Chandler Stephenson: Two Autographed Cards

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Chandler Stephenson had decent statistics in Juniors, nearly a point per game going into the 2012 draft, a point per in 2012-13 after the Washington Capitals made him their third-round pick (77th overall) and 89 points in 69 games in 2013-14, before making the leap to the AHL with the Hershey Bears, where he also improved yearly from 14 to 28 to 38 points, but it was still a toss-up whether he'd end up being a third-liner or on one of the offensive lines, and whether he'd be a winger or a center. He was a full-time NHL rookie in 2017-18 (18 points in 67 regular-season games and 7 points in 24 playoff games) when the Caps won the Stanley Cup.

The Capitals were disappointed with his next season and a half, and he was moved to the Vegas Golden Knights - ironically the team they beat in the Cup Final - midway through last season, and his performance to close out the 2019-20 campaign (8 goals, 14 assists, 22 points and a +19 rating in 41 games) was obviously part of the decision-making process when it was decided the Knights would trade Paul Stastny to the Winnipeg Jets to make room under the salary cap to sign Alex Pietrangelo. With 20 points in 32 games, he's well worth the $2.75M cap hit.

The 2012 draft featured a terrific crop of hardware collectors; among those selected before Stephenson are Tom Wilson (16th, Stanley Cup), Teuvo Teravainen (18th, Cup), Andrei Vasilevskiy (19th, Cup and Vezina Trophy), Olli Maatta (22nd, two Cups), and Tanner Pearson (30th, Cup), and among those selected after him are Oskar Sundqvist (81st, Cup), Matt Murray (83rd, two Cups), Colton Parayko (86th, Cup), Cédric Paquette (101st, Cup), Connor Hellebuyck (130th, Vezina) and Christian Djoos (195th, Cup), as well as a bunch of Cup finalists in Filip Forsberg (11th), Malcolm Subban (24th), Pontus Aberg (37th), Colton Sissons (50th), Chris Tierney (55th), Esa Lindell (74th), Matt Grzelcyk (85th) and Colin Miller (151st), and a dominant Jaccob Slavin (120th).

But the Golden Knights will have to make do without their seventh-leading scorer for the next three games after he was suspended for elbowing Los Angeles Kings defenseman Tobias Bjornfot. This punishment comes on the heels of fines to Connor McDavid (for elbowing forward Jesperi Kotkaniemi of the Montréal Canadiens) and Nathan MacKinnon (throwing a helmet at Conor Garland of the Arizona Coyotes), signaling that star players have started retaliating to the myriad of uncalled questionable shots they themselves have received for the past few years.

Here he is from his Juniors days with the WHL's Regina Pats, first with the white (home) uniform on card #236 from In The Game's 2011-12 Heroes And Prospects Update boxed set:

And here he is wearing their blue (away) uniform, on card #138 from ITG's 2012-13 Heroes And Prospects collection:

He signed them in black sharpie while playing with the Bears in the Capitals organization, adding his jersey number (22) and trying to blend it in with the uniforms.

Anthony Duclair Autographed Card

To many, Anthony Duclair is a mystery inside a riddle inside a maze that is lost somewhere in the vast confines of space. That's because he's a talented winger with all the tools needed to make an impact in today's NHL: tremendous speed, agile hands, a good shot and youth, as he's still just 23 years old.

But he doesn't backcheck hard enough and will make defensive mistakes (like Thomas Vanek still does at age 35, or more fittingly, like 27-year-old Evander Kane used to do, as he's closer to Duclair generationally). Or, as John Tortorella put it in late February, in his hometown of Montréal, with his parents watching the press conference on TV:

Duclair had many options to sign this summer, including a couple of two-year deals, and a two-way contract to play in his hometown (or more likely, a stint with the Montréal Canadiens' farm team, the Laval Rocket under Joël Bouchard's tutelage). Instead, he chose the Columbus Blue Jackets' one-year offer close to league minimum specifically to play under Tortorella, saying:

Before signing here, I talked to a bunch of guys that played for Torts and all I heard were good things. They all said he takes your game to another level and that's what I need, especially at this time in my career. You hear and you see all those interviews on YouTube, and all those rants, it's because he cares. He cares about his players. The main thing I heard is, "If you work hard for him, he'll battle for you."

My agent is Philippe Lecavalier, and his brother is [Vincent Lecavalier]. I talked to him a lot, about what happened in Tampa, when [Tortorella] came in and took the "C" away from him. We talked about what he went through. Then he told me it would be a good fit for me to play for him. It definitely opened my eyes, and it definitely was a no-brainer coming from a guy like that. (...)

If he calls me out, I don't take anything personal. He's just trying to make me a better player. He talks to me privately as well, he doesn't keep anything secret; if he has something to say, he says it, and as a player, you respect that a lot. Some coaches keep it to themselves and you don't get an explanation. He's going to give you that explanation every time. I like the challenge.

As usual, it's one thing to heed the warning, it's another to experience it firsthand. Torts is right in saying The Duke's got all the tools, and it isn't easy for a guy like Duclair, who was a goal-per-game regular-season producer and point-per-game postseason player on a Memorial Cup-caliber Québec Remparts team in Juniors, at point-per-game player on a gold-winning Team Canada club at the World Juniors and a 20-goal scorer in the NHL, to suddenly hear he doesn't know how to play the game, to be forced to play like old teammates of his who were never drafted, to not create plays out of nothing.

But that's the dilemma in the NHL. There are precious few who do not need to play defensively and can get their 50-60 points, but the vast majority of players need to play a perfect two-way game of chess to get middle-of-the-road stats (15-point guys turn in 25-point performances that way, and point-per-game AHLers get their 40-50 NHL points that way too). It evens the game down the middle, with creative plays fewer and further between - but they're still there at times, just once per week instead of once or twice per game; that means players can get a chance to win it for their team that once a week instead of tethering the edge of costing a game per week for their team.

That lesson is what turned Erik Karlsson and P.K. Subban into the best of their profession (although some still make the case that Subban remains risky a few times per year), and that's what separates that elite class from the decent-to-very-good, which holds the likes of Vanek, Ron Hainey in his prime, Morgan Rielly and Mike Reilly at the moment, and many more.

On the other hand, playing within the system is what makes late-round draft picks like Brendan Gallagher and projected spare forwards like Paul Byron into sure-fire 30- and 20-goal scorers.

NHL forwards are considered in their prime from ages 25 to 32; at 25, they're still in the shape they were in at 22, but stronger, and have started to use their experience to their advantage; from 30 to 32 is a stasis, where experience, health and nutrition help keep their production leveled, and after that, the toll on their bodies start showing, they slow down and must rely on their Hockey IQ more and more. Players like Duclair have more "innate hockey reflexes" (pure skill) than "Hockey IQ" (positioning and tactics), but all is not lost for him yet. The colour of his skin may mean a handful of teams in the U.S. might be more hesitant to give him a chance (I really hate to say this, but the past couple of years have shown that racism is not a thing of the past, unfortunately, even if hockey as a sport doesn't come with inherent biases against individuals - at least in my lifetime, it was probably different in Willie O'Ree's day), but he will probably be allowed another, final mulligan in North America before having to resort to playing in Europe if things once again turn sour between now and the end of April.

I just hope it doesn't have to get to that, and that he can find a permanent place within the Ottawa Senators organization. They need each other - but they need the best of what each has to offer, not the noise.

Here he is in happier times, as a member of the New York Rangers, when his future was at its most promising, Manhattan having already given him the nickname "The Duke", his spectacular play already winning the hearts of the team's fans:

That's card #U41 from Upper Deck's 2014-15 O-Pee-Chee Update collection and Marquee Rookie sub-set. I actually bought the unsigned card on Ebay then had him sign it in blue sharpie years later.

Tony Hrkac: Two Autographed Cards

Tony Hrkac was a superstar in College, the 1986-87 Hobey Baker Award recipient after collecting a record 116 points (on the strength of 46 goals and 70 assists) in 48 games, leading the University of North Dakota Fighting Hawks to a national championship. At the time, the team was even known as the Hrkac Circus (both words rhyme).

Before enrolling in college, he had actually been drafted in the second round (32nd overall) by the St. Louis Blues in 1984 after a 106-point season (52 goals and 54 assists in 42 games) in the OJHL (Junior A) with the Orillia Travelways.

His success didn't exactly continue in the NHL, but he did score a team-record 4 goals in a single playoff game in St. Louis before being traded to the Québec Nordiques with shutout leader Greg Millen in exchange for blue liner and powerplay quarterback Jeff Brown.

He didn't stay long in Québec, a season and a half, before they sent him to the San Jose Sharks for Greg Paslawski, and the Sharks themselves sent him to the Chicago Blackhawks just six months later.

All told, he suited up for nine NHL teams, including the Blues and Dallas Stars twice apiece; he also belonged to the Nashville Predators twice, although the first time was for just over a week in the summer, as they had selected him in the expansion draft and sent him to the Stars before he even played a single game with them.

After retiring, he was called upon to start and develop the hockey program at the Concordia University Wisconsin, and his record with the Falcons isn't so great: 10-109-10 over five seasons, leading to his dismissal in 2012.

As a player, I'll always remember him as a member of the Blues and my beloved Nordiques first and foremost, but it is while in his second stint in Dallas that he finally laid his hands on the Stanley Cup - a feat neither of the teams I remember him most by have achieved.

Today, I have decided to feature him with two cards from pretty much the same set, the 1991-92 Score (Canadian Edition) set by Score, first wearing the Nordiques' white (home) uniform which will slot him nicely as #40 in my Nordiques Numbers Project, on card #122 from Series 1, which had cards #1-330:

The same year, as part of Series 2 (home of cards #331-660 in the set, also known as Rookies And Traded or Update), he was featured wearing the Sharks' teal (away) uniform on card #555:

He signed both in (fading) black sharpie, I would say either in February 1994 when the Blues came to Québec to face the Nordiques, or in 1996-97 when he was with the IHL's Milwaukee Admirals facing the Québec Rafales. The latter seems like the best bet.

Fun fact: Series 1 was a bilingual set, while Series 2 was an all-English extension:

Oh, Canada, eh? Where we only care about French (the country's "other official language") and First Nations when tourists are around but are otherwise content to impose the Anglo-Saxon colonists' views and lifestyles the rest of the time.

Peter Bergeron Autographed Card

Last year, I made Peter Bergeron #33 in my Expos Numbers Project. This year, he goes in as #70, with card #U-2 from Fleer/Skybox's 1999 Tradition Update set, which is his rookie card, that he signed in black sharpie:

He's worn a lot of numbers for the Montréal Expos over the years, the result of being a fringe player. I've seen him wearing #70, 30, and 77 in training camp, and 33 and 11 during regular-season play. And that's off the top of my head, although those last few seasons of baseball in town are a bit of a blur.

Oh yeah: fuck Jeffrey Loria, David Samson and Bud Selig. That will be all.

Scott Stewart Autographed Card

Well, it finally looks like summer's here, which is the perfect time to induct the first of at least two more representatives of uniform #51 in my Expos Numbers Project, Scott Stewart:

That's card #U222 from Fleer/Skybox's 2002 Fleer Tradition Update set, which he signed in blue sharpie.

Stewart was originally a 20th round pick of the Texas Rangers and toiled around in the New York Mets' system for a few summers before signing with the Montréal Expos as a minor-league free agent.

He played in Montréal for three of his four years in the MLB, from 2001 until 2003, appearing in 62, 67 and 51 games as a reliever, with a 10-4 record and 20 saves, 17 of them in 2002 as the Expos' closer, although eight pitchers combined for a total of 39 that year.

His 2004 wasn't up to par, though, splitting his time between the Cleveland Indians (0-2 record, 7.24 ERA in 23 games) and Los Angeles Dodgers (1-0, 5.84 ERA in 11 games). He fell off the grid after being let go by the San Diego Padres in 2005.