Ovechkin and Sidney Crosby cards along with a few rookies on Ebay for a buck apiece, trying to get at least a third of my money back.
Score's strengths, like Upper Deck's O-Pee-Chee line, resides in the number of cards in its set, where it's not just the NHL's top-100 scorers, but also a few role players who nowadays don't appear as frequently in card sets. Collectors and autograph-seekers such as myself appreciate that a lot.
But lower-end sets sell at less and probably make the company a whole let less cash, so cost-cutting measures such as having the autograph cards be the same as the regular ones albeit with a sticker on which the player's signature is affixed are now widely accepted. Others, however, such as these two cards of Jason Pominville from box #2 with the exact same picture are downright insulting, especially when you get them in the same pack:
And while we're at it, can we talk about the cheap design? The lines on the side are reminiscent of last year's Donruss set by the same company, but with an added white border comes off like its trashy cousin.
Add that to the fact that some pictures are too light as if the camera's flash was too intense (or, more likely, Panini went overboard on Photoshop):
(actually, the scan makes these look much better than they do in real life)
others are too dark, like they were taken in a minor-league arena in the 1980s:
and others yet just have the colours looking all kinds of wrong:
If I didn't intend on just getting most of these signed, as a collector being given this sub-par product, I'd be pissed off. In this day and age of people not having jobs let alone any money, Score is showing tremendous disrespect to its clientele.
And that's saying nothing of this Nik Antropov card, with a picture snagged at the awful press conference that passed for the Winnipeg Jets' jersey unveiling:
Anyhow, here is how the first box broke down:
36 packs, 7 cards per: 252 cards
Regular cards: 134
'Glossy' parallel: 35, including two 'Highlights' cards, and a few stars including Tim Thomas, Daniel Sedin, Henrik Sedin, Ilya Kovalchuk and Patrice Bergeron.
'Gold' parallel: 1
Hot Rookies: 19, the biggest name being Blake Geoffrion, and one of the cards being a short-print, Ryan Johansen.
Playoff Heroes: 2
Sudden Death: 2: Ilya Kovalchuk and John Tavares.
The Franchise: 1, Jeff Skinner.
Net Cam: 3
First Goal: 1, Derek Stepan.
Score B: 1, Corey Perry.
Making An Entrance: 3, Carey Price, Nicklas Lidstrom and Miikka Kiprusoff.
Highlight Cards: 19 regular, two glossy.
Montréal Canadiens (my home team): 10, including 1 rookie (Aaron Palushaj), 1 Making An Entrance (Price), 1 Highlight (P.K. Subban) and 1 Glossy (Andrei Markov).
Plus the redemption card.
------------------------
Here is a breakdown of the second box:
36 packs, 7 cards per: 252 cards
Regular cards: 169
'Glossy' parallel: 35, including five 'Highlights' cards - chief of which a Mario Lemieux Winter Classic card - and a few young stars including Shea Weber, John Tavares, Brayden Schenn, and Tyler Seguin.
'Gold' parallel: 1, Ryan Getzlaf.
'Black' parallel: 1
Hot Rookies: 18, the biggest name again being Blake Geoffrion, and two of Chris Vande Velde - with a short-print, Matt Read.
Playoff Heroes: 1, ironically of Roberto Luongo...
Sudden Death: 2: Alexandre Burrows and Jason Chimera.
The Franchise: 1, Luongo again.
Net Cam: 3, Luongo, Carey Price and Cam Ward.
First Goal: 1, Erik Condra.
Making An Entrance: 3, Patrick Kane, Martin St-Louis and Jamie Benn.
Highlight Cards: 17 regular, five glossy.
Montréal Canadiens (my home team): 10, including 1 rookie (Aaron Palushaj again), 1 Net Cam (Price), and 1 Glossy (P.K. Subban).
Sure, Martin Brodeur is playing the Canadiens tonight, chances are he'll get another shutout, further surpassing Terry Sawchuk, leading the league once again, heading into the Olympics where his team will be favoured to win gold. And chances are he'll add another Vezina trophy to his filing cabinet, and further cement his (undeserved) reputation as ''the best goalie of all time''. Yawn.
The problem with that is that for the past 5 years, Miikka Kiprusoff has been the best goalie in the NHL. He's deserved at least 3 Vezina trophies in that span (Tim Thomas and Evgeni Nabokov could/should have had the others, and maybe one for Roberto Luongo), but Brodeur has practically won them all in what is nothing short of highway robbery.
History will remember Brodeur as the winningest goalie in NHL history, the one with the most shutouts, and the guy who has won most Vezinas in the 2000s, while Dominik Hasek has won the most in the 1990s. Both those facts erase and tarnish the fact that Patrick Roy was the better goalie for most of those two decades (he's even beaten Brodeur in their only Stanley Cup confrontation that went all the way to 7 games, no less), and that, following Roy's retirement, Kiprusoff backstopped a team that wasn't loaded with talent to a Cup Final and several decent regular seasons.
History might also forget that when Brodeur missed half a season to injuries, his replacement, Scott Clemmenson, who had never before played in more than 12 NHL games in a season, played 40, going 25-13-1, a 2.39 GAA (2 shutouts) and a .917 save %; a career backup with stats that rival Brodeur's. Don't tell me it isn't about the system they're playing in. In comparison, when Kipper isn't playing, the Flames usually resort to putting Curtis McElhinney in nets, who has never posted a better-then-.500 record and lets over 3 goals a game in. Kiprusoff, meanwhile, holds the modern-day record for lowest goals-against average in a season, with 1.69...
He has also backstopped Finland to three surprising (considering the country lacks the depth of Canada, Russia, Sweden and Team USA) silver medals: at the 1999 and 2001 World Championships, as well as the 2004 World Cup.
Not bad for a guy who was the Sharks' third-string goalie when the Calgary Flames took a chance on him for a second-round pick.
He is also notable for giving $10 for every save he makes during a season to children's charities - and with the amount of rubber he turns away, that's a hefty sum.
This particular card, from Upper Deck's 2007-08 Trilogy series (Honorary Swatches sub-set, card # HS-MK) shows Kipper in his white Flames jersey moving from right to left to, presumably, make a great pad save before sprawling for the rebound in spectacular fashion for a highlight-reel moment.
For my money, the best goalie of the past 5 years, followed closely by Luongo and Nabokov, with Thomas not too far behind and Cristobal Huet rounding out the Top 5.
It looks more and more like the Buffalo Sabres will finish last in the NHL to ''gain'' a 20% chance of winning the draft lottery and pick first; at the very worst, the last-place team can pick second overall, and there are allegedly at least two ''generational'' players available in this year's crop (Connor McDavid and Jack Eichel).
But the same was also said of Pat Falloon at some point, and Alexandre Daiglewas another ''can't-miss'' sure shot. The point being: it's not just about raw talent; luck, development and environment also comes into play, as does character.
I hope the Sabres or Edmonton Oilerswin the lottery, because I'd like the talented guys who can potentially turn a team around go to a loyal fanbase who deserves it, not build one from scratch. But ideally, I'd go back to how it used to be - and how it remains in the NFL - which is, the team that finishes last picks first. It's the best way to ensure parity, that the rich don't keep getting richer, and that there's a rotation of potential talent.
Representing the Sabres today is Jean-Pierre Dumont, seen here from behind in the team's turn-of-the-millennium white (home) uniform:
It's card #4 of In The Game's 2001-02 Be A Player Signature Series (signed insert of the ''gold'' variant variety, though the scan looks greenish), signed on-card in black sharpie.
Originally a first-round pick (third overall in 1996) of the New York Islanders, he is one of the many blunders of then-GM Mike Milbury, he who traded away an entire Stanley Cup-contending roster of players during his tenure on Long Island, with a stud two-time gold medalist Olympian, former captain and perennial Vezina-nominated goalie (Roberto Luongo), Olympian goalie Tommy Salo, a Norris-winning defenseman and NHL captain (Zdeno Chara), other top-line defensemen (Vladimir Malakhov, Bryan Berard and/orWade Redden, and Bryan McCabe), another two former first-round pick defensemen (Scott Lachance and Canadian Olympian Eric Brewer), an All-Star 100-point center and former NHL captain (the draft pick that became Jason Spezza), an Olympic medalist center who was an NHL captain (Olli Jokinen), the biggest brawns-for-pounds power forward of the 1990s (Todd Bertuzzi), and known pests Jarko Ruutu and Raffi Torres, in addition to Dumont.
Dumont is a six-time 20-goal scorer (with a high of 29 in 2007-08 with the Nashville Predators), eight-time 40-point producer and three of those being 65 or over, with a high of 72 in 2007-08. He got Lady Byng votes four times in his career (though he's only had 20 or less PIMs five times in his career) and retired having surpassed the 800-game, 200-goal, 300-assist and 500-point milestones.
He also has 17 goals, 17 assists, and 34 points in 51 playoff games, including 14 points in 18 games in a fine run by the Sabres in 2005-06.
I played with him in Midget AAA with the Montréal-Bourassa / Collège Français Canadiens in 1994-95, and he went on to play with my high school teammate (with the Notre-Dame Sabres) Jean-Luc Grand-Pierre both in the LHJMQ's Val D'Or Foreurs and the (NHL) Sabres. He also played with Steve Bégin, Luongo, and Francis Lessard on the Foreurs. (My rights belonged to the Laval / Collège Français Titans in 1995-96 and Halifax Mooseheads the following year, but I never officially played in regulation, I was a goon who was tapped to pretend to play goal but instead started a fight; somehow HockeyDB doesn't acknowledge my 100-plus PIMs because I didn't register a complete minute of play for the Titan).
He also played with another of my high school teammates, Ben Guité, with the Preds in 2009-10. His is a small world.
He had started his career with two seasons playing for the Chicago Blackhawks as a complement to sniper Éric Dazé, but was ultimately sent to Buffalo with an aging Doug Gilmour for Michal Grosek, essentially.
Here's a cool return I wasn't expecting when I got home (late) yesterday, over two years in the making, as I'd sent Bryan Allen these two cards when the Montréal Canadiens assigned him to the Hamilton Bulldogs in January 2015:
He signed them in blue sharpie and sent them from (presumably) his home in California.
While he hasn't officially retired yet, he did not play during the 2015-16 season. The former fourth-overall pick of the 1998 draft - behind Vincent Lecavalier, David Legwand and Brad Stuart and ahead of the likes of Vitali Vishnevski (5th), Rico Fata (6th), Manny Malhotra (7th), Nikolai Antropov (10th), Alex Tanguay (12th), Martin Skoula (17th), Dmitri Kalinin (18th), Robyn Regehr (19th), Simon Gagné (22nd), Jiri Fischer (25th), Scott Gomez (27th), Ramzi Abid (28th), Jonathan Cheechoo (29th), Andrew Peters (34th), Mike Fisher (44th), Mike Ribeiro (45th), Brad Richards (64th), Jason LaBarbera (66th), Erik Cole (71st), François Beauchemin (75th), Brian Gionta (82nd), Josef Vasicek (91st), Shawn Horcoff(99th), Jaroslav Spacek (117th), Andrew Raycroft (135th), Chris Neil (161st), Andrei Markov (162nd), Pavel Datsyuk (171st), Michael Ryder(216th), and Karlis Skrastins (230th) - played for parts of five seasons with the Vancouver Canucks before being part of the first Roberto Luongo trade, sending Allen, Alex Auld, and Todd Bertuzzi to the Florida Panthers for Luongo, the draft pick that became Sergei Shirokov and Lukas Krajicek.
It was with the Panthers that he would crack the 20-point barrier (25, in 2006-07), but the 6'5", 220-pound defender was mostly known as a stay-at-home defenseman, often cracking or nearing the 100-PIM mark.
After most of five seasons with the Panthers, he spent a year and a half with the Carolina Hurricanes before signing his final contract, a three-season deal with the Anaheim Ducks, who sent him to the Habs in his last year for oft-maligned forward Rene Bourque.
It therefore made sense to send him cards of his first and almost-last teams; here he is in the Canucks' 1990s dark (away) orca logo uniform, on card #298 from Topps' 2002-03 O-Pee-Chee set and Prospects sub-set, allowing me to use him as #5 in my Canucks Numbers Project:
And here he is wearing what was then the Ducks' alternate uniform and is now their home garbs, on card #15 from Panini's 2013-14 Score set:
Because it's the lone return I'm missing from my 2015-16 mailings, I thought this might be from Torrey Mitchell; the fact that it wasn't keeps me hopeful that that one may yet be coming.
If you didn't know anything about hockey and read about Mariusz Czerkawski's career on Wikipedia or something of that ilk 100 years from now, you'd think he was Brett Hull.
We're talking about the first Polish player to play in the NHL, a guy who, when playing for his national team, accumulated 39 points (27 goals, 12 assists) in 25 Juniors-level games and 34 points (17 goals, 17 assists) in in 36 mens' teams games, despite often being the only NHLer on the roster, more often than not playing against teams made up entirely of stars and semi-stars. He was doing it by himself.
And if, again, you didn't know anything about hockey and read up on the NHL, some teams would would appear as more important than the others, namely the Original Six, and perhaps the 1980s dynasties Edmonton Oilersand New York Islanders. Well, Czerkawski played for both the Oil and the Isles, as well as three Original Six teams: the Montréal Canadiens, Boston Bruins and TorontoMaple Leafs. If you didn't have the context that we do - how they all sucked at the end of the 1990s and early 00s - you'd think he may be the link, the one common thread, between great and historical teams.
And he had two 30-goal seasons, and two more over the 25 mark - in the Dead Puck Era. Heck, his All-Star game participation, in the midst of a 70-point season, was probably fully warranted, seeing as he led the Isles with nearly 30 points more than the team's second-best scorer and the fact that the goalie they used the most that year was Kevin Weekes, with 32 games played (Roberto Luongo followed with 24, and Félix Potvin appeared in 22; Luongo had the best save percentage of them all at .904).
Those of us who followed the latter stages of his career, however, feel he fizzled greatly at the end, putting a damper on a relatively fine career, not unlike Sergei Berezin or Sergei Samsonov.
Here is a card showing him wearing the Habs' white (then-home) uniform, which is #14 of Pacific's 2003-04 Exclusive collection and Authentic Game-Worn Jerseys sub-set:
The back is even super-specific as to where the blue game-worn jersey swatch is from:
It's from his days with the Isles, with a matching picture on the back! That's what I call attention to detail!
The team as it is known now was founded in 1970 and has changed uniforms a lot since, at the rate of once every five years or so, usually in a complete overhaul.
The Canucks' and Sens' players have been the most responsive in answering my requests, I think, when it comes to current players, in the many years since I've started blogging about cards and collectibles, and I've been getting a decent amount of in-pack hits as well to get me started on my quest, with 29/67 worn uniform numbers accounted for so far, which is why I decided to pursue the task.
Here's the list of those I have featured here thus far:
Captains: 5 of 13: Smyl, Lidster, Linden, Naslund, Luongo, H. Sedin
Which means I'm looking to fill these (luckily I have all 4 retired numbers):
4: GM Jim Benning, Gerald Diduck or Nolan Baumgartner would be nice
8: Willie Mitchell and Chris Tanev
9: I sent Zack Kassian mail years ago, might have to ask Brad May instead
11: no one's worn it since Mark Messier's odd turn as a Canuck
13: Nick Bonino's number, Raffi Torres' too
15: the most-worn number in team history
20: I really liked Alexander Semak back in the day
23: Alexander Edler or Marc Bergevin work well here
28: I've been meaning to write Dave Capuano...
29: Aaron Rome or Tom Sestito work
30: I'll try Ryan Miller and Garth Snow
31: Eddie Lack did not respond, I'll try Corey Hirsch
32: I tried Dale Wiese last year, I'll give it more time
34: I probably have a Jassen Cullimore
37: Jarkko Ruutu would be cool
38: Pavol Demitra or Jan Bulis would be nice
39: this is Dan Cloutier's number
42: Josef Beranek wore it first
And the following numbers have only been worn by one or two players:48, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 57, 62, 64, 66, 71, 72, 77, 79, 81, 89 and 96.
(team and product links go to sponsored Amazon products, player links go to related pages on my blog, news links go to source pages)
There were rumblings around the trade deadline that the Florida Panthers were shopping young star forward Jonathan Huberdeau, the third overall pick of the 2011 draft. That was just an invention from TSN's Frank Seravalli, based on nothing but the Cats' interest in the Columbus Blue Jackets' twin free agents-to-be, Artemi Panarin and Sergei Bobrovsky, whom they could add to their roster this summer without giving away any assets whatsoever, let alone a point-per-game responsible two-way forward who is just still 25 years old.
Indeed, Huberdeau and Aleksander Barkov have been the two locomotives running the Panthers' offense for the past few years and no GM in their right mind would even consider making a trade like that, let alone Dale Tallon, who is now in his second patient rebuild of the team he constructed into a division champion three years ago only to see his successor Tom Rowe destroy it in a single summer.
Huberdeau has not let himself be bothered by such rumours and currently stands at 22 goals, 52 assists and 74 points in 69 games and was just named the NHL's First Star Of The Week with 9 points in 4 games.
The 2012-13 Calder Trophy winner now sports an "A" on his jersey, demonstrating how important he is to the team's young leadership core, with captain Barkov, defenseman Aaron Ekblad (still just 22!), Vincent Trocheck and Frank Vatrano, as well as veterans Roberto Luongo, Evegeny Dadonov and Keith Yandle, not to mention a certain Mike Hoffman, if he can keep out of trouble.
Of course, Luongo's nearing retirement (or a buyout, which would actually affect the Vancouver Canucks, not Florida), and I don't see a goalie in the system ready to pick up the mantle, so the Bobrovsky rumours may very well be founded - and all teams should be going after Panarin, possibly the best in-his-prime impactful free agent of all time, on par with Steven Stamkos a few years back and ahead of John Tavares last summer. But those two need to be added to a roster that includes Huberdeau, Barkov and Trocheck, not replace any of them.
Huberdeau was in Montréal in January, signing two cards for me in blue sharpie (with his number, 11, tagged at the end); first, showing him in the team's best-looking red uniform ever (with the team's 20th anniversary patch on the chest) is card #198 from Upper Deck's 2014-15 O-Pee-Chee set:
There is also the matching white (away) uniform from the same era, from Upper Deck's 2015-16 Series 2 set (card #337 in the series):
In terms of white uniforms, I would classify this one as tied for second with the current one, but I preferred the team's original digs. There was something about that design with the horizontal arm stripes that just worked well in white.
So, uh... who are the best goalies in the NHL, some 10-15 games in?
Mike Condon leads the league in goals-against average (1.57) and ranks in the top-10 in wins (6) and top-5 in save percentage (.940), so he's a candidate. Henrik Lundqvist is tied with Jake Allen and Michal Neuvirth for the lead in save percentage (.945), is fourth for GAA (1.80) and has the second-most number of wins (7), while Allen's two shutouts leave him with a 1.71 GAA and Neuvirth leads the league in shutouts (3).
Jaroslav Halak (1.85, .928 and 2 shutouts), Carey Price (2.01, .936, 7 wins and 2 shutouts), Jimmy Howard (2.01, .934), Corey Crawford (6-4-1 and 2 shutouts on a team not expected to gel until Christmas) and Frederik Andersen (2.03, .935) are also having fine seasons, as expected.
But if one goalie played like an MVP, like a Hart winner this season, it's without Marc-André Fleury, who stands third in GAA (1.74), sixth in save percentage (.939) has the second-most shutouts (2) and a 7-5-0 record on a team that scores 2.21 goals per game. I'm not even sure the Pens win even one game this year without his stellar goaltending; he's this season's Price/Devan Dubnyk so far.
It's not something that was expected just a few years ago, after a second (or third) consecutive poor playoff showing, but with the help of a sports psychologist, he's been able to recover and has been a bright spot for Pittsburgh even in the postseason, and has been their saviour this year as well while Sidney Crosby takes his time getting in gear.
For a few seasons now, when asked who the best Canadian goalies were in the NHL, Price, Crawford and Roberto Luongo would be my go-to guys, but Flower's making it hard to bypass him now - and this year, he might even be The Guy who'd get the nod to start, because many a coach would want to ride the hot hand.
Which brings me to this card I got in a jersey card trade a little more than six months ago, from Upper Deck's 2014-15 Series 1 set (card #GJ-MF of the Game Jersey sub-set), showing him playing for Team Canada with an IIHF-game-worn two-colour jersey patch:
He played for Canada three times, winning consecutive World Juniors silver medals in 2003 and 2004 (earning Top Goalie honors the first time), as well as a gold medal as the back-up at the 2010 Olympics in an all-Quebecer trio with Luongo and Martin Brodeur.
Jean-Pierre Dumont was drafted third-overall by the New York Islanders in 1996 following a 105-point season (48 goals and 57 assists in 66 games) with the LHJMQ's Val d'Or Foreurs. He was part of a stable of high-end talent that was traded away by "Mad" Mike Milbury, then team's GM. Imagine this roster from 1996 to 2001 (assuming All-Star Zigmund Palffy would still get traded because of his contract demands):
With eventual turnover (2001-2006, when he was fired) from the likes of: Sean Bergenheim (grinder), Frans Nielsen (middle-six forward), Robert Nilsson (middle-six forward), Bruno Gervais (third-pair D), Petteri Nokelainen (middle-six forward), Blake Comeau (sandpaper second-liner), Chris Campoli (third-paid D), Kyle Okposo (first-line forward), Andrew MacDonald (third-pair D), Mariusz Czerkawski (top-sic forward), Rick DiPietro (goalie) and three dozen prospects who could have panned out in a better environment.
That has the makings of a consistent playoff team, and one can argue that different draft choices (Zach Parise, Brent Burns, Ryan Kesler, Mike Richards, Corey Perry, Patrice Bergeron, Corey Crawford, Shea Weber, and Joe Pavelski were still available when Nilsson was chosen 15th overall in 2003, for instance) would also have made a huge difference as well.
Instead, the Isles were perpetually in the bottom of the NHL standings while Dumont carved himself a nice NHL career, ending with over 500 points on the strength of 214 goals, 309 assists and 364 penalty minutes in 822 regular-season games and another 34 points (17 goals and 17 assists) in 51 playoff games, including a deep run to the Eastern Conference Final in 2005-06 with the Buffalo Sabres (14 points in 18 games).
He was bought out by the Nashville Predators following the 2010-11 season and played the 2011-12 season overseas with SC Bern in Switzerland, finishing his playing career with solid numbers: 8 goals, 23 assists and 31 points (with 26 penalty minutes and a +6 rating) in 31 regular-season games - good for fourth on the team despite playing 16 to 19 games fewer than those ahead of him, none of whom had more than 10 points more tahn he did - and another (team-leading) 5 goals, 8 assists and 13 points in 12 playoff games as the team made its way to the league final, losing to Bob Hartley's Zurich Lions.
In honour of Canada Day, I wanted to include Dumont as #18 in my Team Canada Numbers Project, with card #271 from Upper Deck's 1998-99 Collector's Choice set and World Junior Showcase sub-set, where he is shown battling for the puck with a Finnish player:
He actually went pointless in 7 games with Team Canada at the World Juniors in 1998, as the team finished eighth in the standings - Finland won gold, ahead of Russia and Switzerland - under disgraced head coach Réal Paiement (now a Toronto Maple Leafs scout). The team's leading scorers were Josh Holden (4 points), Alex Tanguay, Daniel Tkaczuk and Daniel Corso (3 apiece), and the top defensemen were Brewer, Sean Blanchard, Brad Ference and Corey Sarich. Other notable forwards were Vincent Lecavalier, Matt Cooke, Jason Ward, Manny Malhotra and Steve Bégin, while goaltending duties were handled by the Québec duo of Mathieu Garon (1.91 GAA in 5 games) and Luongo (2.89 in 3 games).
Dumont signed this card for me roughly five years ago, at a Foreurs event; the team had retired his #96 nearly a decade earlier.
Writer, mostly, in mediums diverse and similar: musician, film-maker, poet - not the bad type, nor the pretentious type. It's more that I suck at everything except producing words and shouting ideas at people. Oh, and I'm the guy who brings you UnPop Montreal yearly, helping the little guy get a voice in this variety-deprived city.
' third jersey (despite the card depicting 
in the team's white jersey) can often be had for around $10 on Ebay, despite its 'value' nearing $35. It's from the eponymous 
set (#16 in the Authentic Game-Worn Jerseys sub-set) and is numbered 424/850, a relatively high number for a limited edition.
, 
uniform, explaining I was trying to gather cards of him in different jerseys) and a fan letter, care of the 
, on November 29th, 2010:
