We have seen a strong groundswell in the card collecting community for quality painted sets similar to our Masterpiece releases we have done in the past. Our product development team set out to create a very nostalgic hockey release to meet those needs featuring all retired hockey legends and focusing on delivering our collectors tremendous value. What they came up with, was 2011 Parkhurst Champions.

The 'Color Renditions' cards in the set showcase painted images of great players in great moments.

The 160-card base set will feature some of the top names from hockey history and there will be a comprehensive autograph parallel version of the set that will provide for some great chase with collectors. The unique “Wire Photo” subset (cards 101-130) showcases some brilliant photography from the NHL’s infancy and collectors can again find autograph parallels there – including multi-signed cards. Every autographed card will be hard-signed meaning we will not be using any autograph labels with this product.

The 'Wire Photo' cards will have an autograph parallel that will feature one, two or even three signatures from retired legends!

Then we get into the painted card subsets called Renditions which will have color and black & white versions (cards 131-160). Of note, the autographed versions of the Black & White Renditions cards will be signed with a gold paint pen to really make the signature pop.

The Black & White autographed Renditions cards came out looking beautiful!

Champ’s mini painted cards will make a triumphant return as well highlighting some of the NHL’s most well known legends with hard-signed autograph parallels existing as well. And then there is a painted insert set that like nothing the hockey market has ever seen before. Check out this video for a preview:

And last, but certainly not least, we decided to bring back that quirky insert set that introduced the hockey ice with the ice age. That’s right, we will be including some rare Champ’s Fossil and Artifact cards featuring actual cut fossils of prehistoric animals along with some other unique ancient artifacts. We recently received in a batch of some of these incredible pieces. Take a look at some of the items to get a feel for what we’ve come up with!

For the first time ever we will be including cards with ancient coins from Rome and Greece in the Champ's series.

Another new fossil piece will be the brain cavigy of a prehistoric Auroch. Check out the grooves and ridges in the pieces!

And then you have these teeth. Wondering where they came from???

The teeth above belong to the Spinosaurus, and yes, many are still sharp!