On September 8, 1990 Nolan Ryan was starting for the Texas Rangers against the Kansas City Royals. Bo Jackson hit a line drive, which caught Ryan in the face to start the second inning. He refused help and refused to leave the game. If he wasn’t a legend before, he certainly was now. (more…)
Classic Nolan Ryan 8×10
TTM: Shots in the Dark
I use sportscollectors.net (SCN) to track my TTM stats and look for safe bets, in terms of who I send autograph requests to. However, sometimes it’s fun to skip the safe bet and go after an unlikely candidate. This usually ends in you never seeing your cards again. I can’t tell you how many guys I’ve sent to and will never see a return from. That’s part of the game. A lot of those guys I sent to before I had my SCN account so I wasn’t trying for the long shot on purpose. In a recent case however, I did go for the long shot.
Mark Quinn played 4 seasons for the Kansas City Royals after paying for the Rice Owls in college. I’m not entirely sure why, but I always liked the guy and recently considered sending an autograph request to him. I looked him up on SCN and the numbers were glaringly bad. He had a 34% success rate and no one had been successful since 2007. I decided to put him in my TTM queue anyways and wound up sending my request a few weeks later.
38 days later I open up a self-addressed stamp envelope and find these: (more…)
Quick Conversation With Jeremy Fikac
I graduated from Texas State University in May of 2008, but like most alumni from most schools, I continue to take an interest in their athletics. I recently noticed former major league pitcher, Jeremy Fikac had been hired as an assistant coach. Jeremy had pitched for the San Diego Padres, Oakland A’s and the Montreal Expos and made one last stop in the San Fransico Giants minor league system before retiring with a respectable 4.56 ERA. I got into contact with him and he offered to meet with me next time I came into San Marcos. Well I finally got down there and was able to talk to him for a few minutes before he had to get to work. (more…)
Happy Birthday Joe Nathan!
After 10 seasons Joe Nathan of the Minnesota Twins has emerged as one of the best and most consistent closers in baseball. He’s posted sub-2 ERAs in three of the past four years (2.10 in 2009) and four of the last six. He has amassed 247 saves and 4 All-Star game appearances, yet he rarely gets the credit he really deserves. (more…)
Eric Lands a White Whale
I won my first “true” 1/1 on eBay yesterday. The card is a 2008 Topps Triple Threads Josh Anderson with an autograph, 2 games used jersey swatches and a patch piece. Serial numbered 1/1 of course. I just recently started my Josh Anderson PC and it has been growing pretty quickly. I haven’t found a lot of competition and was surprised that I was forced to pay $32 for this card. (more…)
Why We TTM
TTM means through the mail. I along with thousands of other collectors write athletes in an attempt to acquire their autograph. It’s an inconsistent hobby, but I find it to be very rewarding. The autograph aside, sometimes there are things that come from these requests that make the experience extra rewarding. Maybe it’s a handwritten letter from the player or a special inscription or something else entirely. Gregg Zaun provided me with one of those moments Saturday.
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Steiner Buzzes The Collecting Community
Message boards centered around sports memorabilia came alive on Saturday. Steiner Sports had a promo code (YANK909) which allowed purchasers to get $50 off any order with no minimum to buy. So if you could find something for $49.99 then you only had to pay shipping and the item was yours. Virtually free. To good to be true? Probably. Collectors were suspicious but it did appear to be working. I did it myself and after placing my order I got an email which contained this… (more…)
Thank You Art Pennington
I just got something very unexpected in the mail. An envelope from Art Pennington with two autographed post cards and a hand signed letter. He must have gotten when I made a donation on pay pal, but I’ll be honest it was such a small donation that I do not feel like I deserve him taking the time or using the resources to send me what he did. However, that fact also make me appreciate it that much more. (more…)
How can an online store like this even exist?
Let me introduce you to http://www.stungunking.net . Apparently someone wanted to sell stun guns and other gizmos like that and they decided to sell autographs of famous sports athletes on top of everything else. I have no idea how legitimate the electronics side of the business, but get this. They are selling autographed cards of Barry Sanders, Jerome Bettis, Albert Pujols, Kobe Bryant, Dwayne Wade and Mark McGwire for only $5.00. An Eli Manning signed card is only $7.00. $2.00 will get you a signed card of David Wright and for a dollar you could get an autographed card of Paul Konerko, Luis Matos, Paul Sorrento, David Robinson, Ryan Leaf… The list goes on.
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