Today I received a couple Sports Illustrated magazines in the mail. The first was my 10.10.2016 issue that was already signed by five Cubs players from the World Series Champion team. I was able to get Aroldis Chapman to sign it via a private signing with Josh R out of Chicago. That brings me up to six different players on the cover.
The other issue was a 08.16.1994 issue signed beautifully by Eddie Mathews. It is the 40th anniversary issue and depicted the original issue on the cover. I bought this from Eric A via Facebook.
Category: Private Signing
Not Justin
Today I received a package of a couple items from a private signing Matthew P (Mac6185 on SCN) had with Shane Bieber. They turned out flawlessly! I got a baseball signed on the sweetspot with JSA authentication and a debut ticket, also with JSA authentication, with an inscription of “ML Debut 05/31/18”. I thought about getting an inscription on the baseball with 2020 AL CY or something but he might win another and I do not want to have a baseball that does not have all the CY years on it (like I got with Johan Santana after he won his first). The Twins tickets from 2018 are tough to come by as you had to pay for printed tickets. I have had a number of people reach out to me to see if I had this ticket for sale. It was in my Sano home run collection but since printed tickets are SO hard to get for so many teams nowadays, I might scrap the Sano run so this was a perfect opportunity to do that.
A Whise(nant) Man
Today was a fun mail day. I received a scorecard signed by John Smoltz I had sent in for a private signing at Waukesha Sportscards via Mark G (hofcs on SCN). Smoltz signed it exactly as requested. It was from his 188th career win on August 21, 2006. John went 8 innings giving up 3 hits walking 1 and striking out 10.
The other package I received was from Howard C (favorite_things on SCN) who was breaking up a signed near set of 1961 Topps. I purchased four cards from Howard. Three were upgrades and one was a need. I am pretty familiar with two of the signatures on two of the cards. Of the other two, I was fairly confident one was bad but the other was good. I paid for a Beckett Quick Opinion on the two cards and, just as I suspected, the one that I thought was bad was confirmed as bad and the other good. Howard said he would give me a money back guarantee within 60 days so I will send the one back. The other three are beautiful cards and got me within three signed Twins cards to complete the set. The three cards I added to my collection are:
1961 Topps Zoilo Versalles
1961 Topps Jim Lemon
1961 Topps Pete Whisenant
Pronk
Today I received a couple items I am excited about. The first was a ticket I have had for a while. Back on 08.14.2003 Travis Hafner, Pronk, hit for the cycle at the Metrodome. I have sent this ticket in to a few consignors without luck in the past. I noticed he signed up for Past Pros so I sent my ticket in within the first couple days. He was not sure how I wanted it signed so he contacted Past Pros and they in turn contacted me. I provided a description and received the ticket today signed perfectly.
The other package was a baseball I sent to Ralph Garr on what it was like playing in the game when Hank Aaron broke Babe Ruth’s home run record. He wrote a short story on it and sent it back to me.