Re-Pack Rat...

Robert Kron
1997-98 Pinnacle Be a Player #140

Yet another Whaler-turned Hurricane on this card, found inside a re-pack.

Often wondered about the origin of these "re-pack" cards that I've been adding to my collection... Are they pre-owned? Or simply leftover stock that was never sold? Or Both? Aside from the odd 1990s card with bad centering, most of them have been in mint-condition.

Finding this card had me flipping through some of my old Beckett Hockey magazines to locate this article:

From Beckett magazine
Issue No. 101
March 1999

"NHLPA Senior Director of Business Affairs and Marketing Ted Saskin recently confirmed that the majority of the 1997-98 Be A Player cases never actually reached the marketplace - and probably never will...

...the NHLPA has no plans to make a deal with anyone to release the product, unless the marketplace changes dramatically. It's been speculated that much of the unreleased or returned Pinnacle hockey product currently in storage will end up shredded. -Kevin Allen"

Robert Kron
1997-98 Pinnacle Be a Player #140
(card back)

To shred perfectly good hockey cards just to maintain a high market value always seemed kinda absurd to me - But I'm a fairly lame collector in the sense that I prefer to have a good number of interesting cards that capture a particular moment in time, rather than simply chasing a particular card just because it's worth a lot of money.

But with many collectors obsessed with the sheer "value" of the card (as opposed to education & nostalgia), limiting the number of cards in the market helps give a sense of worth.