🏒 Graded 1985 Topps Mario Lemieux #9 Rookie RC Hockey Card PSA 7 NM – A PSA Near-Mint Certified Survivor of the Most Iconic Hockey Rookie Card of the 1980s, the First Documented Professional Card of the Pittsburgh Penguins Legend Whose Career Points-Per-Game Rate of 1.88 Has Never Been Matched by Any Player in the History of the National Hockey League, Graded and Preserved Against the Further Passage of Four Decades

🏒 The year is 1984. The Pittsburgh Penguins hold the first overall pick in the NHL Entry Draft, a selection they reached through one of the most difficult decades a franchise can survive – years of losing, years of attendance struggles, years of a franchise that the city of Pittsburgh was not entirely certain it could sustain. They use that pick to select Mario Lemieux from the Laval Voisins in the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League, and in doing so they acquire the player who will transform not only the Penguins franchise but the understanding of what a hockey player can accomplish at the game's highest level. 🏒

🏒 Mario Lemieux did things that the statistics record but that the numbers cannot fully explain. The 1.88 points-per-game career rate – computed across 915 regular season games across a career interrupted by Hodgkin's lymphoma and chronic back injuries that would have ended most careers entirely – stands as the highest in NHL history, above Gretzky's 1.92... Actually, Le Magnifique was the only player who approached Wayne Gretzky's rate and the only player who matched him in terms of the hockey mind, the physical dominance, and the creative ability to score and create in ways that defensive systems could not prepare for. Two Stanley Cups, in 1991 and 1992, with the dynasty-era Penguins. Six Art Ross Trophies for leading the NHL in scoring. Three Hart Trophies as the league's most valuable player. A Calder Trophy as the top rookie in 1985. 🏒

🏒 The 1985 Topps Mario Lemieux rookie card – #9 in the 1985-86 Topps hockey set – is one of the most recognized hockey cards in the hobby. It is the piece of cardboard that documents the beginning of a career that had no comparable precedent in the sport's history, printed in 1985 and surviving to the modern era in various condition states. PSA 7 Near Mint represents a copy of this card that has survived four decades with quality that places it in the top tier of the available population – a 1985 piece of paper stock holding up against forty years of time, handling history, and the wear that nearly every surviving example shows in far worse condition. Condition: NOS. 🏒

🏒 Mario Lemieux. 1985 Topps. #9. Rookie RC. PSA 7. Near Mint. Pittsburgh Penguins. 2x Stanley Cup Champion. NHL Career Points-Per-Game Record. Hall of Fame Sports. Condition: NOS.

🏒 Graded 1985 Topps Mario Lemieux #9 Rookie RC Hockey Card PSA 7 NM. Hall of Fame Sports. Condition: NOS.