Two oddities on Phil Esposito’s 1971-72 OPC hockey card

Phil Esposito was a Hall of Fame center for the Boston Bruins from the 1960’s and 1970’s. He dominated goal scoring in the NHL for many years, setting many records that would eventually be broken by Wayne Gretzky.

In his era, Esposito was the touchstone for all NHL forwards when it came to offensive output. His bulky 6’1″ frame helped him find room in front of goaltenders, putting home rebounds night in and night out, plus his soft left handed touch helped him slide passes over to wingers like Wayne Cashman and Ken Hodge. And he never backed down from a physical challenge, either.

The total package, Phil Esposito.

What some might not know is that Esposito also had a unique personality that helped define the image of hockey players in the 1970’s.

And two oddities on Phil Esposito’s 1971-72 O-Pee-Cee card #20 are a good example.

Phil Esposito’s 1971-72 O-Pee-Chee

First let’s take a look at the card itself.

Just one of many valuable cards from the 1971-72 O-Pee-Chee set (others include rookie cards of Ken Dryden, Marcel Dionne, and Guy LaFleur), at first glance Esposito card #20 doesn’t stand out for any particular reason. The framed pose by Esposito is not unlike most of the other veteran cards from this set. Action shots were more of a 1980’s thing when it came to hockey cards.

But take a closer look at Esposito.

Is he wearing… slacks?

Oddity #1: Esposito wears classic 1970’s slacks

Yep, if you look closely you can see that Esposito isn’t wearing hockey pants at all. Rather he dons a pair of classic 1970’s slacks.

It looks less like Esposito came off the ice after practice and more like he came directly from a fondue party.

In this era of hockey card making, there would be a “hockey card picture day” for all players. Who knows if they were told ahead of time when that day would happen, but what usually happened is a camera guy would set up, get posed pictures of each player, and send them off to Topps/O-Pee-Chee for the hockey cards.

Most players wanted their hockey card to match their job description, so they would put on all their hockey gear for the picture. Here are some examples:

It makes sense to put on all your hockey gear for this photo. This card will be a memory of you as a player and millions of fans will see it. The impression you want to make on the NHL is one of a professional who takes his job seriously.

But if there’s anyone in the league who didn’t care about what others thought about him, it was Phil Esposito.

He also didn’t care too much for “hockey card picture day”… he was a busy guy and didn’t see the point in wasting time taking pictures of himself for cardboard.

So when hockey card picture day came, Esposito reluctantly put on his sweater, jumped in front of the camera, snapped the pic, and took off.

And if you notice, he didn’t even have time to grab the right gloves.

Oddity #2: Esposito wearing the wrong gloves

As any vintage hockey fan could tell you, Phil Esposito wore #7 on the ice.

But here he is on a hockey card wearing both his #7 sweater and a pair of #17 hockey gloves.

What in the world? When did Esposito ever wear the #17?

The answer is never.

Here’s what I think happened.

In a rush to get “hockey card picture day” over with as soon as possible, Esposito grabbed a pair of gloves that were close by. Likely that pair of gloves belonged to fellow centerman Fred Stanfield, who wore #17. Much like Esposito didn’t care that his pants stood out, he didn’t care that his gloves didn’t match his sweater number.

For the record, here’s Fred Stanfield’s card #7 from the same set:

There’s those gloves!

The most logical explanation for Esposito’s mismatched gloves are that Stanfield had just taken his picture with the cameraperson and then it was Esposito’s turn.

“Hey Fred, let me see those mitts,” you can almost hear Esposito say right before his picture was taken.

And the rest is history.

Want to own part of that history? Greg Morris Cards has several copies of Esposito’s card #20 from the 1971-72 O-Pee-Chee set up for auction now, in various condition:

• 1971-72 Topps Set Break # 20 Phil Esposito VG-VGEX *GMCARDS*
• 1971-72 O-Pee-Chee Set Break # 20 Phil Esposito EX-EXMINT *GMCARDS*
• 1971-72 Topps Set Break # 20 Phil Esposito NM-MT OR BETTER *GMCARDS*

Sources: “Hockey Card Stories” by Ken Reid; hockey-reference.com