Tyson Sexsmith Autograph Card

Tyson Sexsmith had a tremendous 2007 Memorial Cup tournament in which he led the Vancouver Giants to the title on the strength of a 1.40 GAA and .936 save percentage in 5 games after a WHL playoffs in which he went 14-7 with a 1.79 GAA and .914 save percentage in 22 games.

The San Jose Sharks chose him in the third round (91st overall) at the 2007 draft, making him the first WHL goalie to hear his name called out that year. He led his Juniors league in goals-against average two years running, and holds the career record for shutouts with 26.

He spent the three seasons after his Juniors career in the Sharks' system, mostly with the AHL's Worcester Sharks, but also suiting up for the ECHL's Kalamazoo Wings and Stockton Thunder. He then plied his trade in three different leagues for the 2012-13 season, first with the KHL's Novokuznetsk Mettalurg (based in Siberia), then with the AHL's Abbottsford Heat, and finishing in Italy for a short playoff run with the Bolzano HC Foxes (which now plays in the Austrian League, EBEL, where they won the championship this year); the Foxes currently has a goalie who bears the same last name as me, Günther Hell, an Italian.

I don't know what became of Sexsmith for the last two years, but I'd like to find out. Panini believed in him enough to feature him in their 2013-14 Score set, as seen here in card #SS-TSE of the Signature sub-set, sporting the nicest Sharks white uniform of all time, which would be even better without the football-style jersey number on the front, above the logo:

It features an on-sticker autograph, signed in thin blue sharpie with the number 31 tagged onto it, though he's pictured wearing #37. This card was an add-on from a trade last year.

Nicklas Lidstrom Jersey Card

His Hall Of Fame career may be over, but I still have a lot of Nicklas Lidstrom cards to feature as I take my important cards from boxes to alphabetized binders, and few are more dear to me than my Lidstroms - the best defenseman of his era, a true gentleman who signed four cards for me roughly three years ago.

He spent his entire career with the Detroit Red Wings, winning four Stanley Cups, seven Norris Trophies, one Conn Smythe, was the first European-born captain to get handed the Cup and stands as the single player who has appeared in the most games (1564) with the same team.

He also has medals of every kind with Team Sweden, from an Olympic gold (2006) to World Championship gold (1991), silver (2004) and bronze (1994), a feat that's hard to achieve on a team that's appeared in 25 straight postseasons (and would usually get past the second round).

He has played in 12 All-Star Games, made the First All-Star Team ten times (1998-2003, 2006-08, 2011) and the second All-Star Team twice (2009, 2010), proving he was an elite player until the very end; he was even fifth in Norris voting in his final season.

He amassed 1142 regular-season points and 183 more in the playoffs, all while facing the opposition's top players, and finished with an astonishing +450 (and +61 in the playoffs). That means he was on the ice for 500 more goals for than against, not counting the powerplay. That's a whole lot of one-sided play.

His individual achievements are superior to that of individual teams'.

Two of his four sons currently play hockey in Swedish leagues, so we may yet hear the Lidstrom last name uttered again, hopefully in Detroit.

Here's a card from back when he was sporting the alternate-captain's ''A'' in the Wings' white (then-home) uniform, from Upper Deck's 2005-06 Series 2 collection (card #J7-NL of the UD Game Jersey sub-set):

It features a red, game-worn jersey swatch and shows him wearing the Wings' classic white uniform.

Jarrod Skalde Autographed Card

I have featured Jarrod Skalde twice before (here and here), focusing on his playing career and unique career path, spanning 19 seasons with a total of 29 teams in 8 leagues and 6 countries.

After retiring from the game, he became a head coach, first as a player/coach with the Bloomington PrairieThunder of the IHL, then winning a championship and best coach award in the ECHL with the Cincinnati Cyclones (a team he'd played for in the IHL in the 1990s) before starting as an assistant and graduating to head coach with the AHL's Norfolk Admirals. As the Admirals' parent team - the NHL's Anaheim Ducks - decided to move their team closer to home to become the AHL iteration of the San Diego Gulls (a team he's played for in the 1990s when it was in the IHL), he and the team agreed to part ways.

It's unclear whether he was tired of moving his family around (though in March, he seemed pleased to move back to an area he and his wife had loved) and/or the Ducks had found the perfect scapegoat for finishing with a 27-39-10 record with a team whose top talent was either in the NHL (John Gibson, Emerson Etem) or injured (Max Friberg, Chris Wagner, Nicolas Kerdiles) - but the fact remains that he is now currently unemployed.

I'm fairly confident he'll find work soon enough - or whenever he's ready, at least; it's what he's always done.

Here he is wearing the New Jersey Devils' white (then-home) 1980s and early-1990s uniform (with red and green as highlight colours instead of red and black), from Score's 1991-92 (Canadian) set (card #282, part of the Top Prospect sub-set), signed in-person in the 1990s in black sharpie:

Adrian Aucoin Autograph Card

Congratulations to the Chicago Blackhawks for their third Stanley Cup in six years. Captain Jonathan Toews received the Cup from commissioner Gary Bettman's hands and immediately handed it to Kimmo Timonen, who can now retire as a champion after having been on the losing end of every championship game he'd ever played in, including the Stanley Cup loss to the Hawks in 2010 back when he was with the Philadelphia Flyers. Timonen had also captained the Hawks' division rival Nashville Predators.

Speaking of defensemen and captains, I thought it was time I featured this card of Adrian Aucoin, wearing the Hawks' black (alternate) jersey, from Upper Deck's 2006-07 Be A Player set (card #AA of the BAP Signatures sub-set):

Aucoin was the Hawks' 42nd captain, following Alexei Zhamnov and preceding Toews (with Martin Lapointe serving in the role when Aucoin was injured and one time where he was a healthy scratch).

While his time in Chicago didn't showcase the best he had to offer nor was the team the powerhouse it is now (yes, I dare call it a Dynasty), Aucoin was a fine top-4 defenseman, often times a top-pairing guy for most of his career.

He hit the 30-point mark six times (with a high of 44 in 2003-04 with the New York Islanders), once held an NHL record for most powerplay goals in a single season by a defenseman (18, in 1998-99 with the Vancouver Canucks, since passed by Sheldon Souray of the Montréal Canadiens), played in the 2004 All-Star Game (and co-winning the hardest shot competition with Souray), hit the 10-goal mark six times and helped the Phoenix Coyotes to a division title and the Conference Finals in 2011-12.

He has also suited up for Team Canada three times, winning gold at the 1993 World Juniors and silver in the 1994 Olympics, and finishing 7th at the 2010 World Championships.

The 6'2'', 220-pound hard-hitting sharp shooter retired after playing the 2012-13 season with the Columbus Blue Jackets. He was one point short of the 400 mark, with 121 goals and 278 assists in 1108 regular-season games, and 6-15-21 in 65 playoff games. There were rumblings of his joining the Hawks in a player development capacity at some point, but that has never materialized or been formally announced.

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.

Erik Gudbranson Autograph Card

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The Florida Panthers almost made the playoffs this year, and have shown they will be contenders for years to come with the firepower they already have up front (Jonathan Huberdeau, Aleksander Barkov, Nick Bjugstad, and Brandon Pirri, with veteran presence Jaromir Jagr to lead the way) a solid defense anchored around Aaron Ekblad, with Dmitri Kulikov and Erik Gudbranson as a tremendous supporting cast, and goaltender Roberto Luongo still in Vezina nominee form.

And they have the 11th pick in this year's deep draft class, which might enable them to add to that core. Let that sink in. They have a decade or so of great hockey ahead of themselves, in addition to future drafts, without so much as needing to adjust their top-6 forwards, top-3 defensemen and #1 goalie - and if they do, they could potentially become young contenders like the Tampa Bay Lightning this year... as early as next season.

Gudbranson was the third-overall pick at the 2010 draft, behind Taylor Hall (first) and Tyler Seguin, and ahead of Ryan Johansen (4th), Jeff Skinner (7th), Cam Fowler (12th), Jaden Schwartz (14th), Vladimir Tarasenko (16th), Bjugstad (19th), Jarred Tinordi (22nd), Emerson Etem (29th), Justin Faulk (37th), Devante Smith-Pelly (42nd), Tyler Toffoli (47th), Teemu Pulkkinen (111th), Peter Mrazek (141st), Brendan Gallagher (147th), and Mark Stone (178th). It was also a very deep draft, and third seems like the perfect place for the 23-year-old giant (6'5'', 210 pounds).

He's coming into his own in the points-production department though Brian Campbell and Ekblad usually get the best chances to put points on the board, but his hard shot and accurate passes will eventually garner him some top-unit powerplay time. He's also sound in his own zone, capable of delivering punishing checks, and a smart, tireless worker who could eventually wear a letter on his chest.

Born and raised just outside of Ottawa, he speaks fluent French and has suited up for Team Canada twice, winning gold at the 2009 U-18 championships and silver at the 2010 World Juniors. I see him playing with the big boys in an Olympics, and eventually wearing a letter on his jersey if he plays on a World Championship team.

He can also grow a great mustache, as can be attested in this card from Panini's 2011-12 Contenders card (#222 in the set, part of the Calder Contenders sub-set, signed on-card in thin blue sharpie, numbered 585/800):

It shows him wearing the Panthers' red (home) uniform.

Antoine Vermette Jersey Card

So... the never-ending Arizona Coyotes saga, well, never ends. The Glendale city council voted to terminate the team's lease last night, and the team threatened to sue for $200M. But first: an injunction (court order to temporarily put the termination on hold while awaiting further proceedings), of course.

Here's the short story: the Winnipeg Jets left Canada in 1996 to become the Phoenix Coyotes. It didn't work out so great because the arena the team shared with the NBA's Phoenix Suns wasn't adapted to hockey, so they looked at other options, including another downtown Phoenix location, and some suburbs, including Scottsdale, which has more expats from the East and North who are familiar with hockey.

Through backroom deals and the pipe dream of building ''another Las Vegas'' in the desert complete with facilities for all four major team sports, golf courses, upscale malls and hyper-expensive condo towers, the owners decided to settle on Glendale, a not-so-rich suburb full of college football fans. It didn't exactly pan out, and the neighbourhood-building never really occurred.

The team went through tough times on the ice, people stopped coming to games, one ownership group declared bankruptcy, many people tried to buy the team but were rejected by the league (including Canadian billionnaire Jim Balsillie who wanted to move it to Hamilton, Ontario), and the team was operated and self-owned by the NHL for a few years, until four guys came in (Anthony Leblanc being the most vocal) a couple of years ago and bought it for $150M. Last summer, they sold 51% of their share of the team to Andrew Barroway for... $150M, meaning the original bunch kept half the team without paying a penny for it. There are now talks of Barroway selling some of his shares.

The team was said to lose $25M per year and complained they weren't making enough money from arena revenue, so they forced the city of  Glendale, which technically owns the arena, to hand them a contract to ''manage'' the building, in exchange for $15M per year and basically a free lease; in return, they were to fill it on non-hockey nights with concerts, sporting events, trade shows and the like to ring in enough tax revenue for Glendale to recoup most of the money they gave the team.

Which they didn't. There were only 15 non-Coyotes events at the arena last year, raking in less than $6M in revenue (taxes and concession stands included). Ironically, that alone IS NOT grounds for termination of contract. Indeed, Glendale is instead insisting on one anti-corruption clause of the lease contract which forbids a City employee who worked on the deal to start working for the team. And one of them, an attorney who supported the deal, no less, was indeed getting paid on both sides of the fence at one moment in 2013.

This, of course, was to be expected. I could have booked that arena 100 times and would have done it for less than $5M myself, including cab expenses (I don't drive). Anything more is a scam and a sham - and not being able to achieve it in a year where  both Madonna and the Rolling Stones were touring, let alone circuses, mid-level rock acts and current-day chart toppers touring almost non-stop.

Then again, I could also probably manage the Coyotes to better than 29th place with a coach like Dave Tippett behind the bench. Don Maloney at least got some kind of return for the likes of Keith Yandle (Anthony Duclair!) and Antoine Vermette (a first-rounder and defensive prospect Klas Dahlbeck), but he got rid of his best goalie (Devan Dubnyk) because he was hindering starter Mike Smith's confidence, and has done nothing in any off-season to make players feel welcome, buying out veterans after throwing them under the bus (Mike Ribeiro) and letting his best players walk as free agents (Radim Vrbata).

Speaking of Vermette, he's enjoying a rather eventful postseason with the Chicago Blackhawks, going from healthy scratch to overtime hero. In his second Stanley Cup Final (he was on the losing side with the Ottawa Senators in 2007 against the Anaheim Ducks), his ability in the face-off circle is proving to be an important part of the Hawks' game plan. His 6 points in 18 games so far don't tell the whole story, scoring's at an all-time low across the board this year, for everyone. He's having a decent year.

Here he is sporting the Coyotes' alternate (black) jersey - with a matching game-worn swatch - from the 2008-14 era, from Upper Deck's 2012-13 Series 1 set (card #GJ-AV of the Game Jersey sub-set):

He has also played with the Columbus Blue Jackets, who had acquired him from the Sens in exchange for Pascal Leclaire and the draft pick that would eventually become Robin Lehner.

Richard Sévigny Autographed Card

A silver medalist at the 1978 World Juniors with Team Canada, Richard Sévigny was drafted 124th overall by the Montréal Canadiens in 1977, a year in which they also drafted fellow goalies Rob Holland (64th), Barry Borrett (152nd), Mark Holden (160th), Carey Walker (174th), Jean Bélisle (179th), and Bob Daly (180th), literally stocking up at the position.

He would appear in 11 games with the Habs in 1979-80, but really started to make his mark the following season (sharing the Vezina Trophy with Bunny Larocque and Denis Herron in the process), but because he'd served as a backup in the previous season's Stanley Cup run, he had his named engraved on Lord Stanley's Mug before even playing in a single NHL game.

One of his most memorable appearances came in the infamous Good Friday Game (''Le Match Du Vendredi Saint'') which pitted the Canadiens against provincial rivals the Québec Nordiques in which two bench-clearing brawls occured. Sévigny fought the Nordiques' Clint Malarchuk that night and was thrown out of the game.

Ironically, he signed with Québec as a free agent two years later, his workload decreasing with each passing season in the white-and-blue, going from 20 to 11 to just 4 in 1986-87.

He coached in France for four seasons upon retiring, then worked as a homeroom attendant in a Montréal suburb high school until 2012.

I'd never met him when he played, nor when I played, but did so at many charity events where he was a featured guest. It was at one of these last year that he signed this 2012-12 Between The Pipes card (#140 of the Decades - The 1980s sub-set) from In The Game, showing his Jofa helmet while with the Nordiques:

Most goalies in the 1980s evolved from a helmet to a mask, but Sévigny went the other way, as he'd worn a complete face mask in his days with the Canadiens:

That was a great look! He was also the last Hab to wear #33 before Patrick Roy, whom it was retired for. Of note that Sévigny signed the Nordiques card above in thin blue sharpie and tagged it with #33, but he wore #1 with the Nordiques.

Marty Turco Jersey Card

Marty Turco's a unique figure in goaltending, where you either consider him elite or average, and just about nothing will change your mind. I'm in the latter category, mostly, though I do respect that he was a unique stickhandler and, with perhaps Martin Brodeur, may have been the top puck-moving goaltender of his era, with Rick DiPietro and José Theodore vying for third place.

He never won the Vezina Trophy but was a finalist once and in the top-5 for votes another two times despite starting his career with three of four seasons consisting of GAAs below 2.00 and the other at 2.09. Sure, he was a Second Team All-Star in 2002-03 when he compiled a .932 save percentage, but that's pretty much as far as it goes in terms of achievements at the NHL level. In his era, and particularly his peak (2000-06), Patrick Roy was still King Of The Hill, Brodeur was building his legend, Miikka Kiprusoff was dominant, and Ed Belfour, Theodore and Jean-Sébastien Giguère were solid and consistent, as were Curtis Joseph, Olaf Kolzig, Nikolai Khabibulin and Tomas Vokoun. That didn't leave much room for the second tier of good goalies, which Turco was a part of.

Not that it's his fault with a .914 save percentage a low 2.17 in the postseason, but he never really had playoff success with the Dallas Stars, finishing with a losing record (21 wins, 26 losses) in 47 games and a bit of a reputation as a choker (which may very well be unfair); he was named the third goalie for Team Canada at the 2006 Olympics after Theodore tested positive for hair-growth product Rogaine, which can be used to mask steroids (he had a medical exemption, but chose to keep his perfect hairdo instead of watching the Games from the stands in Torino, which Turco was proud and honored to do).

I'll tell you what: I was kind of glad to see Turco have success, because it meant he got to replace Belfour, a goalie I liked even less. I'll also admit his glory years happened when I was shying away from regular-season hockey because Colorado Avalanche games were unavailable at the time in Canada, and my hometown Montréal Canadiens were a wreck that wasn't worth paying attention to; I'd also recently retired from the sport after two seasons in Juniors where I'd been a goon/third-string goalie, so I was a tad disillusioned with hockey in general, until 2002.

So, all told, perhaps I simply didn't get to witness the best that Turco had to offer.

He looked good in the Stars' ''original'' (in Dallas, at least) Star-shaped jersey, pre-golden pads:

It's card #FF-MT from Upper Deck's 2005-06 Ice set (and Frozen Fabrics sub-set), always one of my favourite designs year in and year out. It features a game-worn black jersey swatch, possibly from the away (inversed colours from this picture) uniform.

Greg Nemisz Autograph Card

The Calgary Flames went to the second round in these playoffs, so as an organization, they've improved a lot from previous years. They have built a sound playing structure and attitude under head coach Bob Hartley, centered around youthful enthusiasm and toughness.

The Flames have drafted well in the past couple of seasons and have developed and nurtured their talent, for the most part. They may have dropped the ball on Sven Baertschi, whom they traded away to the Vancouver Canucks at the trade deadline after stalling him in the AHL.

Another one of their formerly prized prospects is the player they selected in the first round (25th overall) in 2008, Greg Nemisz, ahead of Tyler Ennis (29th), Jacob Markstrom (31st), Derek Stepan (51st), Travis Hamonic (53rd), Marco Scandella (55th), Michael Hutchinson (77th), Adam Henrique (82nd), Braden Holtby (93rd), Dale Weise (111th), T.J. Brodie (114th), Gustav Nyquist (121st), Dustin Tokarski (122d), Greg Pateryn (128th), Mark Barberio (152nd), and Jared Spurgeon (156th).

But the 6'3'', 190-pound center had been a point-per-game player for the Windsor Spitfires in the OHL (on the same team as Henrique and Taylor Hall), and he certainly fit the mold the Flames were looking for: big and talented. He capped off his Juniors career with Memorial Cups in 2008-09 and 2009-10, as well as silver with Team Canada at the World Juniors in 2010.

Power forwards typically take a longer time to develop, so with that in mind, his lone assist in 15 games over two seasons with the offensively-challenged Flames isn't necessarily cause for concern. The fact that they opted to trade a former first-rounder for an enforcer (Kevin Westgarth) was puzzling, especially considering said enforcer now plays in Ireland.

Nemisz has already had serious injury troubles, including a hernia and shoulder injury, which may be cause for concern, but could also excuse his less-than-stellar stats (14 points in 21 games) on the Charlotte Checkers team last year.

But at 25 years old, if he is to become a power forward-type of player, now would be the time to start putting pucks in the net and bumping and grinding his way onto the Caroline Hurricanes and proving the Flames wrong for having given up on him.

Here is is sporting the Flames' red (home) jersey, from Panini's 2011-12 Contenders (card #203, the Calder Contenders sub-set, numbered ##470/800), signed on-card in thin blue sharpie with his number (48) tagged at the end: