Steve Garvey Autograph Signing Recap

Well I just got back from the Steve Garvey autograph signing at Hamer Toyota in Mission Hills & let's just say it went great. I arrived at Hamer Toyota a little before 11 ( the time Garvey was scheduled to sign). There were about 100 people ahead of me, but I knew I'd get my autograph. I went with my father & brother, so we were going to get a total of 3 autographs from Steve.

We went inside the dealership & got these tickets for the line, I ofcourse ended up losing mine sometime after I got out of line. It was a great event, they even were giving out free sodas & hot dogs. Then they had a special guest:

For those of you who don't know, that is Roger Owens, or better known as the legendary Dodger peanut guy. Roger is a really cool guy & pretty hilarious as well. I ended up talking to Roger after I got Steve's autograph, but I'll talk more about that later. My father then joined in on a peanut throwing contest with Roger, & what was on the line ? Some cash & a pair of opening day tickets to the Dodgers game sponsored by AM570 radio. Well after all was said & done, We're going to opening day :) After that the line was starting to move as Steve started signing. We got up to Steve at about 11:45 & here's what we got signed:

My little brother isn't quite into autograph collecting yet so he always helps me out with an extra auto, especially at events like this where they only allow one per person. He ended up getting Steve to sign a mini bat that was previously signed by Fernando Valenzuela as well. Next it was my turn:

I've noticed that some people have gotten a ball signed by the Dodgers record setting infield on the four corners of the sweet spot, so I decided to try out that project. I noticed that Steve only had a 

black pen & a blue sharpie with him, but luckily I always take some extra supplies. I popped out a blue pen & it didn't write extremely clean, but still a nice auto. Next up is my father: 

He got this nice photo of Steve & Tommy Lasorda signed. He isn't too much into autograph collecting, but I can see he is starting to warm up to the hobby. The photo was for me, since he's not full on into autographs & Steve inscribed "Tough Loss" after my father asked him if he & Tommy were mad at each other. Well anyways, Steve left a few minutes after we were out of line & we stuck around for a bit enjoying the event. AM570 was raffling off some shirts & DVD's. However, most people stayed since they were going to raffle off another pair of opening day tickets. That would make it the third pair of the day!! Well after a bit we went of to talk to Roger the peanut guy. While getting Steve's autograph again was great, I have to say this next one by far is definetly the most unique one I have in my collection : 

A signed peanut bag by Roger himself !! Now I definetly remember Roger since I was about five years old. I remember going to the games & him tossing out peanuts with all his crazy throws & this autograph is definetly one that will be treasured in my collection. Roger was great to talk to & he's been with the Dodgers for 56 years!! He said he's been there since the stadium opened, now that is truly unbelievable. After a while we decided to leave & it was a great experience. It was a greatly organized event & we have to thank the guys at Hamer Toyota for putting together this awesome event. That's what I have for this recap & once again to you all, Thank you for reading.

Contest winner !!

Well my first contest is officially over. First of all I'd like to thank everyone who entered & has read my blog, it's very much appreciated. So let's get down to the entries, CaptKirk & Dhoff both had one entry a piece. Alex then had 2 entries & Matthew led by far with 9 entries. Like I listed in my previous posting I would be randomizing the list twice & whoever came out on top would be the winner. So here's the results :

Well there we have it, Alex is the winner. Surprisingly his name came out on top of the list both times. So Alex make sure to send your address my way & I will ship out your cards soon. Thank you again to all who entered & I will be holding another contest pretty soon so be sure to check back.

Ball of the Day

Well today I decided to post up this ball for a reason. The last time I went to a Dodger game was last year when they played the Yankees. That game I didn't go prepared with supplies for autographs & just had a few batting practice balls in the car. Well that was better then nothing. And well it paid off taking the balls anyways as I was able to come away with a Mariano Rivera signature . It would've been better if I would've taken a brand new ball, but I'm still pleased that I was able to get his autograph.

Today even though it's just an exhibition game, I will be there at the game. I will definitely be prepared with some supplies & hopefully I can have some same luck as last time. Be sure to stay tuned as I will have a recap of that tomorrow.

I will also be posting up the contest results in a few minutes & will be randomizing the list twice & the person on top of the list will be the winner. Thank you for reading & good luck to those in the contest.

2014 Topps Opening Day

 Well I just got back from target and picked up some packs of Topps opening day. I bought one jumbo pack & 2 regular retails. What I was hoping to pull was some mascot cards, I think it's pretty cool that topps incorporates them into the product. Well here we go with what came out:

Well this is the closest I got to a mascot card. On to the next:

I like these blue border cards. I prefer these over the red target borders, but I wish they would've been of some Dodgers. Next are the cards that I think were the best pulls:

These opening day stars are real nice inserts. The kershaw obviously is my favorite one. As you can tell with the kershaw card these have a 3D effect that make them really stand out.

 

And of course here's the stack of base cards. I thought thought this was a pretty decent pack of cards with the kershaw card being the highlight of it. All the other cards are up for grabs, & once again Thanks for reading.

A little bit of color

Here are three cards of one of my favorite card products, Bowman chrome. I absolutely love bowman chrome & all their color refractors. These are just a few of the colored refractors I  have, as I love collecting them. One of my current projects is to add the rainbow set of matt kemp, but I'm missing the black & red refractor. Ofcourse I gave up any hope of acquiring the 1 of 1's. I'm definetly looking forward to the release of this years addition, & adding more refractors. I'd be more than willing to trade any of these & don't let the picture trick you, but the Andrew McCutchen is the pink refractor not the red one. Thank you for reading once more & have a good day.

Ball of the day

Here we are. Today's autographed ball is one I received as a gift from my girlfriend this past Christmas. She knew I was trying to get as many Dodger autographs as I could so she went out & got me this Matt Kemp ball, I love it. I'm hoping to have a ball signed by every single one of the Dodgers better known players by the end of the season, so this is one less I have to worry about getting. I'm glad to know she also listens to all the things I blabber on about as she even made sure it was certified by Psa.

There we are, the Psa certification sticker. Of the 4 major outfielders the Dodgers have I have 2 of them on baseballs so I'm almost there. Another great autograph that's a part of the collection. I look forward to adding more & Thank you for reading.

Dodgers Fan Fest Recap

Well yesterday I showed off the items I got during the mystery bags. Today I will be showing the items I got during the autograph sessions. Going into fan fest I only had tickets for the Kenley Jansen & Bobby Castillo session, the Paco Rodriguez & Bill Russell signing, as well as the Ron Cey & Matt Magill signing. I arrived early in hopes of purchasing some tickets there at the event as I heard they would have a minimum amount for sale. Well all I can say is I got lucky. When I got to the ticket booth I lucked out & was able to purchase the last available ticket for the Ryu & Ned Colletti session. I was also able to pick up a ticket for the Don Mattingly & Charlie Steiner session. Overall I found myself extremely lucky to have been able to pick up tickets for two of my main goals of the day (Mattingly & Ryu). Well after that I went over to make line for the first ticket I had, Paco Rodriguez & Bill Russell. The line was fairly short as I expected & I was up to the front in a matter of no time.

Well here's the two items I got signed by them. I had been debating whether to have Paco sign a baseball or a photo & well I went with a photo. Big mistake :( I had not paid attention that paco went with a blue marker instead of silver & as a result you can hardly see the signature off to the right. Well things happen. But before him I had Bill Russell sign my team bat that I'm working on, as I'm trying to get as many players from the 1981 World Series team as I can on it. After that the next signing I had tickets for was the Ryu & Ned Colletti session.

I had no doubt that I wanted to get Ryu on a baseball so I decided to roll with that. With Colletti I didn't really want to use a brand new baseball on him but I still wanted his autograph, so I used a ball I had gotten during batting practice at a game a few years back. The next session time I had two different tickets for. I had tickets for the Ron Cey signing & for the Don Mattingly. Well it's a great thing my girlfriend was with me. I had hopped in line for the Ron Cey one & I gave my girlfriend a baseball & the ticket for Mattingly's line. I asked her to ask Mattingly if he would do an inscription, which they weren't supposed to do, but I knew she had better luck of obtaining one than I did.

First these are the items I got signed in my line. I had Matt Magill sign a photo for me & I had Ron Cey sign my team bat. This line took a little bit longer then expected mainly because Ron Cey ran some minutes late, but I still loved the autographs. As for how the line went for my girlfriend:

She got the ball signed with the inscription I wanted !! :) That definetly made this ball my favorite piece of the day. She also got one of the Dodger post cards they had available if you didn't have anything for the person to sign, so she got it autographed by Charlie Steiner. That was the second postcard I got that day as my father had gotten a ticket for the Fernando Valenzuela signing & had gotten a postcard from Drew Butera. Well after this signing I only had the Kenley Jansen ticket left & that was in a couple of hours. Me & my girlfriend walked around a bit & enjoyed the event. We killed those few hours & then I was in line for the final signing of the day. While I was standing in line my father called out to me saying that #7 from the Dodgers was signing autographs for fans behind the autograph booths. I knew that it
was Alex Guerrero signing but I only had one baseball left. Thankfully we saw one guy there who we've seen at previous signings who sells merchandise. We got a ball from him & well:

Great!!! I was able to pick up this ball signed by Guerrero. The signature didn't come out as clean as some of the ones he signed during his session, but I was still able to add this nice signature to the collection. While they got this signature for me, I was still in line for the Kenley Jansen signing & we had been informed that Bobby Castillo couldn't make it due to an illness & Rick Monday would be taking his place. Well I didn't mind at all since I could still use Rick's signature on my bat.

This here is the ball I got signed my Kenley. This is a ball I had been wanting to add as Kenley is my
favorite pitcher from the Dodgers. I prefer him over any other bullpen guy we have, even over Brian Wilson. Especially over the likes of Brandon League, ehhh. The signature of Rick Monday on my bat can be found right next to Ron Cey's in the photo posted earlier. After all was said & done I left Fan Fest a happy camper!! I'm already looking forward to next year's & hopefully I can get season tickets & get a shot at Puig or McGwire before they sell out, assuming their still with the team. Unless I get them at some point throughout this season. Well anyways, that's my recap from Fan Fest & I hope you liked it & once again thank you for reading.

Dodgers Fan Fest Mystery Items

Well it's a pretty late post compared to when fan fest occurred, but considering I haven't had my blog running for too long, today I will show off the items I pulled from the mystery bags they were selling that day. They had 3 different kinds of bags. First they had autographed jerseys which cost $40, then they had autographed baseballs which cost $20 & finally they had autographed photos which were either $10 or $15, I don't quite remember that one. Well anyways, I was stoked for fan fest as I hadn't attended the year before & I decided to buy one jersey & one baseball mystery bag. This was my pull from the jersey mystery bag:

This is what I saw first & I immediately knew it wouldn't be Zack Grienke for the price that I paid. I then thought maybe a Milton Bradley, a slight chance of Jay Johnstone ?

Well it was Juan Rivera. Not the greatest pull, but considering the price it's not too bad.

It also came with MLB certification so that was a plus. Next is the autographed baseball. From what I was hearing, the pulls from the baseball bags weren't going too great. I heard people complaining because they were signed in black, they never had heard of the player & so on. Well when I saw who I got I was pretty pleased.
                                                       
It was Rafael Furcal & it was signed in blue. Furcal gave us a few good years here in LA & he is a former Rookie of the Year, so I couldn't be more pleased with who I got. It also came with a certificate of authenticity from the Dodgers, but I have misplaced that so I couldn't show it. These were my pulls from the mystery bags & I'm actively trying to trade the Juan Rivera jersey so if anyone is interested be sure to let me know. I will also be showing the items I got during the autograph sessions & that will most likely be tomorrow. Thank you for reading.

Cards of the Day

Well today I'm going to show off a couple of cards that I pulled from last years baseball products. The first card I pulled here is a mini game used card of Ian Kennedy. I pulled it from a Topps series 1 hanger box last year & overall I find it to be a good looking card. It is numbered 17/25 & it covers two of my main goals in card collecting, which #1 it is a game used jersey card & #2 it is a mini card. If anyone ever has minis they're looking to get rid of, I would definetly be interested, so be sure to let me know. Getting back to the card, I suppose the only downfall is it is a D-Back card, but anyways still a good part of the collection.

The second card I will be showing here is a work out jersey card of Dustin Pedroia from the 2013 A.S game. This here is another great looking card & it was pulled from a Topps update series rack pack. This one here had led me to wanting to collect the entire set of the 2013 A.S. game used cards, & well let's just say I didn't stay very dedicated to that goal. Anyways, these two cards were very exciting to pull. It's always fun to pull a hit from retail as it's unexpected, rather than hobby boxes where you're already expecting a hit. Don't get me wrong I love purchasing hobby boxes too, but in my opinion I find this more exciting. I'm looking forward to hopefully a couple more hits this year & hopefully some nice Dodger ones. That's what I have for this post & thank you for reading.

First Contest Giveaway

Well here it finally is, my first give away on here. For those who had read my earlier postings I had promised a giveaway earlier & I apologize for it taking a while. After debating which cards to give away I came up with these two pictured above. First is a Trent Edwards rookie jersey card & second is a 1955 rookie commemorative patch card (which I showed off in a previous entry). These are just a few cards of many more that I will be giving away. Well now let's get started with how the contest will work.

After consulting with Matthew, also known for his blog DodgerPenguin, I will be using one of his methods for contests. I will give one entry per comment per day on this post. If you run a blog & you promote my give away on there, I will give an additional entry. And if you promote it on twitter , that will also net you an additional entry. While you're at it you can also give me a follow on twitter @DodgersFan_818. By the way, also let me know in the comment box below if you used the twitter or blog method so I can check it out, as I may not be familiar with you blog or twitter. This contest will run through next Thursday, & the winner will be announced next Friday by using random.org. The person on top of the list will be the winner. If you do everything, you can earn up to 9 entries & best of luck!! Thank you for reading.

Fernando Valenzuela Autographed Baseball

Well here's a new ball popping up in a post. This one here is of former Dodgers pitcher Fernando Valenzuela. This ball here was obtained a few months back at one of the Dodgers Holiday Mall tour signings. With the help of my father & my brother, I was able to get a couple of other items signed as well, which I will be showing in future posts. From what I remember there were quite a few people who attended the signing & by the time I finished getting my items signed there were by estimate 200 people still left in line. Walking away I felt very fortunate to have gotten my ball signed & it was another great autograph to add to the collection.

I would provide more details about the signing, but for now this is all I can remember from that day. However, my advice is if you ever attend one of these signings for him is to get there early !! If you don't get there early then you might be walking away with out an autograph, as there is a large turn out of people. Hope you enjoyed the post & thank you for reading.

Frank Howard Autographed Baseball

A while back I had noticed that my local card shop had a pretty good sale going on online. I was browsing through seeing what they had & I noticed this Frank Howard autographed ball at an amazing price, so it was a must get. It was also a plus that it had the 1960 rookie of the year inscription, as I absolutely love inscriptions. I called up the store to double check it was in stock & sure enough it was, so I made my way over & obtained this awesome ball of the former Dodger slugger. Overall, it was another great pick up & great addition to the collection. Thanks for reading.

Ray Guy Autographed 8x10

Like I've mentioned before, I am a big time raider fan !! After browsing the web a few months back I had noticed that the online nfl shop was having a sale & this Ray Guy autographed photo was way cheaper then I thought it would be. It came certified by Mounted Memories & I had a gift card that would cover the entire cost including shipping, so I decided to add it to my collection. I had a pretty good feeling that this might be the year he would get voted into the hall of fame, and sure enough I was right. It's great to see that he's the first punter to ever get voted into the hall of fame & it's a plus that he wore the silver & black. After all is said & done, I'm glad I was able to get this great photo of a Raider legend at a great price. Thanks for reading.

Hall of Fame Autographed baseballs.

Unfortunately as of now my autographed baseball collection only hosts two hall of famers. The first one pictured on the left is Cardinal great, Lou Brock. The second one on the right is one of the most current hall of famers, Frank Thomas. I try my best to keep the autographed baseballs in my collection to be acquired in person, but it's pretty difficult to expand that way. Therefore, both of these balls were purchased at a fairly reasonable price & came certified by PSA. My goal is to acquire more baseballs signed by hall of famers & I hope to reach somewhere in between 10-15 by the end of the year,. We'll see how that goes. I have a few autographed balls in my collection that are signed by future hall of famers & it's just a matter of time before they get in. Well for now this is what I have for this post & if anyone out there has any balls signed by hall of famers that they're willing to get rid of, then feel more than welcome to contact me & we could get a deal done. Thank you.

Greg Townsend Autograph Signing

Yesterday March 8, 2014 the Raiders All-Time sack leader Greg Townsend made an appearance at the Raider Image store at Universal Studios City Walk. Greg was scheduled to sign from 4-8 and with it being pretty close to home and me being a big time Raider fan, I had to go. I called the store around 11:15 to confirm the signing & asked how it would be run. They informed me that Greg would be selling his own items & if you purchased an item from him he would sign it, or if you purchased something from the store then Greg would sign anything you had for him. With that being said  I waited around a bit for the time to come around & then I grabbed one of my footballs & headed out to the signing.

I arrived to city walk around 5 o'clock or so & made my way over to the store. Walking in the first thing I noticed was Greg sitting behind his table with all his merchandise laid out. His prices were  fairly reasonable. They ranged 15-20 dollars for a photo & 60 dollars for a jersey. Considering that the price covered the item & the signature, I thought it was a pretty good price. I walked around the store for a bit looking for something to buy. I found a pretty nice T-shirt and decided to roll with that. There were just two people in line before me so I waited for my turn to make my purchase & get my football signed. While I was in line there were people coming in requesting to take a photo with Greg & he said yes at the price of 5 dollars. I have heard of athletes charging for a photo-op before, but this was my first time experiencing it in person.

The few people ahead of me finally made their way out & now it was my turn. Greg was really friendly & great to talk to. I handed him my football & I noticed he was going to sign it in black sharpie & I quickly asked him if he could sign it in silver. He froze for a bit but agreed to sign it in silver. I asked him if he would do an inscription & he said sure for 10 bucks. I agreed & asked him to inscribe Raiders All-Time sack leader & he did. He abbreviated it with "R.A.T.S." & added 109.5 which is the total amount of career sacks he had, all coming with the Raiders except for 2. Greg then handed me my football & I handed him another 5 bucks for a photo with him. We took the photo pictured below & I thanked Greg for his time & he thanked me for coming out. Once again Greg was super friendly & it was a great day & great signing at the Raider Image store.

Here below is a close up of my signed football with the "R.A.T.S. 109.5" inscription, which I personally think came out great. Hope you enjoyed the post & Thank you for reading.

Clayton Kershaw Rookie Card Pick Ups.

Just recently I noticed I didn't have any Clayton Kershaw rookie cards in my collection, so I quickly decided to change that. I went online to ebay and found these two cards of the Dodgers ace so I knew I had to get them. I placed my max bid on both cards as they were both ending soon & within a matter of hours I had won both auctions. I added a pair of Kershaw rookie cards for just a few bucks. I received these cards just a few days ago & am completely satisfied with their appearance. I will be looking  to add a few more rookie cards of him fairly soon & I am always on the look out for Dodger rookie cards to purchase or to trade for. Thank you for reading.

First card purchase of the new baseball year.

Well today I stopped by my local Target store & decided to buy my first box of cards for the coming up baseball season. I delayed on getting started on adding cards as I've been investing most of my funds trying to stock up on new baseballs & other supplies for the coming up season. However I finally picked up a quick box & I found to like series 1 this year a bit better than last years. This box came with a manufactured patch card in every box so I thought that was pretty cool.

My first pull from the box was a 1955 manufactured commemorative rookie patch card of the great Roberto Clemente. Clemente was a great person both on and off the field, so I thought it was awesome to get such a nice card of a great man.

  

After ripping through all the other packs I managed to get some pretty nice inserts. The future is now insert cards of Jurickson Profar, Mike Trout, Jose Fernandez & Yoenis Cespedes are probably my most favorite that I got. I also pulled a pair of upper class inserts of Jacoby Ellsbury & Freddie Freeman, along with super veteran inserts of Adrian Beltre & C.C. Sabathia.



The last couple of inserts I pulled were a 50 years of the draft card of Derek Jeter & a mini insert of recent Hall of Famer Greg Maddux. I'm not too big of a fan of this years minis as I preferred last years design much more but no biggie. The last card worth showing is the red foil card of David Ortiz  & the Boston Red Sox from last years World Series. Compared to the base version, the red foil looks much better. That about sums up the better cards as the rest were just base cards & coming from target a bunch of red parallels & a gold one of Josh Beckett. Thanks for reading & all the cards are available for trade if anyone is interested in acquiring any.