A Lightning Hall of Fame Autograph

Ok. So that's a bit of a misleading title.  Of the 1196 games he played in the NHL only 105 of them were with the Lightning. He did manage to score 24 goals and put up 63 points in the blue, black and silver which is good enough for 36th on the all-time Lightning points leader list (tied with Ryan Craig!).

He's probably best known for his work with Chicago Blackhawks, who the Lightning traded him back to in 1995 for a 6th round pick which Tampa Bay used to draft Eduard Pershin. You remember him, right?


Look at those stats, how could you not remember him? Kudos to me for figuring out how to embed some stats, by the way.  That should help with the deadline fire sale the Lightning should be holding in about a week. My guess is Pavel Kubina, Dominic Moore and Adam Hall are forwarding their mail in March and GM Steve Yzerman is figuring out what to do with some extra mid-round draft picks.

Have you figured out who the newest addition to my autograph collection is yet?

At this rate I'm going to have to start collecting the base Champs set all over again

Hall of Famer Denis Savard was signing for free at the Chicago Auto Show today and with nothing better to do I headed down there.  I don't really have any story to tell like I did with the Esposito autograph (and really that wasn't an exciting story, was it?).

I was kind of shocked at how short the line was for Savard's autograph and then I remembered most folks were at work between the hours of 4 and 6 pm on a Wednesday.  Guess there's something to be said for not having a job. Heck, I even got $4 off of admission because I brought a can of food.  Although, the lady accepting the food wasn't happy that I only brought one.  Look Miss, I like my canned soup, you're lucky to be getting anything.

The car show itself was impressive, if you're into that kind of thing I guess.  A lot of folks walking around taking pictures of cars, I mean A LOT of photos.  It makes me wonder how many actually get printed out- less than 1% maybe? What are they going to do with a picture of a 2013 Honda Civic taken with their iPhone?  Although some folks had some sweet camera rigs, and they didn't look like they were with the press - bloggers maybe?

I did take one picture with my woefully outdated Blackberry.  Ford unveiled the new Shelby Cobra Mustang at the show and I snapped a photo to send to my Pops who owns a 60-something-ish Mustang of his own.  Figured I'd show him the newest member of the family.  Not gonna lie, it was kind of bad ass looking. I imagine it would look sweet stuck in traffic on the Kennedy everyday.

How many words at 2 cents a word would it take to own this? I don't know, I don't do math

Where was I? Oh yeah, the line for Savard. There really wasn't one.  I took my spot at 3:45 or so and there were maybe 20 folks in front of me, including a Blackhawks fan who stopped talking to me once I said my best memories of Savard were of him as a Bolt.  Which was kind of a lie, because I don't really remember him as a Bolt as it predates my fascination with the team (1997) and the only reason I knew he played for the Lighting is because I have a British Long Ton of his cards from the Neo-Vintage era.

The line moved pretty briskly, Denis wasn't chit-chatting with the folks.  He was extremely pleasant even when I put two items in front of him (the card and a 5x7 for my boy Link).  He signed both and wished me a good day.  I debated jumping back in line to get a Montreal Canadians card signed as well, but figured the El ride  home would be packed if I dallied any longer.

Eddie Olczyk signs on Friday, but I think I'm skipping that one.  As much as I'd like him to sign something with the phrase "Happy Humans"on it, I'm not sure I can justify another ticket or listen to some dame spout off the specs of a car I'll never be able to afford.

That being said I'm glad to add this card to the collection.  One of these day's I'm going to figure out what to do with the signed cards other than stick them in a binder.  Till then...well it's going in a binder.