This week’s induction to the Overexposed wing is a little different than the rest. I was searching the Internet for the worst hockey cards the world had to offer, and I stumbled upon (actually, I’d say more “got bludgeoned over the head by”) goofy card after goofy card from the 1994-95 Upper Deck Be a Player set. It was like Sophie’s Choice… minus the sad background of the Holocaust and the fact I really didn’t cry my eyes out at the thought of posting that idiotic shot of Jason Arnott on a water slide, Jaromir Jagr’s truly awful mid-90s mullet or Curtis Joseph riding around on a golf cart. To do away with this dilemma that ate away at my brain for all of eight seconds, I decided to induct THE WHOLE DAMN SET!
Ah 1994… This is around the time sports card companies were getting a little too confident about the industry. It’s like they had a license to print money, only in this case instead of money it was stupid-looking cards of every athlete who ever put on a jock strap. Just six years earlier, you had two choices if you wanted to buy hockey cards, Topps and O-Pee-Chee, and your choice was made even easier if you lived in Canada or the United States, because if you lived up North, O-Pee-Chee was everywhere, and in the States, Topps was your go-to hockey card. For the most part, the cards were almost identical save for a few tweaks here and there, and there was the fact O-Pee-Chee sets were bigger and worth a lot more, but that was it. By 1994 or so, we had hockey cards up the wazoo; there were not enough bike spokes in the world to rip apart those Jeff Bes rookie cards clogging up our closets. To make one set stand out among the rest, it was sometimes necessary to have some sort of gimmick like what you are about to see today. I’m talking about the 1994-95 Upper Deck Be a Player set. This might be the silliest pile of glossy cardboard I’ve ever seen.
The set has literally EVERYTHING in it. I’m guessing the premise of this set was to see NHL stars acting like regular every day Joes, but it’s not like every card is like this. You have the usual shots of players skating around, dishing out hits, etc., but a good portion of the set has players in all sorts of goofy poses.
You’ve got dudes shooting pool…
Steve Yzerman sitting like this on a chair for some reason…
Jason Arnott zipping down a water slide… Weeeeee!
Sylvain Turgeon all dressed up in front of a camp fire (?) …
Jaromir Jagr wearing a cat for a toupee…
Wendel Clark doing whatever the hell this is…
A turtlenecked Craig Simpson brushing up on whatever book Oprah is recommending this week…
Rob Niedermayer asking himself that age old philosophical question: WHY?
Louie DeBrusk modeling his Canadian tuxedo…
and Marty McSorley daring you to take his stick away from him.
It also has more players playing golf than you can shake a hockey stick at. If you love golf even just a little bit, THIS is definitely the set for you! There are all sorts of riveting photos such as…
Brad May watching his ball soar…
Mike Hudson putting…
Dino Ciccarelli also putting…
Steve Smith struggling to escape a sand trap…
Paul Kariya looking like he has absolutely no idea how to play golf…
Terry Carkner showing you how to golf in style…
Tie Domi giving someone directions to the clubhouse…
Steve Thomas doing his best Greg Norman impression…
Alexei Yashin doing his best Felix Potvin impression…
Felix Potvin doing his best Alexei Yashin impression…
and Curtis Joseph driving around while grabbing his crotch…
Sweet Jesus is this horrible, but wait… there’s more… so much more…
Such as the drawings that, I suspect, later inspired the Guardian Project… Oh no! Are these cards really necessary?
Here we got the Great One wearing a silver eye patch and carrying a lightning stick or something…
Pavel Bure carrying a jet on his back… I thought he was known as the Russian Rocket?
And then we have Eric Lindros wearing more fur than a caveman… What any of this has to do with Eric Lindros, the Philadelphia Flyers, the National Hockey League or sports in general, your guess is as good as mine.
Here’s Doug Gilmour looking like… I have no idea what… Either way, I don’t think those shoulder spikes or those massive speed skating blades would be allowed in a league game.
And now we have the great Patrick Roy punching blue crystals or something, I don’t know.
And I’m sure you’re wondering, are there any more shots of players relaxing on a golf course? You betcha!
Here’s Steve Larmer diligently plotting his next move…
TWO Hall of Famers chatting it up at the eleventh tee…
And Rob Zamuner looking like a Harvard douche.
I can honestly say this has been the most fun induction I’ve ever written. When I started, I don’t think I realized just how much lunacy could exist in one set of hockey cards. And then I took a gander at the 1995-96 Be a Player set. Stay tuned…