The Sedin Twins Dual Jersey Card

I'm not usually one to be happy about pulling cards depicting multiple players, because I store my good ones (personally autographed and ''hits'') in binders, alphabetically, by player. This one of the Sedin twins, however, was ideal, because I can create a sheet with both players in it, both separately and together:

It's card #WC-SS of the 2011-12 SPX set by Upper Deck, part of the Winning Combos/Dual Jersey sub-set, and refers to each's Art Ross-winning season. The incorporated game-worn jersey swatches don't match the pictures next to them, but I've gotten used to that from UD by now.

Henrik Sedin (blue jersey, #33, white swatch) won his for the 2009-10 season, after scoring 29 goals to go with his league-leading 83 assists and 112 points. He also brought home the Hart and a First All-Star Team nod that year, and also got some Lady Byng and Selke votes in the process. He also repeated as First All-Star center the following season.

Daniel Sedin (white jersey, #22, green swatch) earned his after a 41-goal, 63-assist season good for 104 points. He was the runner-up for the Hart (which went to Corey Perry of the Anaheim Ducks), but did earn the Lester B. Pearson Trophy (Best Player, as voted by the players themselves) with his First All-Star Team nod; he'd been voted to the Second All-Star Team the previous year, despite suiting up in just 63 games. He also routinely garners Lady Byng and Selke votes for sportmanlike conduct and two-way play, respectively.

Having played their entire professional careers together, the pair have similar international achievements with Team Sweden as well: Olympic gold (2006), World Championship gold (2013) and bronze (1999, 2001), World U-18 gold (1998) and World U-17 silver (1997).

Daniel has an extra Olympic medal, though: silver at the 2014 Sochi Olympics, Henrik having to miss the event because of a rib injury after a Martin Hanzal cross-check.

As of now, having both played their entire NHL careers with the Vancouver Canucks, their statistics are fairly similar:

Henrik has 211 goals, 704 assists and 915 points in 1092 regular-season games, with another 23 goals, 55 assists and 78 points in 105 playoff games.

Daniel has 327 goals, 554 assists and 881 points in 1061 regular-season games, with another 23 goals, 44 assists and 67 points in 96 playoff games.

They are under contract for two more years, so both will likely surpass the 1000-point mark with the Canucks before then - and they'll be 36 at that point, so perhaps they won't hang 'em up right then either.

Saku Koivu And Chris Higgins Jersey Card (2)

Remember my trade with Dave? Well, here's the last of the memorabilia cards I got in it, from Upper Deck's 2008-09 SPX set (card #WC-KH of the Winning Combos sub-set):

It features former Montréal Canadiens' captain Saku Koivu and his then-heir apparent (you can sort of see the 'A' on his chest at the far-right of his picture) Chris Higgins. Long-time readers might recognize it, because I already had one:

Not that I mind, though, because the swatch colours are different - Higgins' new card has a red one, where the old one was white. More than four years have gone by between acquisitions and, though I'm (relatively) open to trades, I'm happy to have two of these because I can put one in each player's binder.

Both of them now play out West, Koivu an associate captain with the league-leading Anaheim Ducks, Higgins a grinder on the ever-dropping Vancouver Canucks.

Henrik Zetterberg & Nicklas Lidstrom Dual Jersey Card

Present-day captain? Check.
Past captain? Check.
Sure-fire Hall Of Famer? Oh yeah, check, maybe even twice.

From Upper Deck's 2005-06 SPx set (card #WC-RW, the Winning Combos sub-set) comes this numbered (340/350) dual jersey card featuring two Detroit Red Wings stars:

On the left, current captain Henrik Zetterberg, who sent me this tremendous TTM return barely a month ago. His jersey swatch is pinker, must not have been dry-cleaned...

On the right, former captain and best defenseman of his generation, Nicklas Lidstrom, who sent me a TTM return a year ago. I pulled another double-swatch of his a few years back, though he was alone on that card.

I received this in a trade late last week, along with this Saku Koivu, Lars Eller and Alex Galchenyuk card, featured yesterday.

Ray Bourque & Rob Blake Dual Swatch Card

How good were the Colorado Avalanche in the early 2000s? Two former team captains - future Hall Of Famers - came to complement their defense and win Stanley Cups, hitching their wagons on the train led by Joe Sakic, Peter Forsberg and Patrick Roy. Which two?

Raymond Bourque - Mr. Boston Bruins for all of my life - and Rob Blake - leader of the Los Angeles Kings, the team's two-time captain. Bourque is on most people's top-5 defensemen of all time lists, probably mine too.

Though I usually prefer jersey cards of one player, and when there are multiple, that they be of the same team, I can totally live with this, as they are the best one-two punch of the past 25 years not on a national team. That being said, Blake did win Olympic gold with Team Canada in 2002 (and suffered severe losses in 1998 and 2006); he also won gold (1994 and 1997) and silver (1991) at the World Championships and another silver at the 1996 World Cup. Bourque was also part of the 1998 Team Canada fiasco, and played in three Canada Cups (1981, 1984, 1987) and Rendez-Vous '87.

This card was pulled from a pack of Upper Deck's 2005-06 SPX (it's card #WC-BB in the set, part of the Winning Combos insert sub-set). Though they are both pictured with the Avs, Bourque's swatch comes from a Bruins jersey, which is fitting.

Erik Karlsson & Victor Hedman Dual Jersey Card

After meeting with an uncle of mine who has the largest card collection I've ever seen - at least twice that of the biggest card shop I've seen - I might end up keeping my dual swatch cards, or at least hold onto them for a while longer. So far, I'd been mostly trading them away rather than selling, and I'd usually get far less monetary value than I could have anyway.

I'm mentioning this because I fell upon a couple of really nice ones when unpacking/repacking last weekend and figured I'd share. First up, from Upper Deck's 2011-12 SPX set (card #WC-HK, part of the Winning Combos sub-set) comes this Erik Karlsson - Victor Hedman card:

It's pretty hard to argue against a Norris trophy winner and a second-overall draft pick, eh? Although I prefer my combo cards to feature players from the same team (I guess one could argue they both play for Team Sweden), I won't look a gift horse in the mouth... though at $90-140 a box of 18 packs (4 cards per), you'd think one would be entitled to criticize a bit!

When this card was released, Erik Karlsson had just posted a 45-point sophomore season with the Ottawa Senators, but few imagined he was going to capture the Norris right away, but on the strength of a 78-point season, he bested the rest of the class by a whopping 25-point margin. The Sens had proven right to have traded up (from 18th to 15th, with an additional 3rd-round pick thrown in) for him at the 2008 draft, which took place in Ottawa. He has represented Sweden at the 2009 World Juniors in Ottawa (earning a silver medal) and the 2010 World Championships in Koln (bronze).

Victor Hedman came with a little more hype, for a while considered the top prospect of his class - he was eventually drated second-overall by the Tampa Bay Lightning, behind John Tavares and ahead of Matt Duchene, Evander Kane, Brayden Schenn, Oliver Ekman-Larsson and Nazem Kadri. Louis Leblanc was also selected in the first round.

His progress was slow and steady, and he has become a solid top-3 defender, with enough upside to eventually be a #1 not just in Tampa, but on almost any team. We're not talking 'Norris' yet with this one, but reliability is a quality worth something, and his $4M cap hit for 5 seasons is reasonable. He has represented Sweden on the international stage on numerous occasions, at the 2007 Under-18 tournament in Tampere (bronze), the 2007 Ivan Hlinka Classic (U-18 World Cup) in Hodonin (gold), the 2008 World Juniors in Pardubice and the 2009 one in Ottawa (silver both times), as well as the 2010 World Championships in Koln (bronze). He also played for the men's team in 2008 in an exhibition game in Norway, at age 17.

The Karlsson patch is red, likely from the Sens' home jersey - though he is pictured wearing the white (away) one; the Hedman patch is black, and could be from the Bolts' third jersey (which he is shown wearing), or their regular home one, which used to be black.

Phil Kessel And Nikolai Kulemin Dual Jersey Card

I seem to collect these dual Phil Kessel jersey cards, don't I? Well, I don't. So this one and the one linked in the previous sentence are for trade, if anyone's interested. For reason of Leafs and Bruins...

Phil Kessel is currently proving he is a first-line sniper in the NHL because the Toronto Maple Leafs are no longer a laughingstock... although they are a far cry from where they were when the season started. He will be participating in his second straight All Star Game later this month and played in his 400th NHL game in December against... his former team, the Boston Bruins.

Nikolai Kulemin is currently in his fourth season with the Leafs after they chose him in the second round in 2006. He managed to rack up 30 goals and 57 points last year, which is pretty impressive considering he played with Mikhail Grabovski all season long.

This card, from Upper Deck's 2010-11 SPX set, the Winning Combos sub-set (card #WC-KK). The piece of jersey belonging to Kessel is white while Kulemin's is blue, and both are guaranteed to have been used in an official game.

Again, it's for trade.

Saku Koivu And Chris Higgins Jersey Card

My, my how thing change rapidly in sports!

First, let's put this card in context: it's card #WC-KH from Upper Deck's 2008-09 SPX Hockey series; 2008-09 was the beginning of the 15-month span the NHL called ''The Canadiens' Centennial Year'', and to commemorate the 'event', Upper Deck also released a special 'Habs Centennial' set - so they're aware of the team's history, and have a few 'ins' in the team's present.

This card features, on the left, the team's longest-serving captain ever, Saku Koivu, and a red piece of his home jersey. It was widely known that the 2008-09 season was Koivu's final contract year; whether he'd come back or not was a mystery. On the right of the card, with a white patch from the team's away jersey, is Chris Higgins, sporting his alternate captain's A - he'd worn it before, but the summer before the 2008-09 campaign was when he was given the A permanently; from the day he was drafted, he was viewed by the team as the potential next captain. This card, basically, cemented that idea; it was a ''passing of the torch'' thing, full of symbolism.

A year later, Koivu went to the Anaheim Ducks over the summer, and Higgins was traded to the New York Rangers for, essentially, Scott Gomez. The other two drafted-to-be-captains, Mike Komisarek (free agent, to Toronto) and Kyle Chipchura (traded for a sixth-rounder) are also gone; local hero Guillaume Latendresse was traded to Minnesota a few weeks ago and last year's Player With Heart Maxim Lapierre, another local boy, is but a shadow of himself; the team actually has no captain this season.

History was made for the Centennial Season, just not the history that had been planned upon.

''Passing of the torch'', indeed.

Mike Ribeiro - Patrice Bergeron Jersey Card

The Montréal Canadiens - Boston Bruins rivalry has spawned great moments for hockey fans (as well, apparently, as other seasons' SPX sets), and the Montréal-Québec rivalry has spawned countless arguments in Quebecers' families. Here's a card that puts both rivalries to good use - perhaps without even knowing it.

Montréal native Mike Ribeiro, seen here in his former team's jersey, the white Habs uniform, coming off a season where he led the team in points, shares the bill with Québec-born Patrice Bergeron of the Bruins - also in his team's whites.

This card (# WC-MP from Upper Deck's 2005-06 SPX series) is numbered 007/350, and what makes it so special is that Bergeron's side is actually comprised of two colours - back and white - which likely means it was taken from the stripe at the bottom of the jersey, or the sleeve, both of which hold a slimmer chance of making in onto a jersey card as, say, a piece of the chest or back.

Also of note is that this was to be Ribeiro's final year playing for his hometown team, as he was traded to the Dallas Stars before the start of the 2006-07 season, days after having agreed to a raise. In october 2007, Bergeron's playing days were almost over after he suffered a broken nose and 'Grade 3' concussion after a questionable hit from behind by Randy Jones.