1991-92 Score Re-Visited

1991-92 was perhaps the worst year for hockey cards. The hockey card industry was in the heat of the mass produced era and this is clearly evident by the amount of un-opened Score product around today. I've heard countless people say that they busted so many boxes of this stuff to try and find the Bobby Orr autograph, yet still boxes of this product are easily found usually going for $5-$10 a pop.

Their are so many variations for the set, it makes your head spin! The red bordered card is the Canadian variation, clearly marked on the back with a Canadian Flag. The second series of the Canadian issue has a blue border. The American variation was marked with a purple border and released as a one series 440 card set. Furthermore, the Rookie and Traded set was produced as an addition to the American set and features a green border.

While pulling the base cards could grow really tiresome, the series included subsets such as "The Franchise" and "Dream Team". These cards were such a thrill to pull as a kid and they looked great! Other subset's included "Trophy Winners" and "season" leaders. My Dad brought home a few packs for me one night after work and I pulled a Dream Team Wayne Gretzky card. I cherished this card for a long time and even kept it a secret from the kids at school for fear that they would keep on bugging me to trade it to them.

As I grew up and became a "serious" collector I despised set's like 1991-92 Score but since going back to my collecting roots, focusing on 90's hockey, I appreciate this set considerably now. I began collecting in 1989 and 1991 was when I really came into the hobby full swing. I have large 3,000 count boxes full of early 90's singles sitting in my closet. While many consider these cards to be junk, I consider them childhood treasures.

The Eric Lindros Hot Card was the second best must have card of 1991-92 next to the Pro Set Patrick Roy Mask card. I managed to land one of these about 5 years after the set came out from a kid in my neighbourhood. This card was simply too tough to find during the Lindros craze of the early 90's. These Hot Cards came inserted 1 in every bubble pack of 100 cards.

These Bobby Orr cards were inserted in packs and featured six different cards. Bobby Orr signed a reported 15,000 cards, roughly 2,500 of each card. I just found this information now and I can't believe they made Orr sign that many cards! No wonder he is so crusty when it comes to signing now. Orr is so popular that despite so many autographs of his on the market, they still go for a good chunk of change. 1991-92 Score was so mass produced that even with 15,000 Orr cards inserted, they are still a VERY tough to pull.

Next time I see cheap boxes of 91-92 Score I'm going to pick up two: one to bust and one for my wax box collection. Maybe I'll get lucky and pull an Orr autograph.