8/21/25 - Doug Gilmour

 

Name: Doug Gilmour

Team: Toronto Maple Leafs

Position: Center (Hockey)

Card Year: 1996

Card Maker: Upper Deck

Card Number: 291

We're back on the normal schedule here and with a pretty stark pivot from last week's card. Despite the obvious difference of hockey versus basketball, last week's pick - Rich King had a brief, injury-filled career whereas this week's selection - 1994-95 Toronto Maple Leaf captain, Doug Gilmour had career longevity and success enviable by just about anyone. 

Doug Gilmour was drafted by the St. Louis Blues in the 7th round of the 1982 NHL draft. Despite concerns regarding his small size for an NHL center, he was able to make his way onto the roster and played his first season for the Blues in 1983-84 playing in 80 games and tallying a respectable 53 points. He tallied his first 100+ point season in 86-87 with the Blues, scoring 42 goals and making 63 assists. It was during this time with the Blues that he was given the nickname of 'Killer' by then captain Brian Sutter, due to his aggression and defensive abilities.

He would be traded by the Blues to Calgary after the 1987-88 season where he would go on win the only Stanley Cup of his career with an absolutely dominant Flames team in 1989. He was traded by Calgary as part of a 10 player trade, the largest in NHL history, to Toronto midway through the 1991-92 season which was the starting season shown on this card, with stats both from Calgary and Toronto.

The following two seasons, 1992-93 and 1993-94, would be Gilmour's most productive with 127 and 111 points respectively and making the All Star Game in both seasons. In the 1992-93 season, he would lead the Leafs in assists and overall points, and was only two goals behind Nikolai Borschevsky for the lead in that category as well. This would also be the first and only time Gilmour would win the Frank J. Selke trophy for best defensive forward. Despite only finishing third in their division, the Leafs made it to game 7 in the Western Conference finals, but lost to the Los Angeles Kings, the eventual loser to the Stanley Cup Champion Montreal Canadiens.

1993-94 ended in similar fashion both for Gilmour and the Leafs. Toronto finished just two points behind the Detroit Red Wings in the new Central division of the Western conference and again made it to the conference finals, only to lose this time to the Vancouver Canucks, the eventual losers to the Stanley Cup Champion New York Rangers. Gilmour was third on the Leafs in scoring this season, but still led the team in assists with 84 and overall points with 111. He would be named team captain at the start of the 1994-95 season, that of this card, though that season was significantly shortened due to a league lockout. 

The Leafs started to wane in that shortened season, finishing only 4th in the Central divsion. Gilmour remained in Toronto until rebuilding began, and was traded during the 1996-97 season to the New Jersey Devils. From there, he bounced around the league with stops in Chicago, Buffalo, and Montreal while never reaching the same statistical success he had achieved in Toronto and earlier on in his career.

In 2002, Gilmour returned to the Maple Leafs, but was injured in his first game, resulting in him missing the season and retiring in 2003 after a 20 year NHL career. His number 93 was retired by the Leafs in 2009 and he was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 2011 alongside Ed Belfour, Joe Nieuwendyk, and Mark Howe. He spent ten years with the Kingston Frontenacs serving as head coach, general manager, and head of hockey operations, but stepped down from his role there in 2025 to serve in a community relations role back with the Maple Leafs.

While he didn't have a long list of individual awards earned, Gilmour's consistency and longevity solidified him as deserving of the Hall of Fame accolades. With the exception of goals, he is effectively top 30 in all major career offensive statistics including both assists (15th) with 964 total and overall points (21st) with 1414. Extremely impressive for any hockey player, especially a kid who almost didn't make the league because of his height. 

Sources

Pro Hockey Reference

The Internet Hockey Database

The Kingston Whig Standard

The Hockey Hall of Fame

ESPN

8/11 - Rich King

 Name: Rich King

Team: Seattle Supersonics

Position: Center (Basketball)

Card Year: 1993

Card Maker: Topps

Card Number: 275

I have an early post for you all this week due to some upcoming responsibilities that'll keep me from looking up my silly stats. So not only do you get an early post, I've also pulled the first basketball card of the blog, that of 1991-92 Seattle Supersonics very large rookie center, and University of Nebraska star, Rich King. 

Rich King was taken by the Seattle Supersonics as the 14th overall pick of the 1991 NBA draft - a draft that included Larry Johnson going first overall to the still very new Charlotte Hornets, and Dikembe Mutombo going fourth to the Denver Nuggets. This was after a successful four years at Nebraska where at the time of this card's printing - King had the Nebraska single game, season, and career blocks records, as well as ranking third overall for all time rebounds. As of the current day he is still number 3 overall for career blocks with 183 and number 5 overall for total career rebounds with 761, fitting numbers given his huge 7 foot 2 frame. This card indicates that he had the single game block record with 7, however his name isn't shown in the Nebraska team reference page under that stat.

This is also the second Topps Stadium Club card I've picked out, Byron Evans being the first, if you're into that sort of thing. The reason I bring this up is The Sporting News skills rating system is also used here as it was on the Byron Evans card only with basketball skills instead. King gets 3.9's on both mobility and shooting range which to me translates to slightly above average (still assuming out of 5) - which feels generous but perhaps the card writer was grading on a curve given his size. However, that doesn't seem to be factored in at all to his 'intimidation' rating of 3.4 which is likely based on his poor 'defense' at 3.3. 

So while this card also alludes to his ability to both "pass the rock" and shoot the proverbial "J", his opportunities to do either of these things, let alone anything else basketball-related, was greatly limited in his time with Seattle. He was only healthy during his rookie season, playing 40 games and averaging 5.3 minutes per game. After that he fell victim to a slew of injuries resulting in 6 total surgeries between his thumb, back, knees, and feet. 

In a 2008 interview he describes the situation:

"Instead of being on the court, my memories of the Sonics are of being at Swedish Hospital, being in rehab, being with trainer Bob Medina. I'd never been hurt before that."

Following his rookie year, he only played 3 games in 1992-93, 27 games in 1993-94, and 2 games in 1994-95. After being dropped by Seattle, he went to training camp for Denver, Minnesota, and Vancouver, but did not make any rosters. He called it quits after his sixth and final surgery but remained in Washington, getting married and raising two sons, Christian and Beckham. Christian played the 2024-25 season for Washington as a 6'8 redshirt freshman forward and transferred to Montana State for the 25-26 season. 

King's professional life has involved real estate, a current 14-year stint at Amazon, and most interestingly - starting an investment firm with former teammate, Detlef Schrempf a few years after his career ended. 

Given all of this, I think it feels safe to say that while his NBA experience was a disappointment, Rich King is living a life like well, just that. 

Sources:

Sports Reference 

Kent Pavelka UW Interview

Basketball Reference

Seattle PI Interview

8/7 - Doug Jones

Name: Doug Jones

Team: Houston Astros

Position: Relief Pitcher 

Card Year: 1993

Card Maker: Topps

Card Number: 171

The thing I've enjoyed most about starting this blog, even in the few posts I've written, is getting
to learn about and piece together the stories of the athletes whose cards I've drawn. So far, I've encountered several common sports narratives (the draft busts, the career-ending injuries, the steady success of a hall-of-fame career) but in this week's card - 1992 Houston Astro, Doug Jones, a new type of story emerges - that of the late bloomer who played to his limited strengths and was able to have a long and successful professional career. 

Jones was drafted by the Brewers in 1978 at the age of 20 as a starting pitcher and bounced around their farm system before being very briefly called up in 1982. He returned to the minor leagues until 1986 where Cleveland picked him up late in the season as a reliever and he was able to notch his first major league save, maintaining a 2.50 ERA over 11 games. He threw two pitches - a sub-90 MPH fastball and a change-up and had to rely on batters making contact to get most of his outs. He is quoted as saying "My game is to get batters to hit the ball to someone. If I walk people or give up home runs, I’d be gone in a minute because I don’t have anything else going for me.”

Jones was able to make the opening day lineup for Cleveland in 1987 and despite some hiccups early in the season, maintained his spot on the roster and ended up an All-Star for the first time in 1988, at the age of 31, and the first of three straight All-Star nods with Cleveland. The last of those All-star seasons was in 1990 where Jones tallied 43 saves - good for third overall in the MLB. Despite this, he never made the postseason with the Indians and in 1991 he was giving too many hitters too many good looks, causing Cleveland to not renew his contract, and making him a free agent going into 1992. He was then signed by the Houston Astros.

Jones ended the 1992 season with 36 total saves, a Houston team record at the time of this card's printing. He earned his 4th All Star nod and is still in the Astros record books with the 7th highest overall number of single season saves. He spent one more season with Houston until being traded to Philadelphia for "Wild Thing" pitcher Mitch Williams. Given his steady personality and low velocity, he earned the moniker "Mild Thing" while reaching the All Star game for the Phillies for his 5th and final time. 

After Philadelphia, Jones moved pretty consistently for the rest of his career from Philadelphia to Baltimore, the Cubs, back to Milwaukee in 1996 where he put together in 1997 playing in 76 games and earning 36 saves, then on to Cleveland in 1998 where he was part of a playoff squad for the first time in his career at 41 years old. That Cleveland team made it to the 1998 ALCS but lost to the eventual World Series champion New York Yankees. He finished his career in 2000 after two seasons with the Oakland A's - keeping his ERA below 4.00 at the ages of 42 and 43.

Jones finished his career with 303 saves and all but one of them after the age of 30. He sadly died in 2021 due to complications from COVID. He had a career that seemed perpetually on edge, but he was grounded enough to keep doing what was needed to keep it going for as long as possible.   

Sources

RIP Baseball

Pro Baseball Reference

Society for American Baseball Reference

MLB Obituary