the Autograph Corner
THE DEBACLE AT SOUTH
BEND
I was really looking forward to
it. Four months earlier I had purchased tickets for the
exhibition game between the Arizona Diamondbacks and the
South Bend SilverHawks, their Midwest League class A
affiliate. It was a chance to see the World Champions in
person. Now South Bend is a seven hour drive from where we
live, so I was looking at using two vacation days to do
this. Tickets were reasonably priced at $10 each.
Of course we would get there
early to get autographs. From the beginning, things started
to go haywire. The gates opened up 15 minutes late. That
snipped 15 minutes from my autograph time. When we got into
the stadium I stopped at the souvenir stand to see if the
2002 South Bend sets were not. Of course they weren't.
After all, this was mid-August and we couldn't expect the
team to have them out in time to accommodate autographers
now, could we?
There was a line forming for
Diamondback autographs. "Great," I figured. They've got
this nicely organized. No mobs, no pushing......I was
relieved. These things can be set up nicely with players at
tables around the concourse, or standing by the fence to
accommodate fans as they file past them in an orderly
fashion. I've SEEN these work.
Well, an hour and five minutes
later Nancy and I got to the autograph tables. Two players
were waiting to sign for us. Mike Koplove and Chad
Moeller. Now I'm not knocking either of these two young
players, both of whom should be helpful to the Diamondbacks
in the future, but I was looking for perhaps more and bigger
fish when we got in line.
Twenty minutes left before the
game was due to start. Some of the Diamondbacks were
signing by the dugout, but there was a sea of pushing, loud
and pleading fans undulating against the fence like a heavy
sea beating against a breakwater. I opted to stand with
Nancy near an alleyway leading up to home plate from below
the stands. It wasn't a totally bad guess. I caught Steve
Finley for an autograph, and my wife and I caught Bob
Brenly for a couple. It was getting close to game time and
I don't think he would've stopped, but my card caught his
eye. It was a 1977 Cedar Rapids card showing him as an
infielder.
The Silverhawks won the game by
a run, playing a faded facsimile of the Diamondbacks
starting lineup. People Like Grace and Gonzalez played for
awhile and then the Diamondbacks replaced most of their
regulars with minor leaguers they'd brought along.
We lined up to get autographs
after the game. The lane to the team bus was guarded by
security (rented cops pulling in the overtime bucks and
running whatever scams they could in the process). One of
them came out and showed a friend three bats signed by Randy
Johnson. "I told him they were for charity," I heard him
tell a friend with a laugh. The kid standing next to me
said "Yeah, I remember him pulling the same scam at a
Christina Aguilera concert I was at."
When the team came through
things were orderly at first. Jay Bell stopped and signed
for both my wife and me, and I caught Tony Womack as well.
Then Mark Grace and Randy Johnson came through and all hell
broke loose. The taped lines compressed to barely enough
room for the players to pass through, and when Mark Grace
came through a guy (an adult in a turquoise tank-top) who
should've known better, jumped over the tape and grabbed
Grace by the shoulder and hold a bat in front of him. Grace
just put his arms in front of his face, lowered his head,
and charged
forward. There were a lot of
adults who were acting pushy and rude, far more than the
kids. Nancy said that it was the closest thing to a mob
scene that she'd ever experienced.
The Diamondbacks were pretty
decent. Guys like Johnson, Grace, Gonzalez and Williams
tried to accommodate the fans by signing near the dugout and
really, doing it a lot longer than I would've expected them
to. Unfortunately I couldn't get within a stone's throw of
any of them. South
Bend really did a crappy job of
setting this up. It reeked of a total lack of organization.
Our night ended on a sourer
note. My wife was not too keen on driving much after we
left the stadium, so we stopped at a motel in the southern
end of South Bend. When am I going to learn? My
experiences in motels smelling of curry have not been
pleasant, but we were tired. We didn't
sleep well though. About 3-3:15
we woke up scratching. I'll be charitable and suggest that
we might have had some reaction to what the bedding was
washed in, but I have much darker suspicions. Anyhow, we
endured it for about another 15 to 20 minutes, then said "to
hell with it" and got a very early start on the road home.
A fitting end to a disappointing trip.
Oh yeah, I got my 2001 and 2002
South Bend sets in the mail about 2 weeks after the season
was over. That sure does an autographer a lot of good. I
think a friend of mine called it right. He said that the
ownership has been having financial trouble and the cards
were probably sitting there until they had enough money to
pay for them. Anyway, that was bad enough, but the assholes
had the audacity to hit me for $7.50 S&H as well. That's
become the new scam for a lot of organizations. Savannah
zapped me $7 to send me 2 card sets and Lansing and Dayton
were just as outrageous for 5 set orders. You've got to
watch your dealers on E-bay for this too. One, I've
noticed a few unscrupulous dealers using is $2 for your
first winning bid and $1 for each additional item won. This
adds up quick. If a dealer won't consolodate shipping on
multiple auction items won, especially if your bidding on
single cards, stay away from him.
My last grouse before I move on
(I guess South Bend has my dander up) is the minor league
card dealer who lists card sets on E-Bays "minor league"
listings. He lists at a high opening bid , then posts his
"buy it now" option at less than a $1 more. This isn't an
auction, this is using E-Bay as a catalogue. I'll tell this
to all of you out there. If you can find 3 or 4 friends who
want the same minor league sets that you do (usually you
can, if you're ordering feeder sets of the team that you'll
want to get signed for you at your minor league park) by all
means do so. You'll save by splitting the shipping costs
and avoiding the mark-up that the minor league dealers add
to their sets.
MEISELMAN VS SMALLING
I've used R. J Smallings address
lists for awhile, and have been happy with them. I like his
book format. I've had friends recommend Harvey Meiselman
though, so I opted to buy his new list of baseball addresses
and his new "Men and Women of Distinction" list. While I
don't like his
format as much as Smallings,
I'll be happy if he is more accurate, as he claims to be.
I'm running a test. I've sent out 70 addresses that Harvey
has that are different than my Smalling listings, including
players like Jack Kralick, Dean Chance, Steve Hovley, Bob
Priddy, Ted Sizemore, Fred Norman and Casey Cox, players
whom if I could get them back would make the purchase of his
list worthwhile for me. I've sent out. beginning 2 weeks
ago, the 70 requests and thus far have gotten back Lute
Barnes, Vern Fuller, Dave Grey, Bill Wilson(54) Rupert
Jones, Sal Campisi, and Jim Gosger and have had addresses
for Gerald Schoen and Ron Slocum bounced back as
ineffective. Meiselman's "Men and Women of Distinction" has
listings of the Medal of Honor recipients, something I've
desired for along time, and I also put out a request to Dr
Robert Ballard, whom I consider one of the greatest
scentists and explorers of the 20th century. I'll keep you
posted on how I do next issue.
Anyway, I've written enough for
now. Till next time, take care and have fun with the
hobby. I sure do, despite the South Bends of the World.
PS Both Meiselman and Smalling
ahave websites in which you can learn more about their
address lists.
~ Rich Hanson
