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Team USA upsets Team Canada

To the surprise of most hockey fans, Team USA, lead by Ryan Miller and Brian Rafalski, defeated Team Canada 5-3 yesterday in the preliminary round of the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver. The heavily favored Canadian team never led in the game. Both teams will move on to the single elimination round with team USA earning a bye with the big win. It was the first time since 1960 that USA has defeated Canada in an Olympic hockey game. Today, the sports world can't stop talking about hockey (finally).Even the national media outlets are getting in on the excitement.

It should really come as no huge surprise that USA was able to defeat Canada in this game. First off, both of these teams are essentially NHL teams. Although Canada fields a team with more All Stars, just as in the NHL, any of the top teams should be able to beat another on a given day in the Olympics. Next, the Americans had Miller standing on his head in net, whereas Martin Brodeur had a bit of an off night in goal for the Canadians. With the top teams all fielding elite goaltenders, it will only take a stellar performance by one of these men to lead their team to victory. Last, but not least, it was only the medal round and Canada did not need a win to advance. Canada will no doubt bring their A-game to the single elimination round.

Many fans are saying that the Americans might have woken a sleeping giant in Canada, who went to a shootout with Switzerland in their prevoius game. This could be true, but remember that this team's best player is Sidney Crosby, who is on this way to greatness, but is no Mario Lemieux or Wayne Gretzky. Also, with such a deep pool of talent on a number of teams, this is anyone's tournament. Perhaps Alexander Ovechkin and the Russians will take gold, or maybe the defending gold medal winning Swedes. Maybe the Finns or Czechs can get on a run to the title game. Or perhaps this is the year that the Americans strike gold and Ryan Miller becomes a bona fide star. Hopefully, he can come back to Buffalo and do the same for the Sabres.

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Two Lefty, Future Hall of Famers Retire this Offseason

In January, Randy Johnson announced his retirement from baseball. Just a month later, fellow southpaw Tom Glavine also officially announced his retirement from the game. Both players are arguably among the ten best lefties of all time.

Johnson, who we all know as "The Big Unit", retired with nearly 5,000 career strikeouts. Though he bounced around a lot, he is most remembered for pitching for the Seattle Mariners and Arizona Diamondbacks. Standing 6'10" with a scruffy appearance and big time fastball, Johnson was one of the most fearsome pitchers of all time. He is often remembered for throwing over the head of both John Kruk and Larry Walker in All Star games.Johnson was the World Series MVP in leading the Diamondbacks to the 2001 World Series Championship.

In contrast to Johnson's wild, furious style, Glavine had a calm demeanor on the mound. He relied on a mix of pitches and pinpoint control. Nevertheless, he did still compile over 2.500 career strikeouts. Glavine spent most of his career with the Atlanta Braves, but did spend a few years with their rival, the New York Mets. Like Johnson, Glavine won a World Series and was named MVP (in 1995 with the Braves).

Johnson had a rookie card in nearly every standard set in 1989 (Donruss, Fleer, Score, Topps, and Upper Deck). The Donruss, Score, and Topps rookies are all fairly low quality and only of interest to Randy Johnson fans. His Fleer card was a little better, but his Upper Deck rookie is definitely his signature rookie. Johnson's rookie cards will continue to grow in popularity as he is a 300 game winner a shoe-in for the Hall of Fame. If he could have stuck around to get 5,000 strikeouts, his cards would have seen even more of a bump (he ended up 125 K's short). Unfortunately, his rookie cards do not feature him as a member of the Seattle Mariners (where he first achieved fame) as he broke into the league with the Montreal Expos.

Though both players had rookie cards in bad collecting years, at least Johnson has that Upper Deck rookie to fall back on. Glavine was unfortunately a rookie in 1987, which meant that his rookie cards were issued in 1988, a truly awful year for card collecting. A Glavine rookie was included in all sets that year (Topps, Donruss, Fleer, and Score). Unfortunately, all sets were terrible looking and overproduced that year. The Fleer card would have to be named the best of the bunch as it is the only halfway decent looking rookie of the pitcher, but Glavine had no rookie issued that was really worthy of such a great player. Nevertheless, due to the fact that Glavine is also 300 game winner and future Hall of Famer, these cards will continue to find buyers for years to come.

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The Big Hurt Retires

After two decades of terrorizing American League pitching, First Baseman/Designated Hitter Frank Thomas has decided to hang up his cleats. Most famous as a member of the Chicago White Sox, Thomas also played for the Oakland Athletics and Toronto Blue Jays.

Thomas broke into the league for the White Sox as a 22 year old in 1990. The next season, he would amass over 30 home runs and 100 RBI and was well on his way to becoming a star in the league. He would soon go on to win the MVP award in 1993 and 1994. He led the league in OBP four times and even has a batting title. He would eventually become a member of the 500 Home Run Club and statistics-wise is a likely Hall of Famer. Fans will always remember Thomas for taking the reigns as the biggest star in the game for a couple of years despite playing in the same era as Ken Griffey Jr. and Barry Bonds.

Unfortunately for baseball card collectors, Thomas was a high draft pick in 1989. This means that his rookie cards came in 1990 which was an awful year for baseball card collecting due to overproduction of generally low quality sets. Thomas had a rookie card in the following standard sets that year; Bowman, Leaf, Score and Topps. He also had a few cards issued in update sets later that season. His Leaf card is probably the best of the bunch as far as both aesthetics and rarity. However, his Topps card is particularly notable for the rare "NNOF" error variation. Thomas collectors can take solace in the fact that it is not difficult or expensive to get their hands on all the rookie cards of such a great player.