1972 O-Pee-Chee Guy Charron #223 Detroit Red Wings

Description

1972 O-Pee-Chee Guy Charron #223 Detroit Red Wings Few cards on this sheet carry a better story line than this 1972 O-Pee-Chee Guy Charron #223, which freezes a young Quebec centre at the very moment Detroit was betting its future on him. Charron arrived in Motown through the January 1971 multi-player deal with Montreal, the same blockbuster transaction that reshaped the Red Wings' roster, and the back bio openly praises his potential to stay in the NHL, his fine scoring ability and his strong goal-scoring season in the Quebec junior ranks that had scouts excited long before he ever laced up for the big club. The friendly headshot against the green studio background shows the sideburned young centre at the start of a career that would see him become a reliable NHL scorer with stops in Atlanta and Washington, where he later posted some of his finest offensive seasons and earned a reputation as a smart, skilled two-way forward. For collectors who follow the Montreal-to-Detroit pipeline of the early 1970s, Charron's cards are a fascinating footnote to one of the most talked-about trades of the era, and his third-series OPC card is somewhat scarcer than the early printings. The card comes from the 340-card 1972-73 O-Pee-Chee set with the classic tan woodgrain border, yellow name bar and circular winged wheel crest that define the issue. The reverse is the genuine Canadian O-Pee-Chee bilingual back with the English and French text printed side by side, the cartoon panel and the career record table, confirming the Canadian OPC printing and not the American Topps version, and it is not a puzzle back. the front shows sharp corners with only a faint touch at the lower left, minimal edge wear, centering at roughly 55/45 with a touch more border on the left, and a glossy surface free of creases, wrinkles and marks, while the bilingual back is clean with crisp orange print and no staining. Grading conservatively as I do for all vintage OPC, the small corner touch and slight centering drift hold this at a raw estimate of EX 5, an attractive honest grade for a card with a great trade-history story at a very approachable price. Grade Estimate: EX 5