Moody's Olympics Gold: Team Slovakia

Team Slovakia has never won a gold medal and finished fifth at the last Olympiad held in Torino, Italy. In Vancouver, Slovakia just knocked Team Sweden out of competition.

Cards signed by some of Team Slovakia's players:

Top row: Spartak's Branko Radivojevic, Boston's Miroslav Satan, Barys Astana's Josef Stumpel and Los Angeles' Lubomir Visnovsky; and
Bottom row: Locomotiv's Richard Zednik, New York Rangers' Marian Gaborik, Los Angeles' Michal Handzus and Chicago's Marian Hossa.

More cards signed by Team Slovakia players:

Top row: Spartak's Martin Cibak and Colorado's Peter Budaj; and
Bottom row: Tampa Bay's Andrej Meszaros, Chicago's Tomas Kopecky, Boston's Zdeno Chara and HK 36's Ziggy Palffy.

Montreal's Jaroslav Halak

Buffalo's Andrej Sekara

Tampa Bay's Andrej Meszaros on a Ottawa Senators wallpaper.

Most of these items have been signed over the past two seasons, either in Hockey Bay or South Florida.

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It's not just because the Colorado Avalanche are my favorite Western Conference team that I get jacked up any time they come to Hockey Bay. There's a lot more to it than that. It's because the Avs are one of the best-signing teams.

Last season, Colorado provided the front half of the biggest haul of the 2009-09 campaign. This season's no different, as the Avs tied the Los Angeles Kings as the most productive team. And though Colorado lacks Joe Sakic this season, it's no reason not to load up on autographs.

All told, we added 79 autographs, including a dozen pucks, from Avs players between the morning skate walk and the gametime bus.

Among those signing pucks, shown above, were:

Top row: Matt Duchene, Adam Foote and Milan Hejduk; and
Bottom row: Marek Svatos and Darcy Tucker.

Even members of the coaching staff got into the act, including, from left: Adam Deadmarsh, Steve Konowalchuk and Joe Sacco.

It should come as no surprise, either, that cards (36, altogether) made up for nearly half of the day's haul:

Top row: Craig Anderson, Peter Budaj, T.J.Galiardi and Scott Hannan
Bottom row: Matt Hendricks, John-Michael Liles, Cody McLeod and Darcy Tucker.

Also signing cards, especially in the specialty variety, were:

Top row: Milan Hejduk, Ryan O'Reilly and Paul Stastny; and
Bottom row: Chris Stewart, Marek Svatos and Wojtek Wolski.

Other highlights:

~ Colin filling up a team sheet with 26 signatures; and
~ Adam Foote signing an appropriate patch on an Avalanche jersey.

Any ideas?

For some reason, I've been having the darnedest of times with silver paint pens. These two pucks, signed by New York's Marian Gaborik, are the latest example of my futile efforts.

Beyond priming them before each use (shaking them, as suggested, as well as making sure the paint is flowing) I've tried switching brands, using new and old, and even keeping them capped after priming. Nothing, however, seems to lead to a decent autograph.

It's particularly frustrating, too, that these came from a player of Gaborik's quality and star power. Because the Rangers head back to Hockey Bay in April, I'm seriously considering wiping them clean and trying again. This time, though, I'll use a blue paint pen.

Well on his way

One of the more welcome sights Wednesday after a long summer layoff from hockey was Tampa Bay defenseman Andrej Meszaros back out on the ice.

Coming back from offseason shoulder surgery, Meszaros is trying to answer questions of whether he'll be ready for training camp.

To me, he looked at ease running and participating in a few drills with a handful of Lightning teammates.

And, just to make sure, he passed Hound Central 5.0's autograph test, signing this Slovakia puck.