2011-12 Pinnacle Hockey Box Break

Packs Per Box:  24
Card Per Pack:  8
Expected Cards:  192

Common Base Set Cards:  175 out of 250.
     Duplicates:  6
Insert Cards:
Rink Collection Parallels:  (5) R. Whitney, C. Smith, P. Wiercioch, C. Atkinson, B. Saad
Team Pinnacle: (1) C. Price/P. Rinne
Tough Times: (2) B. Shoebottom, W. Clark
Breakthrough: (3)J. Van Riemsdyk, J. Skinner, L. Eriksson
Game Night Materials: (1) Claude Giroux
Threads Prime: (1) Marc-Andre Fleury #/50
Starting Six Threads: (1) N. Backstrom/A. Semin/K. Alzner/A. Ovechkin/J. Carlson/M. Neuvirth #/199

Our Thoughts:

Panini should have renamed this product as lacking instead of Pinnacle.  I expected more from this product and was disappointed in what the box contained.  To be fair, the product does guarantee two autographs or memorabila per box.  I received three, and the Prime variant of Marc-Andre Fleury was nice as well as pulling the 6 piece Washington Capitals card.  But it seemed like there wasn't much thought on the design of the cards or the inserts.

The base set according to Pinnacle are the 250 veteran cards, 30 Ice Breaker Rookie cards and 10 Ice Breaker Autograph cards.  Um, no.  The base set is the 250 veteran cards.  If you open a box and do not receive one single Rookie card, how in hell can you decide that they are part of the base set?  All the photos in the base set are orinentated so the card is longer sideways.  That is about the only plus to be found here.  The design is basic with team colors and doesn't inspire anything.  One of the coolest pictures is Card #125, Chris Neil of the Ottawa Senators.  He is in the locker room area about ready to go through some double doors and two large Senator logs around him.  The visual is real nice.  The worst photo is Marc-Andre Fleury on the ice during warm-ups skating around in a Pittsburgh Steelers helmet.  That is card #129.

The inserts are also just bland.  The jersey cards are just a picture with straight lines dividing the colors.  We got the team logo as well, but it doesn't do anything.  And who decided that a guy who played 35 games at the NHL level and accumulated 53 Penalty Minutes in those games as a Tough Guy.  I don't care what he did in the minors.  Bruce Shoebottom should not be in the Tough Times insert set. 

I paid $45 for this box and if it wasn't for the Starting Six Threads, I would have felt cheated.  As for a regular box, $45 is too high for this substandard product.  It is OK for a set builder, but that is about it.  The only other reason is if you feel lucky and want to try for an autograph.  But that seems to me something that you cannot bank on that one.

Box Value 1.5 out of 5.