2024 Happy Hobby Help For Hockey Card Collectors Everywhere!
The 2024-25 NHL season has begun! Our Patrick Imhoff shares some great advice for novices and hockey vets alike!
Each “Happy Hobby Sports Card Newsletter” pack tries to help sports card collectors working with limited budgets – like me!
This Week’s Newsletter Highlights!
🏒 2024 HAPPY HOCKEY HOBBY HELP FOR BEGINNERS & VETERANS
🏒 TOP 15 NHL 2023-24 ROOKIE CARDS TO COLLECT!
🏒 TOP 10 MOST COLLECTABLE ACTIVE NHL PLAYERS!
🏒 TOP 10 MOST COLLECTABLE RETIRED NHL PLAYERS!
🏒 HAT TRICK HELP!
🏈 ⚾ 🏀 IF PATRICK IMHOFF BECAME CEO OF FANATICS
🏈 ⚾ 🏀 SPORTS CARD TRIVIA & CARD GIVEAWAY!
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🏒 2024 HAPPY HOCKEY HOBBY HELP FOR BEGINNERS & VETERANS🏒
Our resident Puck Head, Patrick Imhoff, shared some great hockey card collecting tips for both new collectors, ones who have dabbled on and off, and even some veteran hockey card collectors!
As the late “Badger Bob” Johnson once said:
“It’s a great day for hockey.”
That’s right, the coolest game on ice is back, as we kickoff the 2024-25 NHL season! We welcome in a new crop of rookies and new rookie cards in the 2024-25 Upper Deck product lines, which makes this a great time to review the top rookies who had cards in the 2023-24 Upper Deck products, especially since the 2023-24 O-Pee-Chee (OPC) Platinum set just released a few weeks ago.
When looking for Rookie Cards, I recommend checking out a player’s Upper Deck Young Guns cards, their OPC Platinum Marquee Rookie (MR) and Retro MR, and find the one that fits in your price range.
Two notes associated with OPC Platinum:
Beware of OPC base cards (this is a different release)
The MRs have parallels associated with them.
🏒 TOP 15 NHL 2023-24 ROOKIE CARDS TO COLLECT!
Connor Bedard, C, Chicago Backhawks (age 19) – 61 points in 68 games
Adam Fantilli, C, Columbus Blue Jackets (age 19) – 27 points in 49 games
Leo Carlsson, C, Anaheim Ducks (age 19) – 29 points in 55 games
Logan Cooley, C, Utah Hockey Club (age 20) – 44 points in 82 games
Matthew Knies, LW, Toronto Maple Leafs (age 21) – 35 points in 80 games
Brock Faber, D, Minnesota Wild (age 21) – 47 points in 82 games
Luke Hughes, D, New Jersey Devils (age 22) – 47 points in 82 games
Ridly Greig, C, Ottawa Senators (age 22) – 26 points in72 games
Connor Zary, C, Calgary Flames (age 23) – 34 points in 63 games
Tyson Foerster, LW, Philadelphia Flyers (age 22) – 33 points in 77 games
Matthew Coronato, RW, Calgary Flames (age 21) – 9 points in 34 games
Matthew Poitras, C, Boston Bruins (age 20) – 15 points in 33 games
Zach Benson, LW, Buffalo Sabres (age 19) – 30 points in 72 games
Marco Kasper, C, Detroit Red Wings (age 20) – 0 points in 1 game
Fraser Minton, C, Toronto Maple Leafs (age 20) – 0 points in 4 games
One last note, Connor Bedard’s Young Guns and even OPC Platinum rookie cards are still expensive. (You can read about all the best Connor Bedard rookie cards here.) For his card, I recommend finding an insert or parallel as there are plenty available in the under $20 range. Check out other products such as Upper Deck Allure, Upper Deck Trilogy and Upper Deck Credentials to name a few.
🏒 TOP 10 MOST COLLECTABLE ACTIVE NHL PLAYERS!
Here are two more top 10 lists of hockey cards every collector should have. For some of these players, look at second- and third-year cards, as well as milestone cards, as their rookie cards might just be too expensive.
Sidney Crosby, Pittsburgh Penguins
Connor McDavid, Edmonton Oilers
Alex Ovechkin, Washington Capitals
Auston Matthews, Toronto Maple Leafs
Steven Stamkos, Nashville Predators (that feels weird to type)
Nathan MacKinnon, Colorado Avalanche
Marc Andre Fleury, Minnesota Wild
Nikita Kucherov, Tampa Bay Lightning
David Pastrnak, Boston Bruins
Artemi Panarin, New York Rangers
🏒 TOP 10 MOST COLLECTABLE RETIRED NHL PLAYERS!
I specifically chose to keep this list to players with cards from the ‘90s and beyond to keep the prices down. That’s the reason a lot of great players are missing from this list:
Wayne Gretzky, Edmonton Oilers
Mario Lemieux, Pittsburgh Penguins
Jaromir Jagr, Pittsburgh Penguins
Mark Messier, Edmonton Oilers
Ron Francis, Hartford Whalers
Paul Coffee, Edmonton Oilers
Joe Sakic, Quebec Nordiques
Steve Yzerman, Detroit Red Wings
Ray Bourque, Boston Bruins
Teemu Selanne, Winnipeg Jets
You can find our list of the Best Hockey Cards From Each Set Since 1951 to 2023-24 here!
🏒 HAT TRICK HELP!
Do you know what a hat trick is? How about the Gordie Howe hat trick? Here are some cool hat trick definitions to keep your hockey savviness up and impress all your non-hockey friends!
Hat Trick: Score 3 goals during the game
Natural Hat Trick: Score 3 straight goals before anyone else scores
Gordie Howe Hat Trick: Get a goal, an assist, and get into a fight
Mario Lemieux Hat Trick: Score an even strength goal, power play goal, and a short-handed goal
So why do the fans throw hats onto the ice when a hat trick occurs? Well, according to the Hockey Hall of Fame, in 1944 a winger for the Black Hawks named Alex Kaleta couldn’t afford a nice hat he saw in a shop in Toronto. The owner offered him a deal: score 3 goals against his local Maple Leafs team and he could have the hat for free. As it turns out, Kaleta scored those 3 goals and the tradition began.
Subscribe to Patrick Imhoff’s Substack Newsletter here, and get his Thrifty Thursday picks!
🏈 ⚾ 🏀IF PATRICK IMHOFF BECAME CEO OF FANATICS: #12 of 23
Imhoff breaks down all the moves Fanatics should make, just two years away from when they unify the baseball, football and basketball card licenses in 2026. He shared his first move in our June 20 newsletter, and he’ll continue to share more of these going forward.
Here’s Patrick’s latest move on how he’d do things differently if he were the CEO of Fanatics:
No. 12 – BOUNTY PROGRAM
Upper Deck has a great Bounty Program with hockey cards and I would steal that idea. Inserts (like Stars of the MLB) would have a scratch-off code on the back. If you collected every card in the insert set and entered your codes, you would get a bonus numbered or parallel card from the inserts set. The best cards would go to the first ones to finish the set, but everyone who completes it would get something.
[Editor’s Note: THIS WOULD BE SO AWESOME!!!]
🏈 ⚾ 🏀 SPORTS CARD TRIVIA & CARD GIVEAWAY!
Send me the answer to this question and you could win this card – 1976 Topps Reggie Jackson!
Who did the N.Y. Mets draft with the No. 1 overall pick, just before the Athletics drafted Reggie Jackson?
Email your answer to gonoscards@gmail.com!
LAST WEEK’S QUESTION: What was the first year for true rookie cards for players like Kawhi Leonard, Klay Thompson and Nikola Vucevic? ANSWER: As a result of the 2011-12 NBA Lockout, the true rookie cards of Kawhi Leonard, Klay Thompson and Nikola Vucevic in pro uniforms were not released until 2012. No one answered this question correctly.
Coming Next Week!
🏈 ⚾ 🏀HOW THE ‘HAPPY HOBBY SPORTS CARDS’ WORLD IS CHANGING!
⚾ SPORTS CARD TRIVIA!
🏈 ⚾ 🏀 IF PATRICK IMHOFF BECAME CEO OF FANATICS!
***Important Card-Collecting Articles on DavidGonos.com***
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Email me: mailto:gonoscards@gmail.com
Have a #HappyHobby!
Podcast Music: "I dunno" by grapes - 2008 - Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution (3.0)
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Good reading, David and Patrick! I just came into a mystery box of cards I won from HiBid, and the majority are hockey cards. This will help fill in some blanks for me