Memorable Memorabilia

I've this before, so I'm just goi copy and

When I was about 12 I got to go to a couple of games at Fenway with a friend of mine. We stayed at the same hotel as the visiting teams (my friend's family had some kind of partial season plan and they knew their way around).I bought a 3x5 spiral notebook and we just hung out in the lobby getting autographs. The Orioles were in town for the Sunday game (rained out - got to see Rick Dempsey do his routine on the tarp before they called it) and the Yankees came in for a Monday night game. 

Reggie came out, and of course he was mobbed. He excused himself after a minute or two (before we got to the front of the mob) and went into a restroom. I turned to my friend, said "I think I have to go' and followed him in. I took care of business, finished washing my hands about the same time as Reggie, then asked him if I could get his autograph. He said, "You don't even let a guy pee in peace, do you?" I don't know if I even answered, but he signed my book.

I still have the darned thing, and it's amazing some of the names in it.Palmer, Weaver,  D and T Martinez, Oscar Gamble, I think Catfish Hunter...I'm going to have to get that out again, because there were a lot more familiar names. I also got the autograph of some guy who turned out to be one of the trainers for the Orioles, but he looked like somebody and he was with somebody...

OK, I dug it out.  McGregor, Bumbry, Singleton, Ruppert Jones, Dempsey, and Tommy John were the other significant names.  (No Catfish Hunter)

In the sixties my family had a business executive friend who worked for Cargill. Every spring he would take me to the Twins "Welcome Home" Luncheon. Back then, they were pretty much just bigshots from around town. And every year I would show up with my Topps cards from the previous year and go right down the entire front-of-the-house table at some point, the players getting a kick out of seeing their card (only one card back then) as well as a kid in a suit amidst all these executives.

I quit the autographing for awhile and got back into it, with my most memorable experience being the first person to write to Pat Neshek getting an autographed card and, I'ma shamed to say, calling him an outfielder. Of course, Pat is one of the most accessible of players ever. But a bonus Neshek event was proposing to my wife on the scoreboard in a game started by Matt Garza which Pat ended up winning for the Twins. He has, of course, become our pitcher and I look forward to attending at least one game when he is visiting, shouting him down from the outfield pre-game.

And I used to love the Metrodome, with the bullpen down the third baseline. I would choose those September afternoon games when no one would be in the park and I would have the whole row for myself before and during the game and could interact with the current and future bullpen throughout the game.

Check out www.twinscards.com where we keep track of Twins players - majors and minors - and you can check out autographs from different collections (I'm "rosterman"). After the New Year, we should have the beginnings of the 2016 look at the Twins roster and minor league system.

#1 My wife and I had planned a trip to Arizona to see some of her family and it just happened to coincide with the Twins playing against the Diamondbacks so we were pretty excited to catch the series while we were there. It also just happened to be the time when Killebrew passed away. My wife and I had met him a couple of times, as autograph junkies and he was always the nicest guy in the room. We were able to go to the funeral and it amazed me to see the number of players (both active and retired) and fans that honored him. That was when I made the connection to realize that these are not just on the field heroes, but they can truly transform and impact people when you leave a legacy of caring for people the way Harmon did.

#2 I was born and raised in Kentucky.  We didn't really have any professional teams that dominated support. I naturally gravitated towards certain players in each sport and they became my team. For baseball it was Kirby. I truly wish I had got to meet Kirby before he passed away. The joy he played baseball with transcended the way I watched baseball and single-handedly made me a fan of the Twins.

Probably not a JR Graham autograph.

Thanksgiving of 1992. My girlfriend and I were traveling with two friends from LA to San Antonio to visit her parents.  We flew Southwest, which at the time, had a few rows of seats that faced each other, so families could sit together. The four of us found one of these sections, and sat there with one other guy.

Well, at one point on the flight, my buddy said something really idiotic, and so I blurted out, "Oh, shut the f*#k up". Well, at that precise moment, the pilot cut the engines back, and so that word kind of reverberated around the cabin and I noticed that the ten year old boy with the family across the aisle whipped his head around faster than an owl tracking a mouse. I felt like a heel, but didn't say anything more except mouthing "sorry" to the kid.

About 20 minutes later, the guy who was in the row with us said to me, "If you were one of the richest players in baseball, would you fly Southwest?" I asked what he meant, and he just pointed to the father of the family, who was sitting in the seat to my right, just two feet away across the aisle.  

Orel Hershiser.

Needless to say, I struck up a conversation with him, and we chatted for a little while. He ended up signing an autograph for the guy in our row.  Took about five minutes to craft the autograph.  I've never seen a player take so much time to write his name on a piece of paper.  He put a lot of care into it, and it was rather iconic looking.  I didn't ask him for one, simply because he was with his family and I felt bad enough about the F-bomb I had dropped earlier.

I'm a longtime autograph collector. At one point I had over 5,000 signed baseball cards before I recently sold the bulk of it to focus primarily on collecting Twins players. 

From many years of going to Twins Fest, I had amassed autographs of roughly half of the players to ever suit up for the Twins in their history - through 2015, I believe the total number was 765 players. 

I recently started a project to get that other half - autographs of every former player, including the guys who came up for 15 at-bats or whatever and were never heard from again. 

It's been a ton of fun combing through old rosters, remembering some long-forgotten players, and learning about the older teams of the 60s and 70s. Many of the guys I needed were easy to locate, and I'm down to needing autographs from about 150 former Twins to complete the project. Many of them deceased or living in foreign countries. Some will be nearly impossible - Herman Hill and Don R. Williams, for instance - but that won't stop me from trying! 

P.S. - if any other collectors feel like helping a guy out, I can send the list of players I need :-)

#1) When I a was about 8 my next door neighbor, who's son went to Cretin in the 70's and was very good friends with Paul Molitor invited my family to her son's Christmas party in St. Paul. When we got there her son, Sean welcomed us and then came up to me to tell me there was someone who really wanted to meet me. As a confused 8 year old at a "grownups" Christmas party I had no idea who would want to meet me. When we got downstairs he said, "Pete, this is my friend Paul Molitor." I couldn't believe it. I got to hang out with him all night long, talking baseball and hockey. I got my picture taken with him and a few autographs. It clearly had an impact on me as its now 27 years later and the moment seems like it was yesterday. I finally realized years later my parents obviously knew what was going to happen that night but never told me. I still have that autographed ball and a 2nd ball my neighbor's son got Molly to sign for me again since I brought the first to show and tell and somehow got ruined. The one thing I remember him saying was he had hoped to never leave the Brewers and wanted to work in the front office when he retired.

#2) My dream memorabilia would be to meet and get Ken Griffey Jr. to sign my Mariners jersey to be a wall centerpiece for my basement bar.

This is a great idea. Thanks Seth.

1) My daughter was in 1st grade and the Twins' Caravan came to our town. Kirby was there and my daughter and I went to see him. He signed her baseball card but didn't say too much. However as we were leaving, his wife Tonya, stopped us to compliment my daughter on her pretty braids and talk to her. Tonya insisted that I take a picture of the two of them. This made a little girl's day and is a memory that has lasted for 25 years.

2) I wish I had met Harmon and got his autograph on a baseball.

1) There would be several. We still have the ticket stub from my son's first minor league game, a 1996 contest of the Fort Wayne Wizards starring (don't throw anything at me) A.J. Pierzynski. When the same son was 11, we did a seven-games-and-four-Halls-of-Fame-in-eight-days trip. Afterward, we sent gobs of photographs to players and a large number of them autographed and returned. It's a great keepsake photo album. On said trip, we were standing along the foul line at Comerica Park with a ball my son had gotten. We politely waited until a player finished his conversation, not quite sure who it was. Given his size and the several references to Notre Dame, I deciphered an ID and instructed my son to say, "May I have your autograph, Mr. (Craig) Counsel?" The guy looked a little perplexed, which made sense when he signed his name "Andy Green." Turns out that Counsel had gotten traded from the Diamondbacks that winter and was no longer with the team, but it makes for a good story in our family.

I guess my ticket stub from David Wells's perfect game against the Twins at Yankee Stadium in 1998 doesn't really count for much, but it's stashed away somewhere. 

My earliest memory is not about meeting any players, as I never attended a MLB game until I was about 30. But I was a big Twins fan. I was in Detroit sometime in probably 1985, while Kirby Puckett was still hitting lead off. I was there for work, but I ended up spending the weekend. The Twins were playing the Tigers, so my first MLB game was at old Tigers Stadium. I bought a ticket from some guy outside the stadium that was trying to get rid of it, and I ended up sitting about 10 rows up from 3rd base, great seats. 

So of course Kirby was the first batter in the game, and he hit a towering home run on the very first pitch. Can't top that experience with much. I think the Twins ended up winning the game like 8-0 if I remember right.

As far as a dream experience, I would love to meet and talk with Tony Oliva.

Probably not a JR Graham autograph.

There are two girls in our Awana club at church that know I'm a Twins fan, and they are pretty proud of the fact that their uncle (or possibly cousin - I can't remember exactly) pitches for the Twins.  I might be able to get you that autograph...

I guess my ticket stub from David Wells's perfect game against the Twins at Yankee Stadium in 1998 doesn't really count for much, but it's stashed away somewhere. 

Burn it! Burn it!

Just kidding.  I'd keep it too.  But then I also have the program from Dave Goltz' 1-hitter against the Red Sox (complete with my scorekeeping) from the 70's ('76?  It was the year he won 20.  Twins won 7-0.  Jim Rice got the hit in the 6th or 7th). 

Nice story about a Killebrew keepsake, in case anyone missed it the first time around:

http://www.csnphilly.com/phillies/salisbury-remembering-harmon-killebrew

Nice story about a Killebrew keepsake, in case anyone missed it the first time around:

 

http://www.csnphilly.com/phillies/salisbury-remembering-harmon-killebrew

Thanks for that link.  I'd never read that piece before.  And it described Harmon perfectly, he was kind to all and a real gentleman.  I talked with him quite a few times and always enjoyed it.  Probably the best instance was sitting on the bench in a dugout with Harmon and a friend of mine who had one of Harmon's first gloves he used in the bigs.  Harmon had an interest in buying it back.  Me on one side and my friend on the other.  Harmon put on the glove and spoke of those early days.  I put the glove on, it was a treat. 

There are two girls in our Awana club at church that know I'm a Twins fan, and they are pretty proud of the fact that their uncle (or possibly cousin - I can't remember exactly) pitches for the Twins. I might be able to get you that autograph...

2007, My  future (at that time) in-laws had come up from Iowa for the groundbreaking ceremony for TF, but due to the 35W bridge collapse it was postponed, along with the game that night. I was moving to Omaha for school the next day, so we decided to go out for a nice dinner at the Capital Grill in downtown. While sitting and eating, I notice Torii Hunter and his family at the table next to us. I tell my wife, and when he gets up to leave, she goes over and asks him to come say hi to our nephew (9 at the time), who is a huge Twins fan. He was super nice, said hi, took pictures, etc.

BUT then as he was leaving, my wife thanked him again, and he said no problem, then tapped her butt, like a ballplayer butt tap, nothing malicious about it.

My wife comes back and says "Torii Hunter just tapped my butt!"

That's my most memorable moment meeting a player.