2025–26 Flair Hockey: McDavid Layers, Hot Mitts and Heat-Reveal Cards

Connor McDavid’s 3-on-1 Breakaway card cuts his portrait into intersecting treatments: natural color across the eyes, a pale green lower face, bright abstract color through his hair and a graphic orange-and-teal edge. A cream border and fine gold lines keep the whole thing contained. It is a remarkably busy face—and a remarkably good reason to bring Flair back.

2025–26 Flair Hockey, released April 15, 2026, is the first standalone Flair hockey set since 1996–97. Upper Deck has revived the brand’s elaborate lettering and layered photographs, then added heat-sensitive ink, textured acetate and sharply different insert designs. The nine card images in this guide are Upper Deck’s promotional previews.

McDavid’s BW-17 belongs to a 20-card 3-on-1 Breakaway set at 1:100 Hobby packs. Upper Deck describes the construction as a multilayer shadowbox. The portrait collage gives those layers a purpose: several versions of the same face share the frame, with enough quiet space around the edges to keep it readable. That combination of ornate presentation and unusual construction runs through the release.

Schaefer’s rookie puts the old Flair handwriting to work

Matthew Schaefer’s No. 194 has an enormous gold-script surname running across the lower half. Above it, a large close-up in a white Islanders sweater sits behind a smaller skating photograph in blue. The orange in the uniform echoes the warm background, while the white jersey gives all that lettering room to breathe.

The 200-card base checklist has 150 regular cards and 50 rookies, with the rookies numbered 151–200. Schaefer shares that section with Gabe Perreault, Ivan Demidov and Beckett Sennecke. Upper Deck’s account of Flair’s return describes a new laminate intended to preserve the weight and rigidity associated with the old premium line.

The parallel ladder changes photographs as well as scarcity. Image B is numbered to 349, Image C to 199, and the 1993 Variant to 93. Blue Ice is /49, while Image B Blue Ice is /25. Regular Spectrum cards are /5; Image C Spectrum is the 1/1. Those last two are separate versions, an important distinction when identifying a Schaefer or Demidov parallel.

Schaefer’s base design makes the multi-image approach easy to appreciate. The close-up establishes his face, the smaller photograph supplies the full uniform and skating pose, and the oversized signature-style typography supplies the Flair identity. The name is part of the artwork here, not merely a label below a photograph.

Hot Mitts and Hot Gloves make a lively pair

Gabe Perreault’s Hot Mitts rookie, HM-27, places him in front of a gigantic blue glove surrounded by blue flames. His Rangers sweater carries the same blue, with the red pants and white skate details keeping the action photograph distinct. Gold lettering runs up the side, leaving the center for the player and oversized equipment.

Connor Hellebuyck’s Hot Gloves, HG-1, uses the same basic joke on a goalie's scale: a huge catching glove behind a goalie already wearing a large catching glove. His white pads and white Jets sweater form a bright center against the dark pocket and blue flames. The two cards belong together visually, even though their checklist families differ.

There are 20 Hot Gloves cards at 1:125 Hobby packs, 20 regular Hot Mitts at 1:125, and 10 rookie Hot Mitts at 1:250. Perreault is in the rookie group; Demidov is HM-30. The rookie version is therefore a less frequent family pull than either the regular Hot Mitts or Hot Gloves. These are set-level odds, not the odds of pulling one particular player.

Demidov changes with touch; Sennecke changes the surface

Ivan Demidov’s Touch of Flair, TF-5, sends his red Canadiens uniform across a background of pink, violet, lime and blue strokes. Upper Deck specifies heat-sensitive ink that reveals a background image when warmed by touch, giving the card an effect beyond the printed design shown here.

Touch of Flair has 20 cards at 1:100 Hobby packs. Hellebuyck and Perreault also appear, so collectors can follow those players from the giant-glove designs into an insert built around a different physical feature. Demidov’s red jersey remains prominent enough to stand out from the rainbow around it.

Beckett Sennecke’s Wave of the Future, WF-16, takes a cooler approach. A pale blue splash curls around his white-and-orange Ducks uniform. The big orange helmet and gloves provide nearly all the warmth in the image, while the lower title overlaps the water pattern without hiding his upper body.

Wave of the Future is a 20-card rookie set at 1:20 Hobby packs. The checklist identifies it as acetate, and Upper Deck describes a die-cut, textured finish with a water-drop feel. Schaefer, Perreault and Demidov join Sennecke in the set. Its appeal comes from that combination of rookie photographs, pale watery framing and a surface treatment designed specifically for the insert.

Ovechkin gets two different Flash and Flair cards

Alex Ovechkin’s FLASH-8 puts his red Capitals sweater against a cyan background, with thin geometric lines and large vertical lettering. FLAIR-8 switches to a white sweater, a closer skating photograph and a pink-and-orange patterned field. The second card is more than the first design with another color applied.

The materials differ too. Flash uses PETG, while the rarer Flair uses Upper Deck’s Spectrum LTFX treatment. Each checklist has ten cards: Flash falls at 1:40 Hobby packs, Flair at 1:250. McDavid occupies No. 1 in both families, giving his collectors another paired design to pursue alongside the Breakaway portrait.

Ovechkin’s pair works particularly well because the uniform change is immediately obvious. The red sweater is a bold block of color against Flash’s blue; the white sweater lightens the denser Flair background. Together they show how much more interesting a companion insert can become when the photograph, layout and material all change.

Tage Thompson’s autograph has room of its own

Tage Thompson’s Rare Breed autograph, card 1 OF 8, places a broad pale signing area across a bright blue, fractured-looking background. His black Buffalo sweater and large white buffalo-head crest remain visible above it. The blue signature has clear space, while the oversized orange-and-blue insert title fills the bottom.

Thompson’s autograph is numbered to 99. The card identifier “1 OF 8” refers to its place in Rare Breed’s eight-card regular checklist; the autograph checklist contains four subjects with different serial limits. Thompson’s /99 belongs to that autograph edition.

The separate Autographics family has 76 checklist entries at 1:30 Hobby packs, with individual short-print designations. Autographs also appear in Scoring Power, Trophy Room, Flair for the Dramatic and Hot Hues. Rare Breed gives Thompson a particularly strong setting: the dark jersey, pale signing panel and vivid title each occupy a distinct part of the card.

What comes in a Hobby box

Hobby boxes contain ten packs of four cards. Upper Deck’s box averages include 30 base and rookie cards, four numbered base or rookie parallels, four cards from Scoring Power, Trophy Room, Flair for the Dramatic, Rare Breed and/or Hot Hues, and one Wave of the Future, Center Spotlights and/or Flash. These are average insert groupings; the published Autographics rate is one in 30 packs, not an autograph promise for every ten-pack box.

Further down the checklist, Guaranteed Fresh! has 20 rookies at 1:500 Hobby packs, and Time on Ice has 20 subjects at 1:750. Those longer-odds inserts sit alongside the more frequent foil and numbered cards, giving Flair several different levels of chase within its small-pack format.

Flair earns its return through the variety of things it does with a hockey card. Schaefer’s sweeping gold name recalls the original line’s elegance; McDavid’s fragmented portrait pushes into layered construction; Ovechkin’s two inserts change the whole visual treatment. The most appealing choice depends on which of those designs grabs you. For us, the McDavid portrait is the one that makes this comeback immediately recognizable.