What's Your Favorite Piece of Packers Memorabilia?
A franchise as old as the Packers spawns a lot of memorabilia, and Packers fans are all too eager to snap it up whenever the opportunity presents itself.
But anybody who’s collected any amount of memorabilia has a favorite piece. Whether it’s attached to a favorite player or a special moment, there’s something that makes a certain item jump out.
Here are our favorites. Tell us about yours on our Facebook and Twitter pages!
Jon says: My first Ahman Green patch card
A close friend of mine is a world class memorabilia collector. His accumulation of hockey and baseball paraphernalia boggles the mind in the best possible way, both in the breadth and depth of the collection and in the uniqueness of the items within it.
As he was truly diving into this hobby, I started to pick up an interest in it as well. You can’t be around that level of fanaticism without some of it rubbing off. As a result, I developed a taste for patch cards.
Patch cards (or sometimes swatch cards) are made by cutting up a portion of a player’s uniform (either game used or otherwise) and embedding into a traditional trading card. I love the look of the cards and the feeling of having a close personal connection to something that was actually a part of a favorite player’s game day equipment.
My favorite card, though, was my first big buy. A particular Ahman Green card caught my eye online one day and I had to have it. The patch captured some of the green from a Packers home jersey and a chunk of the tackle twill used to create the white home numbers. The picture featured Green wearing one of the throwback uniforms the Packers used in their early 2000s trips to Detroit for Thanksgiving. To top it all off, the card came with an autograph and inscription from the man himself.
I bought the card and never regretted what I spent for a second. The moment I arrived in the mail, I was in the club. My friend and I now had a two person hobby, even if I never kept it up at the level he did. We still talk about that card (and many others) as we spot new and interesting pieces of memorabilia.
Today, the card is tucked away safely in a moving box, waiting for the right time and place to go on display.
Gary says: My collection of ticket stubs from Packers games
There are two kinds of football fans: those interested in experiences and those interested in memorabilia. I’ve found in my travels that those who would rather go to a game in person aren’t as interested in owning a game-used jersey, and those who want a piece of the turf used in a Super Bowl would rather watch the game from their couch and big screen TV.
As a millennial, I fall into the predictable category of an experience-based football fan. My favorite Packers memories are bundling up in layers of winter clothes to go to Lambeau with my dad, or spending a summer afternoon watching training camp with friends and trying to figure out who was looking like the next big thing.
Therefore, my memorabilia collection is small and nostalgic. My favorite piece is my collection of ticket stubs from Packers games, because of how it fondly brings back memories of times with loved ones.
I recently flipped through the ticket stubs, and could bring back the smell of the stadiums for specific games. There’s a ticket from a snowy game on New Year’s Day against the Lions when Matt Flynn tossed six touchdowns. Or the ticket from the season opener in 2011 against the Saints, when the Packers celebrated their Super Bowl XLV championship.
Maybe one day I’ll want an autographed jersey or adorn a man cave full of game-used items. But for now, I love my collection of ticket stubs.
