Best Autographs You Ever Got

I have to admit, I have never gotten an autograph. But tucked away somewhere I have a baseball my Dad gave me from an early '50's textile league baseball team. Here are some of the autographs:

Truman Owens
Stick McGee
Charlie Malpass (pronounced Mappas; it doesn't work as it's spelled)
Roy Peeler
Pug Abrams
Jake Lyerly

They were semipros, but those are some major league names.

 

All attained in person as a child:

Baseball
Bernie Carbo and Bobby Doerr (at an Old Timers game, a very cool day), Carl Yastrzemski (card show), Ned Martin (in the elevator to the roof boxes at Fenway), Roger Clemens, Wade Boggs, Ellis Burks (an all-time fave), Louis Tiant (card show)*

* At this particular show, Tom Gordon was still Flash and a phenom, and the cost for his autograph was twice that of Tiant's.

 

I know there are mixed feelings about him, and I really don't want to turn this into a debate...I have an onion-skin letter from Simon Weisenthal. I wrote him years ago as a young person, asking some questions and he wrote back. Maybe it was someone in his office for all I know.

The only sports one I have is a batting practice foul ball signed by Rod Carew when he played second base. He turned his ankle during the game, showered, changed and came up in the stands to watch the rest of the game.

 

I have Hank Aaron's autograph on a baseball. It was given to me by a family friend who at the time worked for Coca-Cola and he and Aaron were good friends.

 

Got both sides of my 1998 Game 1 World Series ticket autographed by Steinbrenner and Selig (I was just 16, didn't truly understand the level of evil/incompetence of these men). And I did it by merely knocking on the door and asking. I don't just have brass balls, they're triple-coated.

 

My previous autograph story was more about the story than the signatures.

My coolest signatures hang in my game room at the new digs: a Wendy's Champions Skins Game flag signed by Jack Nicklaus, Tom Watson, Raymond Floyd and Dana Quigley and a flag signed by Jack and Arnold Palmer.

I also have a ball signed by three members of the 300-win club: Steve Carlton, Warren Spahn and Early Wynn. It's a long-standing goal to get all the living 300-game winners.

 

Dr. Mike Marshall, the former relief pitcher, was another one who didn't believe in autographs. "Kids should look up to their parents and teachers, not ballplayers" and all that. Just saw that he's doing a private signing next month and autographs are $250 a pop.

He will add "1974 N.L. Cy Young" for an extra $75.

 

When I was 10 or 12, Hank Aaron came to some kind of TV or electronics store for its grand opening or some big-ass promotion. My mom took me and my best friend. Mr. Aaron very graciously signed a baseball for me, let me have his picture taken with him and visited with us for a couple of minutes.

I don't know if baseball autographs weren't big business then or what, but we didn't pay anything for it.

I also interviewed Evel Knievel a few years ago and he gave me a signed copy of his book "Evel Ways". I didn't ask him for anything, but figured it would be rude to decline it. I was a huge Evel mark when I was a kid, so I consider the half-hour I spent with him in his big-ass RV the pinnacle of my journalism career. (I have since moved on to software tech support)

 

Ron MacLean

One of my idols, even though he is TV and I'm print.

 

Two come to mind.

The first is Elmore Leonard. I gave a book to a friend and he gave me a book autographed by Elmore Leonard. I was happy because I had his autograph and couldn't find it.

The other one is Rod Carew. It wasn't so much that it was Rod Carew but that my niece, when she was 10, got his autograph on a baseball and gave it to me. It was the thought that counts.

 

I have a harder time asking for autographs now than I did as a kid growing up. For some reason I feel I lose a bit of professionalism when I ask a guy I just interviewed for an autograph. Just my self consciousness though

 

Got a Cal Ripken Jr. autograph on one of those large Donruss cards at a Spring Training game in Florida.

A class act all the way, and my favorite autograph.