Happy Thanksgiving everyone!
Seems the Stars were in a decent mood to give thanks to their fans as a decent size chunk of them signed on the way out of their practice this morning. I decided to just do after practice and just do the main entrance instead of the back door and did decently.
Practice got moved up from 10 to 9:30 and only went for an hour. I arrived just before 10 and was only halfway done with booking my cards when players started leaving the ice. Fortunately I wasn't in too bad a position among the decent size group of autograph seekers. Got to chat with a family who was in town from Florida, and occasionally 'graph the Tampa Bay Lightning (and no, it was not Puckhound Ron; apparently Tampa does in fact have other hockey collectors).
Shockingly, Shawn Horcoff was the first one out, joined by former Oilers teammate Ales Hemsky. Horcoff was a back door guy almost every single time last year so it was good to see him come out front. He was a single-pen signer though, using another person's green Sharpie on my card, signing one of the two I carried. It looks alright though; a sig is a sig. Hemsky signed two of my three cards.
We had a pretty long gap after the pair of former Oilers. It took about another half hour or so before Trevor Daley came out. The Daley enigma continues-- I can't complain since he signed three cards for me, but I never know how many he'll do. The first time I got him years ago he was one-per. Last season, he would always do three or four. This year during training camp he asked which card (of the three in my book) I wanted him to sign. So I almost put only one card in my book, but am very glad I decided I might as well drop three in.
There are still a number of players I have nothing for, all of whom signed, of course. Jyrki Jokipakka, Patrik Nemeth, John Klingberg, and Travis Moen all signed, but the first three have no cards yet, while I somehow lack any Moen cards. On the plus side, I do have an awesome shot of Moen fighting Antoine Roussel that would be cool to get signed by both.
Jokipakka came out about the same time as Jason Spezza, who signed the two cards I put on my board. He was another who kept with just one pen, signing mine in black. Fortunately I rubbed my Prizm and Select cards down just in case he did that, as he did it to me during training camp. Moen came out with Jason Demers, who signed the lone card I could find of him.
Alex Goligoski emerged as well, signing the two cards and custom index card I had of him for Ross at the TTM board. Goligoski saw the USHL photo on the CIC and said "Wow, there's a blast from the past!"
A pleasant surprise was another usual backdoor guy in Vernon Fiddler walking out and signing for us with his son in tow. Either he didn't recognize me or he dropped the grudge, but my occasional 'graphing nemesis signed one of the three cards I carried.
Cody Eakin emerged next with Anders Lindback. Lindback signed a CIC for Ross, while Eakin signed cards I've been holding since camp for others-- one for Jon in Florida, one for Fernando in Alberta, and one for Jeff in Ohio.
The rest escaped out the back, it seems. I heard Benn and Seguin both were spotted out back and neither signed. Still, not too bad for my first outing of the season after training camp, and one that I half-assed by not going early.
TOTALS: 17 cards from 9 players (2 from 2 for Ross, 1 from 1 for Jon, 1 from 1 for Jeff, 1 from 1 for Fernando, 12 from 7 for me).
Blog is on indefinite hiatus as of November 2020.
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