Team 2000 -- Hockey 1-6

While I haven't been doing this whole blogging thing for a month yet.  From what I keep reading we are currently in the slow period. The time frame where no new card sets will be arriving until the first of the year. It seems that some are scrambling with ideas for posts to get through December. I thought it might be fun to take something I can learn from and maybe some others will as well. So I am going to tackle three sets yet one set at the same time.  Right now you are asking yourself what is this crazy guy talking about three sets but one?
  

  For the month of December I will be going after the Pinnacle Team 2000 sub-sets. The reason I say three sets is I will be attempting to do all three sets that were created. Baseball, football, and hockey are the sets. My plan is to give some information about each player then decide if his career was a success or a bust when it comes to Pinnacle picking the player. For football, and hockey it will be a touch more challenging as stats don't tell the whole story. Let's be honest too. My knowledge of hockey is limited so I might miss out on a few of these players. Everything I get will be from trying to find any information possible from the internet. So if a player is tabbed wrong let me know and why.         

1. Eric Lindros -- Originally drafted first overall by the Quebec Nordiques who later became the Colorado Avalanche.  Eric had stated originally he would never wear a Nordiques uniform. Quebec not willing to trade Lindros vowed he would then never play in the NHL. Later at the strong request of the NHL President, Quebec took trade offers. After arranging two trades an arbitrator was brought in to decide which trade would be valid. Eventually the Philadelphia Flyers were declared the rights to Lindros. The trade is believed to be the reason Colorado has been a powerhouse since then.
      Once his career started with the Flyers, Lindros established himself as the teams top player and one of the leagues best. Playing for the Flyers from 1992-2000 Lindros scored 290 goals, made 369 assists, six all-star games, and won many personal awards. Suffering from multiple concussions after 2000, Lindros still played but was traded. Finishing the last few years with the Rangers, Leafs, and Stars before retiring in the 2006-2007 season. Lindros never made the impact he had earlier in his career. These last five season Lindros scored 82 goals, and made 124 assists.  Despite a great career Lindros never won the Stanley Cup.
                                                                 SUCCESS

2. Mike Modano -- Drafted first overall in 1988 by the Minnesota North Stars. Modano spent 20 years of his 21 years with the franchise, including years when the team relocated to Dallas. Making an instant impact Modano was a finalist for the Calder Memorial Trophy (rookie of the year). In a controversial move he lost the trophy to Sergei Makarov who had played in the Soviet League for 12 years. This led to a rule change of future winners needing to be younger than 26. An 8 time all-star and one time Stanley Cup winner with Dallas. Modano finished his career by playing one year with Detroit before retiring after the 2010-2011 season. With career stats of 561 goals, and 813 assists, Modano is the all-time American born NHL goal scorer and points leader.
                                                                    SUCCESS

3. Nicklas Lidstrom-- Playing all 20 years of his career with the Detroit Red Wings. Drafted 53rd overall by the Red Wings out of Sweden. A defenseman known for his extreme pride in hard work. Lindstrom became the first European born player to win a Stanley Cup as captain, and first European player to be named playoff MVP. The all-time leader for games played with one team. Lindstrom was a 12 time all-star, 7 time Norris Trophy (best defenseman), and 4 time Stanley Cup winner. He was also named best European player ever by The Hockey News, and NHL player of the decade by The Sporting News and Sports Illustrated.
                                                                SUCCESS

4. Tony Amonte -- Drafted 68th overall by the New York Rangers in 1988. Amonte played 16 seasons with the New York Rangers, Chicago Blackhawks, Phoenix Coyotes, Philadelphia Flyers and the Calgary Flames. Known as a scorer during his years with the Blackhawks, where he had his best seasons. A 5 time all-star, all during his time frame with Chicago. Amonte finished his career with 416 goals, and 484 assists.
                                                                   SUCCESS

5. Felix Potvin -- Better known by his nickname 'The Cat'. Potvin was selected 31st overall in 1991 by the Toronto Maple Leafs. A great goalie who upon his arrival the Leaf's coaching staff appointed him the starting goalie. The success meant the Leaf's needed to trade current goaltender Grant Fuhr, and they did to the Buffalo Sabres. While his climb to the top was fast his fall was just as fast. In 1998 a knee injury limited Felix to just 5 games in what was now a back-up role to Curtis Joseph. That same season Potvin was traded to the Islanders. Two other trades followed to the Canucks then Kings before signing a one year contract with the Boston Bruins. I have to admit that I am on the fence with this man but with a nickname 'The Cat' I have to say..
                                                                    SUCCESS

6. Scott Lachance --  The 4th overall selection by the New York Islanders in 1991. Lachance came into the league with high expectaions. A decent defender he played in 819 games during what ended being a 13 year career. During his career Lachance played for four teams New York Islanders, Montreal Canadians, Vancouver Canucks, and Columbus Blue Jackets.
                                                                       PUSH

Snoop Doug In My Hizzle

Continuing what has been a trend for the last month. Monday is errands and goof off day. Today's adventure was back to go get the wife's present I attempted to get a couple weeks ago. While the call came in late last week that her present had come in and was waiting for me to come over. A combination of going to a Christmas bazaar, and a football game in town prevented me from making a trip over to get it. With all that going on I didn't mind making the trip today as it meant going to some other places as well.

The journey started by getting the wife's present and moving on to the thrift store. Walking in, I did the usual row after row looking for anything that would catch my eye. The look of sadness followed as I left head down and nothing in hand. I couldn't let it faze me as other errands needed to be done. A stop at the grocery store for some goodies, and what is always my favorite stop whenever possible. The stop at the closest Jamba Juice. Oh, how I love those fruit slushies or whatever you'd call them. Taking my juice and heading home with just the goodies I was sent out for. Seemed kind of like a disappointment but hey, I had my juice. 

Earlier while doing errands the wife called to tell me a certain store had the movie 'Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol' on sale for dirt cheap. Trying to find it before going to Jamba and coming up empty was fine. As I had my juice! On the drive home though something happened. The car hit the off ramp and started to head into town instead of going homeward. No problem as there is a Goodwill on the way I thought. Expecting the worst I wasn't to worried as I could take the back-road into our town and get the dog's flea medicine anyways. So going into the Goodwill with very low expectations I headed for the usual sporting good section. Sometimes I can find advertising baseballs there, but that's been getting tougher to find new ones.

Looking through the helmets, and gloves two baseballs popped up but both were trashed. Not too upset by the sight it was time to head down the next favorite row, nick-nacs. Rounding the corner I made the look at the top shelf and there it was.

 While I'm not an Angels fan. I am a fan of bobble-heads, and who doesn't love Snoopy? It does look like his head might be slightly busted as it's turned to the right instead of straight forward. Maybe it was released that way, I don't know. Either way he had to come home and join my other bobblers. While still excited about the find, I slowly walked on. Giving what was a little more in-depth look at each shelf. Looking deeper to make sure nothing got missed. Thinking to myself that these things seem to come in pairs 90% of the time. Then three quarters down the row sitting on the top shelf my hunch was right. Sitting on the top shelf blowing a bubble was none other than.

My excitement level was through the roof at this point. Turning it over and expecting to be making a phone call to the wife trying to explain I just found two bobble-heads. My joy hit an all-time high as I looked at the bottom to reveal a $2.99 price-tag.  Score I thought to myself as the phone call was avoided. The kicker is it's labeled on the bottom as #1282 of 5000. Going nuts at this point and thinking I was on top of the world. Always going through every row as you never know what you'll find. Next was the row of glassware. Being we live in Oregon most times you can find those Dairy Queen Blazers glasses from the 1990's. This time was different.

A Colorado Rockies glass from the 1995 Spring Training. As a Rockies fan it had to come home with the other baseball goodies. By now it was time to get out before I stumble across more goodies. I'm not crazy though as I did make one more trip down nick-nacs lane with no results. Overall it was well worth the side trip. I did end up looking for the Mr. Magoo movie and no results there again. It's no wonder I never shop at the store where the movie was supposed to be.

Artelopes-- Hyundai Sun Bowl

This was our third return of artelopes since starting this. I started with only five going out to get a little feel on their returns. While the plan since deciding to start them was to make it a signature for my envelopes while doing mailings. Getting a little feel on whether or not to continue what in business cards terms were risky letters. If the artelopes didn't get very good returns the plan was to maybe wait until January, or February before thinking about taking risks again. I would still consider some sure things but risks would be out.
        
 In October I thought it would be fun to start collecting cards from NBA Developmental League teams, college bowl games, and NASCAR racetracks. These envelopes were sent out pre-artelopes, and my return rate simple put sucked. The lot was the final six NBA business cards missing, two bowl games, three NASCAR tracks, and the Washington Nationals (my last MLB need). The Knicks, Nationals, and Bristol came back while 9 letters are still MIA. Four of the envelopes were high risk while the NBA should have been sure things. NBA teams always send returns, even if it is pocket schedules instead of business cards. So nothing from the NBA is startling.
      
We have had some mail delivery problems in the past so this could be the case again. Our address is shared with a family on 10th, and another on 8th with the exact same house address. There have been a couple times in the past we got some VIP letters for these addresses dropped in our mailbox. While I always go and deliver their stuff personally. They might not be as willing to put out the effort, and just throw them out or drop them back in the mailbox with wrong address written on them. These things always work themselves out after a few months, but who knows how much mail goes lost. With this in mind as returns seem to stop I usually wait until things seem to be back on track before starting up once more.

While this sounds like a trashing of the Post Office. In all fairness they aren't the only delivery service that has done this. Last year the family on 8th hand delivered the Kyle Busch 1/24th car ordered by my wife. I believe it was Fed Ex that made this mistake. So at-least the boxes make it here if they are delivered wrong. Now that I've rambled on enough, how about I share the artelope and the return.

This was the only artelope that the daughter has let me do so far. While it was somewhat simple I had an idea for it and she didn't want to deal with doing that. The idea was to just do the bowl games logo over the top of the mailing address.

Much like the daughter, my art needs some improving and will get better as this project continues. The only problem is she is enjoying the idea so much that we have four artelopes ready to be sent out on Monday. One of the four is mine, and I had to do it while she was out. The bad part is the more she does the more confident she will get and my opportunities will get even fewer. That's a good thing though as she loves to draw and getting better at it is what I'm hoping for.

While my return seems small it was exactly what I was looking for.

                                                                      RESULTS::
                                                                 2 business cards
                                                                       14 days
                                                                 Successful return

Putting Out The Fire- Jim Konstanty

 I wanted to end this series with a bang so while doing research for other posts. I came across the name Jim Konstanty. Jim was one of baseballs first relief aces. While his stats don't compare to the closers that have come after him.

 Without his success in the role baseball would be different than it is today. Starting his career in 1944 for the Cincinnati Reds with 12 starts out of 20 games and zero saves. Jim missed the 1945 season while in the U.S. Navy before returning as a Boston Brave in 1946. In a very disappointing season he was 0-1 with a 5.28 ERA in 10 games before having his contract sold to the Toronto Maple Leafs.
        Once again Jim was back to the majors in 1948 with the Phillies. In six games he was 1-0 with a 0.93 ERA and making his first two saves of his career. The following season Jim became the teams biggest figure out of the bullpen. Finishing the season with 7 saves and second to Ted Wilks.
          The following season was Jim's best as he had 22 saves. Due to his great work from the pen he was rewarded as the first and to date only reliever to win National League MVP. Staying as a closer until 1953 when he made 19 starts winning 10 of those games. After the season Jim went back to full-time in the Pen for the remainder of his career. Pitching until 1956 a year he was on three different teams. The following season Jim played a few games for the San Fransisco Seals before retiring.
CAREER STATS
SAVES- 74
EARNED RUN AVERAGE- 3.46
STRIKEOUTS- 268
WIN-LOSS- 66-48
AWARDS
NL All-Star (1950)
NL MVP (1950)

This has been a fun series to write and learn a little more information about past and present closers. Hopefully anyone who has come along to read this series has learned some stuff as well. If you have anything to share I'd love to hear it in the comments.