Update

I go back and forth about whether to count Hank Aaron as a "successful" autograph.  I think I've decided to take his name off my list of completed autographs, dropping the number to 13.  I've updated the last update to reflect the new numbers.

Update

I thought it might be time to update the status of my quest to obtain an autograph from all sixty-seven living Hall of Famers.  Here is how the collection currently stands...


13 autographs from living Hall of Famers

7 unsuccessful returns (including 3 "return to sender") (note: this includes a copied Hank Aaron)

24 requests still waiting for a return (including an e-mail to a politician's website)

12 not mailed because they are known to charge for an autograph

3 players with no known address (Kiner, McCovey, F. Robinson)

3 players who are known to not sign through the mail (Yastrzemski, Brett, Ripken)

5 players to whom I have not yet sent a request

Doug Harvey (1930-2018)

I was extremely happy to see a letter in my mailbox today from Doug Harvey.  Mr. Harvey is a former MLB umpire as well as a member of the most recent induction class as you can see from his signature.  He signed the 3x5 cardstock I sent him in standard blue pen.  He was nice enough to include his induction year as well.

Harvey apparently earned the nickname of "God" for his authoritative command of the baseball rulebook.  Not a bad moniker for an umpire!

Harvey is the first MLB umpire in my collection and is in fact the ONLY living Hall of Fame umpire.

Update: Mr. Harvey passed away on January 13, 2018

Non-HoF Autographs: Jim Bouton

Today i attended a celebration of forty years since the release of Jim Bouton's controversial book, "Ball Four.  Mr. Bouton is far from a Hall of Famer, but he has been inducted in to the Baseball Reliquary's Shrine of the Eternals (an incredible organization).  His contribution to the sport is in publishing "Ball Four", a book which rocked the sporting world upon its release.

I have a copy of "Ball Four", but it is in storage somewhere on the east coast, so I quickly ordered a used copy of the follow up book, "I'm Glad You Didn't Take It Personally", and took it along today to get signed.

You can see a more thorough review of the day's events at my other blog.

Potential Hall of Famers

In my recent post regarding Vladimir Guerrero, I mentioned that I have started to try collecting autographs from players who I expect to be inducted into the Hall of Fame.  Here is the list I have compiled.

Am I missing anyone?

Should anyone be removed from this list?


Almost a lock Hall of Famers (* current player):

Albert Pujols*
Bert Blyleven
Bobby Cox*
Craig Biggio
Curt Schilling
Derek Jeter*
Frank Thomas
Greg Maddux
Ichiro Suzuki*
Jeff Kent
Jim Thome*
Joe Torre*
John Smoltz
Ken Griffey Jr
Mariano Rivera*
Mike Piazza
Omar Vizquel*
Pedro Martinez
Pudge Rodriguez*
Randy Johnson
Roberto Alomar
Roy Halladay*
Trevor Hoffman*
Tom Glavine
Tony LaRussa
Vladimir Guerrero*


Steroid/Gambling Question Marks:

Alex Rodriguez*
Andy Pettitte*
Barry Bonds
Manny Ramirez*
Mark McGwire
Pete Rose
Rafael Palmeiro
Roger Clemens
Sammy Sosa

Update in 2016, six years later - Blyleven, Cox, Biggio, Thomas, Maddux, Torre, Smoltz, Griffey, Piazza, Johnson, Alomar, Glavine, and LaRussa have all been elected. Not surprisingly, none of the question mark players I listed have been enshrined. Perhaps next year that will change?

Non-HoF Autographs: Rafael Perez

A random middle reliever for the Cleveland Indians, Perez was once labeled by some as their closer of the future, but has struggled to gain command of the late inning role.  I got this autograph at Angel Stadium when I went down to watch CC Sabathia pitch for the Indians a few years ago. 

You might remember that I guessed Perez was a name on this ticket stub I had signed during spring training, but comparing the two autographs do not lead me to believe that I am correct on that guess.

Detective Work

A thought crossed my mind today about my recent Return to Sender envelope from Red Schoendienst.  Both Return to Sender, and Red Schoendienst have capital letters "R" and "S" and share five small letters - e, d, o, n, t.  I wondered if my envelope had been written on by Mr. S himself.

So I did a bit of sleuthing...

This is the writing on the envelope I received.  Notice the way the "R" is drawn with a looping pen-stroke, and the "S" is written in classic cursive.

Here is Red's signature on a baseball card that I found with a quick Google search for images of his autograph.  Both the "R" and "S" are pretty close matches.  I also noticed that the small "e", "n", and "t" are very similar between the two.  The most different letter is the "d" in his last name, but the "d" in his first name matches pretty well!

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that my envelope was written on by none other than the living Hall of Famer himself.  If this is the case, it makes me wonder why he feels that he has time to sign "Return to Sender" (14 letters), but not "Red Schoendienst" (only 15 letters!).

It is quite possible that this baseball great is tired of people profiting off of his autograph.  I'm sure these players are constantly harassed by people hoping to make a quick buck or two on ebay, or in collector shops.  Sad, but I guess I see the frustration there.

Mr. Schoendienst, if you are reading this, can you deny or confirm?