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2005-06 Parkhurst Hockey
Great for fans of 1960s, 1990s hockey cards

By Sal J. Barry
Published October 12, 2007

In the past, several different companies have "leased" the Parkhurst name, starting with Pro Set way back in 1991, as an effort to sell a brand of hockey cards with some nostalgia attached to it. The 2005-2006 Parkhurst Hockey set was the first produced by Upper Deck, coming out just as the Stanley Cup Finals were underway. This late-season set was a great "jumping on" point for collectors (such as myself) who had fallen off the hockey card-collecting wagon, but wished to return without spending $100 for a box of cards. This relatively low-price, barebones design, late season release was met with mixed feelings from collectors.

Player selection
Parkhurst was the largest released set of 2005-2006, clocking in at 700 cards--500 base cards and 200 short-printed subset cards. Talk about kicking it old school. While the design was definitely 1960s, the size of the set is so 1990s--and that's a good thing. The obvious upside of such a large set is that more cards can be dedicated per team. Each team was allotted 16 or 17 different base cards. This is great if you like to collect not only the superstars on each team, but the other players as well. Many sets, being as small as they are these days, can only dedicate two or three cards per team. While it is fun to get the best players in any given pack of cards you might buy, hockey is a team sport, and many fans not only celebrate a team's leading scorer, but also their other, less known players such as a hard-working defensive forward or a backup goaltender. Parkhurst made it possible to get cards of many players who did not get any cardboard in any of Upper Deck's other miniscule-sized sets released during the season.

Card design
The 2006-2006 Parkhurst set went with a low-tech, almost classic design of a player "cut out" and dropped against a light background, with that player's team logo faintly repeated in the background. This gives it a late 1950s, early 1960s feel. Every base card depicts the entire player from head to toe--and I find the consistency appealing. The base set has a uniform cohesiveness to it, which looks nice. The low-tech card fronts are very basic--no holograms, silver or shiny ink, or embossed player photos. Additionally, the cards have virtually no gloss, which makes them perfect for getting autographed.

Stats & info
While the card fronts' are simple yet appealing, the backs of each card are kind of a letdown. One of the greatest things about hockey cards is that you can learn a lot about each player. However, these Parkhurst cards seem to lack some of the most basic biographical information--height, weight, birth date and whether the player is left or right handed. Maybe those are my expectations, being raised on Topps cards, but I think this very basic info could have easily been "squeezed" on the card backs.

One major upside, though, is the inclusion of a player's complete statistics. One gripe of mine that seems to be the norm on too many sets is when they only show a player's stats from the past four or five years. Not the case with Parkhurst, as 20+ year pros Steve Yzerman and Mario Lemieux have all of their stats listed. Even Gordie Howe--who has a card in this set for some reason--has all of his NHL and WHA stats listed.

While I am almost always a fan of a player headshot on the back of hockey cards, doing that simply would not fit in with Parkhurst's "retro" design. Full-color pinting on both sides would also have prevented this from being a cheaper, lower-priced offering.

Subsets
Two hundred different cards comprise six different subsets. Some of them are vital to the set--such as the 70-card Parkhurst rookies--while others were a bit--or even wholly--unnecessary.

The 30 card "A Salute to Captains" subset sounds nice in theory, but those "let's hear it for the team captain" subsets never seem to work in practice-partially because the guy who wears the "C" is not always the team's most exciting player. Couple that with the fact that many teams don't have a dedicated captain (*cough*, Minnesota, *cough*). What you end up is with 30 cards that could have been dropped from the set without anyone really noticing, since those guys get their own "regular" cards anyways. More than anything, this subset really seemed to be just an excuse to make another card for Sidney Crosby (who is an alternate captain).

By comparison, the "Team Logos" subset makes the "Captains" subset look ten times more appealing. How fun is it to get a Tampa Bay Lightning logo in your next pack of cards--complete with general information about the team on the back! These would have been nice if the back had been a Team Checklist, but Upper Deck saw some reason to make that its own wretched subset.

The "Northern Stars" subset was also quite unnecessary. Did we really need a subset that celebrates hockey's best "Canadian" players? I don't think so.

And then we have the "2005-2006 Season Highlights" subset...which brings me to my next gripe. These cards--both front and back--feature a horizontal design, while the other 685 cards in the set are vertical. Why? There was really no advantage of making these cards "break" the design. They are not even that interesting to look at. And I have a real hard time with a 2005-2006 set having highlight cards from that same season. I mean, the season wasn't even over when these were being printed. That gives us highlights for only 80% of the season.

On the upside, the "Parkhurst Rookies" subset featured a nicer design, and a very comprehensive 70 card selection of the top rookies from that year. The dynamic design--featuring diagonal "rays" emanating from behind the player--look nice, but kind of contradict the otherwise retro feel of the set. The usual suspects are featured--Sidney Crosby, Alexander Ovechkin, Dion Phaneuf, Hendrick Lundqvist, Thomas Vanek and Wojtek Wolski, as well as some up-and-comers like Jim Howard, Brent Seabrook, Mikko Koivu, Corey Perry and R.J. Umberger.

Finally, we are "treated" to the 30 card "Team Checklists" subset. Checklists are always nice to have...but why make them short printed?

In fact, why make anything, except maybe the Rookie cards, short printed? I think this is what made the 2005-2006 Parkhurst set such a "turn-off" for many collectors. 130 of the short printed cards were really nothing to get excited about. Factor in that you only get one short printed card per six-card pack, and you can see why many collectors took their dollars elsewhere.

But on the other hand, the lower price point, and overall great player selection were reasons for many collectors to jump on this set and attempt to get all 700 cards. If you like retro design, and not paying several hundred dollars for a complete set like Upper Deck, then this set is for you.

Final rating:
Parkhurst is a very good set if you like vintage design sensibility or massive sized sets.

BONUS: Top 5 cards

• 657 Sidney Crosby - this may be Sid the Kid's "Ghetto RC"-but it's still a Crosby rookie card.
• 669 Alexander Ovechkin - same applies to Alex. This is a good "cheap" RC for your collection.
• 390 Mario Lemieux - Super Mario's last card as an active player.
• 173 Steve Yzerman - Another guy who retired, destined for The Hall and nostalgia card sets.
• 500 Mr. Hockey - an unnecessary card of Gordie Howe. We all respect the guy--but he's really out of place here.

Click photos to enlarge