I have written about another Michael Ryder card here, and about other cards in this series here, but I never actually went further in talking about Ryder.
He is a player who, twice, has reached the 30-goal plateau, both times with the Montréal Canadiens. He has also scored 25 (with Montréal) and 27 with the Boston Bruins last year. He also has a terrible 14-goal season with the Habs.
So he can score. His wrist shot is actually what keeps him at the NHL level, because despite his size, he doesn't hit so much, isn't all that quick, and isn't the most reliable defensively. Additionally, he tends to score in streaks.
Knowing all this is why coach Guy Carbonneau didn't give him his usual playing time in 2007-08 (his 14-goal season), because he was, basically, on a season-long no-goal streak. He was a healthy scratch for 12 games, most of them at the tail end of the season, and he only played 4 of the team's 13 playoff games, registering no goals and no assits, instead keeping busy in the press box by eating popcorn and throwing paper airplanes at the crowd.
I'm sure you can tell he wasn't one of my favourite players (I prefer my snipers to be gritty), but you had to respect the fact that he was the only Newfie in the NHL for most of his career so far. All in all, I'm not sad that he's gone, but I'm not happy about it either. Over time, he has left me with a general impression of ''meh''. I just hate that he went to our historic rivals the Bruins just so he could haunt us six times per regular season, plus the playoffs.
So I still keep this one in my collection, but for the right price - think $5 - this 2006-07 SP Game-Used Edition card (#AF-RY) by Upper Deck could end up in your hands. It's from when Upper Deck could actually certify that the jersey in the card had actually been used in an official game by the player on the card - a territory they don't dare to venture in anymore.
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