Nathan Marsters Autograph Card

Posting about Jean-Sébastien Giguère last night got me thinking about this former prospect, Nathan Marsters, seen here wearing the AHL's Portland Pirates' beautiful red (away) uniform, from In The Game's 2005-06 Heroes And Prospects Series 2 set:

It's card #A-NM in the series, with a black-sharpied on-sticker autograph affixed to it.

Masters was picked 165th in the 2000 draft by the Los Angeles Kings but they let him go a few years later and he signed on as a free agent with the Anaheim Ducks. He never got to play in an NHL game, but he did suit up for one when Giguère fell to injury in practice in 2005-06.

His 23-9-2 record (with a 3.10 GAA and .900 save percentage in 37 games) with the Pirates that year would prove to be his best professional record, save for a .917 and 2.61 performance in an 8-game stint with the CHL's Laredo Bucks the following year.

After a couple of seasons with a GAA near 4.00 in the ECHL, he tried his luck in Germany in 2007-08, playing 9 games for the Krefeld Penguins.

We'll never know if he would have pulled an Andrew Hammond on the hockey world, because he died in the summer of 2009, his truck being the second that hit a deer, which crushed his windshield and hit him directly.

He is survived by his wife, Olivia.