In the continuing saga of a guy that spends a whole lot of free time on Ebay looking for things he shouldn't buy, Can Ball Ray has found some more gems with a certain collectible theme and two things that connect them are that they are basketball cards and they feature a certain curly mullet wearing point forward who's last name begins with blautins ...
So despite that fact that former Senior Men's National Team head coach Leo Rautins is the former head coach of the national team, he was actually a pretty decent player in his day. He was a journeyman player on this side of the water after being stunted by some serious injuries in this few years in the NBA, he would go on to play a long time in Europe. Regardless, I had been able to find a pair of dandies that would remind you that Leo was a pretty decent looking baller before the stint on TV and manning the helm of the underachieving National Team ...
Item #1 - A 1989-90 Lacrosse Catbirds Team Set
What we have here is a full team set from the now defunct CBA's LaCrosse Catbirds. If you look carefully, that Leo in the bottom corner of the image and he's DUNKING the basketball. OK, he's not really dunking but at least he's tapping the glass. If you also note, a young Flip Saunders was coaching younger Leo on this team.
Item #2 - A 1983-84 Star Co. Leo Rautins Rookie Card
Hot damn! This is the piece de resistance to any collection of Canadian basketball memorabilia - Leo Rautins' rookie card. If you will recall, he was a pretty good player coming out of Syracuse and was drafted in the first round with the 17th pick by Philadelphia. Back in that particular period in time, basketball was not getting the great sports card due that baseball, football and hockey were. The Star Co. decided to release team sets of every NBA team in the general region of the team and it made getting a complete set pretty difficult. Star cards are a little tough to come by now in general and to have found a gem mint (and graded a 9.5 by some pricing and condition expert somewhere) makes this a pretty impressive find. Bear in mind that I've found three of these particular cards on Ebay but they all are asking about the same general price. And for a timeless relic that has Leo in one of them white dude afros/super perms may be worth the price.