Wednesday, December 18, 2019

Jeff Zatkoff Autograph Card

How many Pittsburgh Penguins goalies can I feature in a single month? After Eric Hartzell and Johan Hedberg, it's time to look at Jeff Zatkoff again and see what he's been up to for the past couple of years.

He last played in the NHL with the Los Angeles Kings in 2016-17, but his .900 save percentage and the fact that the Kings acquired Peter Budaj and Ben Bishop during the season made him more than expendable, so he was traded to the Columbus Blue Jackets, only seeing time in 17 games with the AHL's Cleveland Monsters in 2017-18 before moving to Germany to play for the Straubing Tigers, where he's been the clear #1 ever since.

His save percentage was better last year (.910) than it is now (.900), so I'm not certain we'll be seeing the 32-year-old in the NHL again any time soon.

One thing no one can take away from him is his name on the Stanley Cup as a member of the 2016 Penguins - the year Phil Kessel should have won the Conn Smythe - appearing in 14 regular-season games and 2 post-season games, sharing in goaltending duties with Matt Murray and Marc-André Fleury.

Here he is wearing the Pens' Reebok-era black (home) uniform, on the signed insert version of card #118 from Panini's 2013-14 Dominion set and Dual Rookie Class sub-set:
It features an on-card blue-sharpied autograph and is numbered 202/299. Of note, he actually wore #37 for both the Penguins and Kings, but this was from a training camp before he was given that number, so he's wearing #36 instead.

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