Here’s yet another memorable pic from one of my all-time favorite sets, 1997-98’s Upper Deck Collector’s Choice. More specifically the National Heroes subset featuring some of the best Canadian women players of the era, and the best young Canadian NHL hopefuls.

Most of the cards in the subset are pretty normal-looking. See for yourself…

Here’s women’s hockey legend Hayley Wickenheiser.

And here’s Patrick Marleau… looking normal.

So why is his future San Jose teammate Joe Thornton doing this?

You may know Joe Thornton as one of the bearded stars of the Sharks. A lot of people feel that people who wear beards have something to hide, but I personally think Joe just grew up after making his way to California and decided to sport a more mature look. You see, back in his junior days, he was all “Hey ladies, check out my crotch!” He apparently liked doing this while leaning over to the left to not-so-subtly let a fart squeak out. You gotta love that “Ay, whatta ya gonna do” look on his face. With Erik Karlsson now patrolling the San Jose blue line, I got a feeling a lot of opponents are going to be asking themselves what they are going to do too.