Tim Raines Swatch Card

It's finally done!

My favourite baseball player of all time and childhood hero Tim Raines will enter the Hall Of Fame, as a member of the Montréal Expos no less, joining Andre Dawson and Gary Carter as such! And, in true Raines fashion, he personally answered a ton of congratulatory tweets before his fingers probably went numb from all the typing. He's just that classy.

Although I have recently lost my day job, I may still make the trip to Cooperstown this summer for the induction ceremony. It could very well be my final nod to baseball, what with my interest in it waning dramatically after the shit that went down in the team's final decade.

And Raines was there nearly until the end; his return in 2001 and subsequent trade to the Baltimore Orioles so he could play with his son - just the second time a father-and-son tandem had played for the same team after the Griffeys (Ken and Ken Jr.) - were probably the lone heartwarming story after Pedro Martinez' Cy Young win in 1997, which makes for just two feel-good stories after the 1994 Players' Strike.

And so I present you with a card I traded for this summer (for a bunch of signed basketball and baseball cards), #SS-TR from Upper Deck's 2008 Sweet Spot set and Sweet Swatch Memorabilia sub-set:

It shows him wearing the Expos' classic powder-blue (away) uniform, but contains a white game-worn jersey swatch.

Shaun Alexander Jersey Card

Shaun Alexander was kind of a big deal.

2005 NFL MVP, which led him to sign the biggest running back contract in history up to that point. An NFL-record 28 touchdowns and a Seattle Seahawks-record 1,880 rushing yards. Three Pro Bowls. An NFL-record of rushing for over 100 yards in nine straight games against divisional opponents. He holds Seahawks records for career yards rushing (9.429), rushing touchdowns (100) and total touchdowns (112). He made the NFL's 2000 All-Decade Team. He was an impact player.

Then the injuries hit in 2006, and the fans started booing him. Then the Seahawks let him go, leading him to sign with the Washington Redskins in October of 2008, but they almost never used him. Then they let him go themselves.

Nowadays, he hosts a football-and-Christian podcast out of D.C., where he and his family have decided to settle, away from the pressure of being a full-time celebrity in Seattle. They have a farm... and nine children. Who are home-schooled. That's a lot of time in the family circle talking about Jesus, but whatever works to make good people is fine by me.

Here he is on card #IR-SA from Topps' 2008 Stadium Club set and Impact Relic sub-set, which I got in a multi-sport repack around 2010:

It shows him as a member of the Seahawks, wearing the white (away) uniform, with a blue game-worn jersey swatch right in the middle.

Gaston Gingras: 8 Autographed Items

And score another TWO for my Habs Numbers Project!

That's right, Gaston Gingras can account for both #2 and #29 in the project, so I don't have to look for expensive Doug Harvey (2) or Ken Dryden (29) cards or memorabilia.

Gingras was drafted in the second round (27th overall) by the Montréal Canadiens in 1979, after a successful Juniors career with the Kitchener Rangers and a fine WHA season with the Birmingham Bulls in 1978-79 (13 goals and 34 points in 60 games).

A smooth skater with a hard slap shot, but not quite a Hall Of Famer, he had a hard time establishing himself on a stacked Habs team at first, and was traded to the Toronto Maple Leafs after parts of four seasons in which he still managed to score a point in every two games; after 109 games in two and a half seasons with the Leafs in which he was on the score sheet 57 times, he was dealt back to the Canadiens, who sent him to their AHL farm team, the Sherbrooke Canadiens. The team comprised of youngsters Patrick Roy, Claude Lemieux, Brian Skrudland and Stéphane Richer won the Calder Cup in 1984-85, and they all graduated to the main club the following season, helping the Habs to their 23rd Stanley Cup in 1986.

He would play another year in Montréal before getting traded to the St. Louis Blues two games into the 1987-88 season, and would also play with them the following year, before setting his sights on Europe as a player-coach, first in Switzerland, then Italy, before coming back and doing the same in North America, with the AHL's Fredericton Canadiens first, then the ECHL's Chesapeake Icebreakers.

He remains a teacher at heart to this day, hosting weekly hockey clinics in the Western part of Montréal (Louis Leblanc is an alum), in addition to his regular participation in NHL and Canadiens alumni games.

And so I wanted to pay tribute to all aspects of his career with the Canadiens when I made these custom Hell's Kitchen 2013-14 Series 2 cards, first with the B (checking the Chicago Blackhawks' Grant Mulvey hard into the boards in a fight while wearing the #2 sweater) variant of card #35 in the series on the left, then the A ''regular'' version, wearing #29 in an alumni pre-game skate, both with the Habs' classic red (then-away) uniform:

I also made a C variant, a frame-style card with an action photo of him in the Habs' white (then-home) uniform, with the same jersey juxtaposed in front of it, both of him wearing #2, so from his first stint with the team:

Those were sent to him (care of the Canadiens Alumni) with a fan letter on April 9th, 2014, with the following ''official'' card, from O-Pee-Chee's 1980-81 O-Pee-Chee set (card #322 in the set), from a lot of old cards I bought at a flea market as a kid:

I received those four back 175 days later - on October 1st, 2014 - signed in black sharpie, with the following two team-issued cards of him wearing the white uniform, but deliberately associating him with the not-yet-retired #29:

On the left, with the blue border, is a card from the 1999 Molson Export Habs set of past players, while the one on the right, with the red border, is from the Centennial-related 2008 Molson Export Montréal Canadiens Alumni collection.

He also signed the two index cards I'd included to protect the cards:

Kitana Baker Prop (Baseball Cap) Card

Kitana Baker's career has really taken off since first being ''discovered'' through Playboy's Girls Next Door contest, gaining major fame through her Miller Lite commercials in 2002 as one of the ''Catfight Girls'' with fellow model Tanya Ballinger, enough to start hosting shows on E! and The Playboy Channel, and to have cameos on WWE programming.

She has had small parts in such films as Auto Focus, Intolerable Cruelty and The Scorpion King, as well as in the 2008 flop B-movie-with-decent-actors-in-it Toxic, alongside Tom Sizemore, Susan Ward, Dominique Swain, Danny Trejo, Bai Ling, Lochlyn Munro and rapper Master P.

She was a Benchwarmer regular from 2003 until 2010, and this card is from packs of the brand's 2008 Signature Series collection:

As stated on the front of the card and obvious because of its colour, this ''Prop Card''  (#PC 7 of the 15 in the set) features a piece of the baseball cap she's sporting in the picture, possibly the largest item of clothing she has on. It just might be the thickest card I own, at nearly half an inch.

It is one of two BW swatch cards I own (unless I have another one hidden somewhere that I'm forgetting about) and is probably the one with the highest ''book value'' though, like most of my cards, I don't plan on ever selling it.

I do still have unopened boxes of this set, though; I might sell those some time in the future.

Kurt Russel Swatch Card

It seems Kurt Russell's career is intimately linked to Elvis Presley's. Indeed, Russel's first film part was in the King's It Happened At The World's Fair, and he actually played him in the eponymous 1979 film Elvis, as well as voiced him in Forrest Gump. Not just that, but he also played an Elvis impersonator with alleged ties to the King in the under-appreciated 3000 Miles To Graceland.

He has other themes throughout his career, like playing in Disney movies, from 1969's The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes to 1972's Now You See Him, Now You Don't to 1975's The Strongest Man In the World to the really good hockey-themed Miracle, the 2004 film about Team USA's so-called Miracle On Ice.

Another recurrent theme is his frequent collaborations with director John Carpenter, notably in 1981's Escape From New York, 1982's The Thing, 1986's Big Trouble In Little China and 1996's Escape From L.A.

Other notable films of his include Quentin Tarantino's Death Proof (2007), Ron Howard's Backdraft (1991), and Mike Nichols' Silkwood (1983).

I got this swatch card of his in a pack of Donruss' 2008 Ameriana (card #106 in the set, the swatch card variant is numbered 73/500 and is considered to be of the Stars Materials sub-set).

Phil Goyette Autographed Card

Phil Goyette resides in the same Montréal burrough where he was born almost 80 years ago - Lachine, Québec. He had a glorious NHL career, nearly half spent with his hometown Montréal Canadiens, nearly half with the New York Rangers, a year with the St. Louis Blues and parts of two seasons with the Buffalo Sabres.

He won 4 straight Stanley ups with the Habs (1957 to 1960), a Lady Byng trophy in 1970, some IHL hardware (the MVP and the leading-scorer trophies in 1954-55), and is ranked 59th of all-time in the book 100 Ranger Greats. All said, he scored 207 goals (for 674 points) in 941 regular-season games to go with 17 goals (and 46 points) in 94 playoff games.

I met him at the Habs' Centennial during a team event, and he signed this team-issued 2008 Molson Export Montréal Canadiens Alumni card (#20) in black sharpie.

He stood pretty tall (5'11'', maybe) for a guy who retired in 1972.

Patrice Brisebois: 7 Autographed Items (Part 2)

(continued from the previous post)

After 14 seasons with the Habs, the last 4 increasingly difficult due to fans' discontent, Breezer signed with the Colorado Avalanche as a free agent. He had a career-high 38 points (and second-highest goal total with 10, five less than his 2000-01 best) in his first season, while injuries limited him to 33 games the following season (11 points). He was playing behind Rob Blake and John-Michael Liles at this point in his career.

This card is from Upper Deck's 2005-06 Series 2 set (card #296).

After two seasons away, Brisebois made it back to the Canadiens on back-to-back one-year contracts where he retained his Avalanche jersey number (71), perhaps a way to cut ties with the past and start anew. He played his 1000th NHL game in a Habs uniform, serving as mentor for the team's young defensemen.

The two items I have of this era are both team-issued cards he included in the mailing without my asking. First, a team-issued postcard, which he personalized (transated, it means ''Kindly, Sébastian''):

And this 2008 Molson Export Montréal Canadiens Alumni card (#71), with the team's Centennial shoulder patches:

All in all, a tremendous return (7/5 !!) from a unique homegrown player who is now the team's Player Development Coach, a position in which he'll concentrate on the organization's defensive prospects. It is of note that when I sent him these cards along with a fan letter on March 22nd, he had not yet been named to the position.

Steve Penney: 3 Autographed Cards

I started following hockey a bit during the 1984-85 season and more seriously in 1985-86, when the Montréal Canadiens won an unexpected Stanley Cup on the strength of a miracle performance by rookie goaltender Patrick Roy.

Before Roy, the Habs' net belonged to youngster Steve Penney, who also hails from Ste-Foy, a suburb of Québec City; Penney tended the nets for 54 games in 1984-85, a rare feat at the time, especially for a rookie.

Speaking of his rookie year, the card below is from Topps' 1984-85 O-Pee-Chee set (card #269), Penney's rookie card:

OPC was good for taking most of their pictures for their cards between plays or during pre-game warm-ups, and in the case of goalies, many without a helmet, sporting a towel around their necks as was customary for back-ups at the time.

The card above is from Topps' 1985-86 O-Pee-Chee set (card #4), the season where Penney got a Stanley Cup, serving as Roy's back-up, although the league forgot to engrave his name on the trophy. Still, the Habs gave him a ring and put him in the team's picture.

Penney was kind enough to include the above card as a bonus, one in which he appears in the team's home (white) uniform, which was almost impossible to get from 80s OPC cards. This card is from the 2008 Molson Export Montréal Canadiens Alumni set, created as a complement to the 1999 set in time for the team's centennial.

Ironically, superstar blogger Sal had the same three cards signed at the beginning of the season.

I sent Penney the two O-Pee-Chee cards and a fan letter explaining that his years with the Habs (and Roy's, of course) were what inspired me to be a goalie as a kid on February 13th, 2012. He added the Molson card, signed all three in blue sharpie with his number (37) tagged at the end, and I received them back on February 22nd. Barely more than a week later! What a guy!

Spencer Scott Autograph Card

I wish I would have written this one 25 days ago.. but I didn't have the card yet.

Born on April 4th, 1989, the beautiful model known as Spencer Scott from Dallas, Georgia (a small town not too far from Atlanta) is on the rise.

Eventually, she'd like to be assigned to a brand like Guess? Jeans or Victoria's Secret - and after being Playboy's Miss October 2007, chances are she'll succeed. It has even given her a small role in the Girls Next Door TV series...

For now, she is single, and the most beautiful place she's ever been to is Cancún, Mexico.

Here is a limited (Benchwarmer only 25 made of these purple foil/red back cards) 2008 Benchwarmer Signature Series card (#8 of 12 models who made red back cards). That's why they usually go for $30 or more.

Erik Estrada Material Swatch Card

I heard the cries: ''someone call the cops because Martin Brodeur just stole himself another Vezina nomination!''

Well, here he is, and not just any cop - a member of TV's CHiPs (which was the acronym for ''California Highway Patrol'', by the way), Officer Francis ("Frank") "Ponch" Poncherello, or as he is known in real life, Erik Estrada.

CHiPs was really Estrada's biggest role, and he played in all six seasons of the show's run, although a contractual dispute kept him off the first seven episodes of the fifth season. His regular partner, Larry Wilcox (Officer Jonathan A. Baker) played in the first five seasons. Estrada didn't know how to ride motorcycles before getting the gig, so he had to enter an extensive eight-week program to learn before shooting started; most of the time, Wilcox and Estrada actually rode the bikes themselves and performed the smaller stunts. And throughout the course of the series, they never took their handguns out.

After CHiPs, Estrada worked mainly in Spanish telenovelas (those cheap Spanish-language soap operas) and appeared in many a Reality TV show; he also does voice work in cartoons, namely Sealab 2021. He can also be seen in videos for Bad Religion, Eminem and Butthole Surfers.

In addition to all that, he is always involved in charitable work, as can attest this segment of his Wikipedia page.


This card (#TS-EE), from the 2008 Donruss Americana II set, by the company now known as Donruss Playoff LP (TV Stars materials sub-set) features a square swatch of material guaranteed to have been worn by Mr. Estrada. Look at it, look at its colour: it's pretty obvious it's from a CHiPs uniform, too. It is numbered 467/500.

Erin Tietsort Autograph Card

It seems someone wants me to have every single copy of these Erin Tietsort 2008 Benchwarmer autograph cards (card #26)! Indeed, I had previously written an entry on my three Ebay-purchased copies of this card, and a friend was kind enough to send me a fourth one.

This time, her signature resembles the middle card in my previous entry; they are just about identical.

I wonder how many of these Benchwarmer have produced. I don't think I'm anywhere near.

Although Tietsort is known primarily for being a (beautiful) model, she has also been in two Reality TV shows, Sunset Tan (in which she runs a tanning salon) and Reality Obsessed, a show about Reality TV shows, which shows her behind the scenes of Sunset Tan. She is also MySpace friends with my band.

Erin Tietsort Benchwarmer Autograph Card

Here's a special trio of cards - three Erin Tietsort autograph cards available in packs of 2008 Benchwarmer model cards.

Benchwarmer are the most reknowned model cards manufacturers - ahead of even those by Sports Illustrated and Playboy, but I feel they may be working their girls a little too hard...

Look at these three autographs: they have obvious similarities, namely the 'E' and 'T', but it seems I got cards from each stage of the day she spent signing them, from the beginning when she was happy to clearly sign her whole name, to the middle when she started shortening it, to the very end when, really, it's more of a blur or a doctor's presciption.

All three cards were purchased from Ebay, from different sellers, they just happened to be so drastically different (I didn't even mean to purchase three of a kind, I had just bid on 3 in the hopes of getting 1, as these little buggers sell fast and high).

But Benchwarmer guarantees, on the backs of the cards, that all autographs are genuine. And knowing how other card companies have disappeared from the market for not being true to their word (hello, Pro Set!), I doubt anyone would try fooling their collectors that way again.