First Look: 2015 Leaf Best of Hockey

[pwaldo]

http://www.beckett.com/news/2015/01/...est-of-hockey/

Instead of a one-of-one sketch card being placed into packs this time, Leaf has decided to make the most of its partnership with In The Game and will be putting one card from a past release into packs of 2015 Leaf Best of Hockey instead. Considering the vast array of memorabilia cards that the company produced over the years, the odds are strong of pulling an excellent piece featuring some of biggest names from the past and present. The foil stamp will indicate that these are one-of-one cards as well.

[Kessel_fan_87]

Cool.

[Gallinator]

I'd much rather NOT have a "one-of-one" stamp on the old card, as that's just going to separate it from the rest of the set and be a sore thumb waiting for replacement. E.g.: They show a 80's Decades Mario Lemieux Game-Used Number Silver card, which had a print run of 3. Now, one of those 3 will have a "one-of-one" stamped on it and the other two will not. I'd pay a lot more money for either of the non-stamped two than I would for the 'one-of-one" stamped copy. It's like a show-stamped card but even worse, as it is coming from the main print run!

The only thing "one-of-one" about these cards, it seems, is that they are the only one of that particular card to be inserted into that set. Unless they get a true one-of-one in the first place and then re-stamp it "one-of-one" - yikes!

Other than that, the concept is sound. Might go down like a lead balloon a la History of Hockey, but we'll have to see where the price point starts out to make a value judgement. At least they are saving us from more horrific sketch cards!

[iidaemmi]

So they are going to collect all the remaining cards from the shelves and put them on 1/1 stamps.. Another history of hockey.. huh..

Harri

[30ranfordfan]

Have to wait for a checklist & price point before I can really comment. I really liked the idea of history of hockey, but too many undesirable cards in that product to make the packs worth it. Maybe this one will be good?

[Cunnuc]

I'm sure the SRP will be quite high when it first comes out which is why I will stay away from it. Never did buy any 'Best of' Leaf last year but did buy some History of Hockey. The rookies I got in History of Hockey were atrocious. An Alexander Mogilny and.. I can't remember the others. They buy-back autos I received were decent and I managed to get a Patrick Roy patch /10 but I would assume after 6 months of release the price will be cut in half which will make this product a better buy.

History of Hockey and Leaf Best of were competing with eachother last release but this time there is only one which should help in sales but overall I think the product is lack-luster.

[RGM81]

I didn't think too much of the release last year and I don't really this year either.

I'm really on the fence about this "buyback" trend - it's an interesting practice done by all of the companies. Some don't bother me a whole lot - for example, this year is the 25th Anniversary of Upper Deck making hockey cards, so to celebrate they "bought back" some of the cards from the original release back in 1990 and had players sign anywhere from 10 to 25 cards for insertion into this year's product. That's easy. There's thousands and thousands of those cards out there, so sprucing them up is not a big deal, but some of those cards in this Leaf release are extremely limited to start with, and there's only a handful of copies of it out there. So to be taking even one or two of those cards out of circulation and re-issuing them as a 1/1 because it's got a little stamp on it, I dunno.

[mingus_md]

Not a fan of the 1/1 stamp. At least with History of Hockey, it was just a slab, so you could always take the card out and it would be as it was originally.

[cygnusx1]

I honestly think that this release is just taking great cards from the history of hockey cards and making them less valuable... I am a fan of buybacks when it actually adds something to the card, such as the various Young Guns over the years that have been bought back, auto'd and numbered. This is similar to show stamp cards in my eyes, except maybe worse? At least with the show stamp cards, it was extra stock. Now you're ruining some of the best cards in existence...

[bdiam]

I heard that the new Leaf slogan is:

"Leaf Hockey, slowly but surely destroying the value of every past ITG card, one product at a time"


Not sure if this rumour is true or not but have heard that the Leaf "inner circle / brain-trust" is made-up of ex-Toronto Maple Leaf executives?