The Portland Thorns play for the championship of the NWSL on CBS a little over an hour from now. A win would give the franchise their third championship, which would be the most a single team has won in the short history of the league. (One caveat here – the Thorns’ opponents today, the Kansas City Current, are officially playing for their franchise’s first title, however their forerunner, FC Kansas City, won two championships before ceasing operations and transferring their player assets to Utah Royals FC in 2017… which subsequently ceased operations in 2020 and transferred their player assets back to the new KC squad. So, let’s not split hairs here – KC’s also going for their third.)
Anyway…
Almost anyone who pays attention to soccer, women’s sports, the national news or the general concept of fairness and justice knows that soccer has been far from the top story circling the Thorns and women’s soccer as a whole this season. However odious some of the decisions made by the team’s ownership and management have been over the last decade, and however much most of the fanbase would like to toss the bastards at the top into the Willamette River, I’ve loved this team since their formation, and I continue to love them to this day. Its infuriating what some former Thorns had to endure under the past leadership (and current ownership) of the team, and it’s heartbreaking that the current iteration of the team has been playing with the cloud of the past hanging over them. I’m hoping with everything I’ve got that they can rise above it today.
My soccer fandom is probably considered pretty shallow by the most dedicated of Timbers and Thorns supporters. Although I’ve been a Timbers season ticket holder since their first year in MLS, I won’t pretend to be a soccer savant. As much as I’ve watched ‘the beautiful game’ over the last decade-plus, its mostly been a passive activity. I can’t explain any real technical aspect of plays – I can recognize some formations and can usually tell when there’s a good possibility of a goal coming, but that’s about it. I just enjoy watching the game and leave it at that. I’ve gravitated to the Thorns over the last five years or so, likely in large part due the good fortune that we’ve had in Portland to continuously have some of the brightest stars in the women’s game play for the Thorns.
This Thorns team in particular has some incredible players – from legends Christine Sinclair and Becky Sauerbrunn to budding superstar Sophia Smith and overlooked but powerful scoring threat (and my personal favorite) Morgan Weaver, this team is packed with talent – and that’s before top IX honoree Hina Sugita, rookie Sam Coffey, goalkeeper Bella Bixby are mentioned. Between the star power and how damned likable the players are, I feel personal invested in this team to the degree that I haven’t felt about a team in quite a while.
Thanks to that, and to the fact that new baseball and basketball cards have gotten prohibitively costly in pack form, I’ve tried to focus my collecting attention on the players, people, and teams I really enjoy. One major beneficiary of that has been my Thorns collection. So, as we approach the end of the 2022 season, here’s some of my favorite Thorns cards.
First up is my 2020 Parkside Challenge Cup Promising Prospects card of Morgan Weaver. There’s a companion card for Sophia Smith, however that one has quickly spiraled out of my price range. The last one to sell at auction on eBay was within the last two weeks and went for north of a grand. I’m hoping I can someday swing a trade for one, but I’m not someone to spend four figures on a piece of cardboard – however obsessed I may be.
Next up are two autographs, also from the 2020 Parkside Challenge Cup set. I was able to get these with proceeds from Sportlots sales made over a few months. This Weaver is a great example of buying the card, not the grade. It’s definitely in good enough condition for my collection, especially since I hadn’t seen one come up for auction in the year or so before I pulled the trigger. The Sinclair was pricier, but I’ve followed her back to her Portland Pilot days, so it was a no-brainer.
My most recent major pickup was this “nice for a 7” (again, buy the card, not the grade) Lindsey Horan from the 2020 Challenge Cup set. This one had been on my radar since picking up the other two Thorns in that set… now I have all three! – not too shabby since each were limited to 100 copies.
Before the Weaver and Sinclair autographs above, the 2021 Sophie Smith and Olivia Moultrie autographs were the first two I chased down using proceeds from selling off some unwanted cards. Moultrie has yet to find regular playing time, but c’mon – the kid’s 16 years old! Sophia on the other hand, was just named MVP of the NWSL and seemingly scores goals for the National Team at will. She’s poised to be an anchor of the USWNT for the next decade.
I can’t show off the Sophia and Olivia 2021 autographs without the rest of the 2021 signatures I’ve collected. The Rocky Rodriguez is the harder to find purple ink variety – no, I will not be chasing the purple ink of the others.
The next four aren’t the hardest cards to find, but I had to pick Weaver and Smith’s post-goal euphoria if for no other reason than to try to trigger some luck for today. I also had to include Olivia and Christine superimposed over the Rose City. These are all from Parkside’s 2022 NWLS set.
Last but not least, semifinal stoppage time hero Crystal Dunn. I pulled this from a pack last month. Unfortunately, it (along with most other 2022 Parkside autographs I’ve seen) came out of the pack damaged, with what looks like some kind of roller damage on the silver ink. Nonetheless, I won’t complain about adding this card to my collection. I will complain a bit about how most of the retail boxes I bought of this year’s Parkside set had cards that came out of the pack damaged. I love that there’s more of these on the market now, but let’s not lose track of quality control.
That’s it for now – if anyone has a line on a 2020 Sophia Smith Promising Prospects card that’s available for trade, let me know… in the meantime, go Thorns!