Want a shot at free Golden Knights hockey cards?
On Saturday, March 3rd, trading card stores all over the United States will be participating in Upper Deck's National Hockey Card Day.
These five Golden Knights cards will be randomly inserted in special 2018 America National Hockey Card Day packs:
The players included are:
LV-16 – Marc-Andre Fleury LV-17 – Alex Tuch LV-18 – Jonathan Marchessault LV-19 – Reilly Smith LV-20 – James Neal
Go to a participating store on March 3rd -- these packs should be handed out for free.
Marc Bilak, owner of Legacy Sports Cards, guessed that the Knights cards will be seeded about one every two or three packs.
Here's the full list of participating US stores, along with more information about the 2018 America National Hockey Card Day set.
In Las Vegas, Legacy Sports Cards (located on 8125 West Sahara Avenue #160) will be the only store offering National Hockey Card Day packs. Bilak mentioned that he will give one free pack to anybody who walks into his store, noting, "I tell people if you bring five kids with you, five packs." More packs are available with other in-store purchases.
Upper Deck is also producing a separate 2018 Canada National Hockey Day set for Canadian hobby stores. The Canada set does not include any Vegas cards. Canada's National Hockey Day is also March 3rd; the above links furnish all the information you need about this set.
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Last month, Upper Deck also released 15 Golden Knights cards specifically for the Las Vegas market:
The players included are:
LV-1 – David Perron LV-2 – William Karlsson LV-3 – Colin Miller LV-4 – Deryk Engelland LV-5 – Nate Schmidt LV-6 – Luca Sbisa LV-7 – Oscar Lindberg LV-8 – Brad Hunt LV-9 – Shea Theodore LV-10 – Brendan Leipsic LV-11 – Cody Eakin LV-12 – Brayden McNabb LV-13 – Malcolm Subban LV-14 – Oscar Dansk LV-15 – Erik Haula
These cards are not free. With a $20 purchase at participating locations, you will get three of these 15 cards, meaning you'll have to spend $100 to get all 15.
For more information about these cards and where you can pick them up in Las Vegas, check out this link.
Legacy Sports Cards is one of the participating retailers.
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For National Hockey Card Day, I caught up with Marc-Andre Fleury, James Neal, and Alex Tuch. They reminisced about collecting as kids, their favorite cards, and the thrill they felt when they saw the first hockey cards of themselves.
In Pittsburgh, Fleury actually wore a mask which featured hockey cards.
HockeyBuzz: When you were a kid, did you collect hockey cards? Whose cards did you collect?
Marc-Andre Fleury: Only goalies. I traded all my players for goalies.
James Neal: I loved hockey cards. I always enjoyed collecting my favorite player and carrying them around. Wayne Gretzky, for sure, was my favorite player. But all the great players. I loved collecting the Leaf players, being a Leaf fan.
Alex Tuch: Oh yeah, definitely. I probably had like 1,500 cards. I had them all in a little booklet. All organized. Jersey cards, rookie cards, stuff like that. I probably stopped when I was 10 or 11. But the first six or seven years of playing hockey, I collected a good amount.
Always the greats. Lemieux, Gretzky, Messier, guys like that. I was coached by Claude Lemieux and Mark Messier a little growing up. A couple spring hockey teams. So whenever I got their cards, I got them to sign it. It was pretty cool.
HB: Marc, you traded your Gretzkys and Lemieuxs for back-up goalies?
MAF: I have a few Mario. The others guys though. Everybody else, they were getting traded.
HB: Is there a particular card you remember from that time? A favorite card?
MAF: I was a big Habs fan. Patrick Roy was the guy that I had the most cards of. Marty Brodeur was the second guy.
JN: No, just the old-school box of cards we used to have. There'd be like 400 cards in a box. They're in a huge set. I loved opening packs too. Going to McDonald's and getting packs.
AT: I really liked the jersey cards. Those were always special to get in the Upper Deck packs. They had a cool feel to them. I think I got a Modano jersey card.
HB: So you used to buy a lot of those McDonald's packs, James?
JN: Well, I guess I used to eat a lot of McDonald's. After a big game, as a kid, my Dad would surprise me with McDonald's.
HB: What was the thrill like when you first saw yourself on a hockey card?
MAF: I kept them. (laughs) I stole them. Growing up, I [collected] it until I was pretty old. So when I finally had a card, it was pretty cool.
JN: It's cool. Being on a hockey card and being in a video game, those are two things...when you played a video game as a kid, you'd always play hockey. It was a good feeling, a dream come true.
AT: It's pretty cool. It's different. Working with Upper Deck, we sign a bunch of them. Little tiresome after a while. (laughs) Sign a few thousand, your hand starts cramping up. But no, it was really good.
Hopefully, kids are excited [to get a signed card of me] as I was to get [autographs] when I was kid.
I got a couple boxes back home that I have to sign. (laughs)
HB: For younger players, Alex, is your first video game cooler than your first hockey card?
AT: It's the same thing. I played with myself a couple times and then realized I didn't want to do that anymore because my Overall wasn't that great. (laughs) But they're both really cool.
HB: You said you were pretty old, Marc, when you stopped collecting. How old?
MAF: In my teens, I was still buying packs.
Steve Guiremand: Do you ever check Beckett price guides to see how much your cards are worth?
MAF: Mine? I don't look at mine.
HB: They still sell pretty well!
MAF: (laughs) That's a good thing, I guess.
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The Golden Knights have been big business for Legacy Sports Cards. Bilak observed:
A lot more new collectors into the hobby. The [Golden Knights] hype [in this store] is like the Aaron Judge hype from last year.It's insane.
Fleury is the most active. Neal is right there. [William] Karlsson is starting to move up.
Pretty much if they see [Tuch cards], they'll buy him.
Even Shipachyov, his stuff sells. The autographed card of his that I had, I got $10 for it. Online, it's a $3 card.
It keeps building, more people just keep coming in, looking for Knights stuff.
As a long-time collector -- I probably have the world's second-largest Adam Deadmarsh collection, seriously -- I can tell you that their prices are mostly competitive with online. Legacy is a good place to get into the hobby and Marc is super-helpful.
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Here's some other great memorabilia that you can get at Legacy:
(Photo credit: Jason Pothier)
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Special thanks to Sal Barry, who runs the best hockey card blog out there, Puck Junk, for his assistance on this piece.
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