2011-12 Heroes and Prospects Hobby Box Break * 2

 It may have taken me a bit of time to get to this, but let's finally show off the cards from these two boxes. 

I do like that they identified the players on the box. I like that they identified the prospects on the front (Andy Miele is hidden by the wrapping). Only Adam Henrique is still in the NHL of this group.

The set is broken up into segments, and although I did get cards from all of them, I did end up about 30 cards short of the base set.

The Heroes portion opens the set. And we have a box cover appearance! I guess there's no need to include a name on the front if his card appears.

Prospects show up next, and it opens with international players. I'm not sure if ITG had the license to show the Djurgardens jersey  that Zibanejad is sporting on his card, but I appreciate the randomness of it appearing.

The next 90 or so cards are devoted to (then) current CHL players. The Kitchener Rangers punched way above their weight with 3 players making appearances here. I missed out on the Ryan Murphy, but was happy to see their annual Remembrance Day jerseys show up on these cards. It was also used on Ryan's..

While I did get cards of future NHLers in this mix, I do like getting cards of people who had no other pack-pullable appearances outside of these.

When you get to the triple digit portion of the set, the AHL portion starts. Again, the most interesting ones here are of players with few cards outside of what showed up in this set. I think Sweatt is the only one of this four that would get NHL level cards.

How do you get current NHL stars into a product that didn't have the license? Salute their time in the CHL or AHL with the 'Grad" portion of the set.

The base set ends with a 4-card tribute portion dedicated to players who had recently passed away, 3 from the nightmare-ish 2011 off-season. And the Lokomotiv plane crash wasn't even part of this portion.

And there are the base cards. As said, I'm about 30-ish out. I'll probably get a listing up sooner rather than later. Unfortunately, I missed out on the big one - #101 Nathan MacKinnon.

But there are inserts to get to.

There were inserts the saluting both the Calder Cup and Memorial Cup Champions. I lucked out by getting the former, and a pair of new Senators cards. I already had NHL level cards of both these guys, but these are still nice, and do include my favourite background choice outside of the actual one in the original photo - a team logo.

These were part of some draft redemption program. Long-expired, these are just another prospect insert set.

No Ryan Murphy base card? No problem! He makes 1 1/4 appearances among the relics. ITG products would often have a hit or two more beyond what was advertised. But despite its position in my Kitchener Rangers binder, that two-colour piece of a Swedish jersey is my favourite among all the swatches seen here.

And here are the autographs, with one of the boxes containing an extra one. As usual, they made the sticker autograph work with the design

I guess that since they would go on to play for the Senators, I can count both the Pageau and the Phaneuf as Sens autographs. I could. But I won't. Out of the others, Wotherspoon was the only one of those three to get NHL level cards.

I guess I could get a little upset over the collation leaving me a distance from the completed set. But they were still pretty solid boxes.

There you have it!