Mario Lemieux is a Hall of Fame center and widely considered one of the greatest hockey players of all-time. He was drafted by the Pittsburgh Penguins with the 1st pick in the 1984 NHL draft. Mario Lemieux led the Penguins to back-to-back Stanley Cup Championships in 1991 and 1992. Unfortunately, his career was plagued by health issues that limited the number of games he played. He retired early in 1997 as he battled Hodgkin’s lymphoma before returning in 2000. Despite all this, Mario Lemieux ranks in the top 10 in career points and had a career average of 1.883 points per game; 2nd only to Wayne Gretzky. Of the top 35 players with at least 1,000 career points, he is the only one to have played in less than 1,000 games. He ended his career with nearly 700 goals and over 1,000 assists.
Below is a look at some of Mario Lemieux’s career accomplishments and highlights.
- 9x All-Star
- 2x Stanley Cup Champion
- 3x Hart Award Winner
- 4x Pearson Award Winner
- 6x Ross Award Winner
- 2x Smythe Award Winner
- 1984-85 Calder Award Winner
Mario Lemieux’s rookie card is in 1985 Topps set and he is the only significant rookie in the set. Throughout the years, he has been very hit or miss answering fan mail. There was a brief window a couple years ago that lasted about 3 weeks before he was flooded with requests. I was fortunate to get him TTM and later decided to sell them and upgrade. I purchased a raw card on eBay and sent it in to a paid signing with an extra fine tip silver paint pen. The card turned out awesome.
Currently there are only 38 autographed Mario Lemieux rookie cards in the PSA registry.
Total Investment: $268.49
Estimated Value: $750
Return on Investment: 179%