Today I picked up a box with three Sports Illustrated magazines I had sent to Donnie D (macey225 on SCN) who was going to the National. I mailed him my 1980 US Olympic Hockey team SI to get Mark Johnson on it (I am now down to needing just John Pavelich) as well as two Manny Ramirez SI’s. I had read where Manny was signing things really crappy so I was a little nervous on what signature I would get on them. Turns out Donnie hit a grand slam for me. The signature versions I got, especially his first SI cover, look pretty good compared to what I had seen. He also took care of getting Swartz Sports holograms on them exactly where I wanted them.
The SI’s Donnie got signed for me are:
03.03.1980 Mark Johnson
07.05.2004 Manny Ramirez
04.01.1996 Manny Ramirez
I could not be happier. Thanks a ton Donnie!
A Rose is a Rose is a Rose is a Rose
While on a short get away vacation with the family this weekend, I received a package on Friday which contained four Pete Rose magazines. I sent these magazines, plus one other, to Tom Orr for a signing a while ago. The signing was rescheduled a couple times but Tom’s persistence got it done! The magazines I received were all signed beautifully and were:
Sport, September, 1967
Home Run, 1969
Dell All Star Sports, May, 1974
Sport, June, 1974
I found one other one after I mailed these to him and sent them separately. That one should be coming soon. As always, Tom does a great job!
Rookies and History
Today I received a pair of packages. The first one was a package with seven prospects my friend Paul C got me from the minor league teams in Florida. It contained:
Stephen Gonsalves w/”Go Twins”
Nick Burdi w/”Go Twins!”
Matt Imhof w/”Go Phillies”
Ricardo Pinto
Chih-Wei Hu with his name in Taiwanese also
Jarlin Garcia
Amir Garrett w/”Go Reds!”
As always, Paul does a great job and I cannot wait for his next package!
My other package was a do-over with Hall of Fame broadcaster Marty Brennaman. I had sent to him a couple years ago for his call on Pete Rose’s 4192nd hit and he returned it but it was signed in a black felt tip marker. I know that baseballs signed with felt tip markers usually always end up bleeding. I was told that spraying the baseballs preserves them so I tried it. What ended up happening was the ink really bled and make the ball look less than ideal. I sent him another request, with another donation of course, along with pictures of the baseball and kindly asked if he would do another. I got it back today and it looks real nice!
Awesome Eddie
Eddie Rosario was signing autographs today at the Cub Foods in Crystal. It so happened that I was off work and heading to Caden’s state baseball tournament in Big Lake and it worked out that Crystal was on the way. I picked up Caden’s friend Cayden at 11 am and headed to Cub Foods. We got there about 25 minutes before he was supposed to start signing. My family was at Eddie’s Major League debut and witnessed him hitting a home run on his first pitch. It was awesome. Before that though, Cami and I reserved a game used baseball from that game and knew we were going to get it signed at some point. Today was that moment. We got to him and I explained we were at the game and bought the two baseballs and requested an inscription on the ball. He signed each of our baseballs with “1st Game MLB Debut 5/6/15”. They look really cool. Caden got a ticket from that game signed with “MLB Debut Home Run”. Cayden got a couple cards signed for his collection. Afterwards we got in the car and got to Big Lake in time to start warming up. We ended up winning that game so it was a great day all around!