I received one more sase than was shown in my Informed Delivery email this morning, which for some reason is not surprising on the day after a postal holiday. I'd much rather get an extra one than for one of the returns in my email to not show up in the mailbox, which is more often the case.
Today's failure was my second attempt at having Maury Wills sign the 1960 Topps #389 card commemorating game #5 of the 1959 World Series and Luis Aparicio sliding safely into second base with Maury Wills covering. This card pre-dates Maury's rookie card. I had included $10 with each of the two requests, but this time I did not tear the $10 bill in half when I opened the return envelope.
I'm not sure why he didn't sign it. I've seen another return on SCN in April where he signed two of these cards, so it doesn't appear to be an issue with the card itself.
He does have some random failures within his otherwise reliable history. I sent to him last in September of 2021, so I wouldn't think it's an issue of him keeping track and rejecting requests that are too frequent. And if it were, I would assume he'd include a note explaining the situation.
I could keep guessing (and probably will), but for now, I'll just hang on to the card and watch his signing results on SCN. If they continue to be pretty reliable, I'll try again. Perhaps with a handwritten letter, maybe with a different message than I normally send.
Several of my successes today include just a single card. I usually try to include 3 or 4 cards if the signer appears to allow it and they don't charge. I try to get the most for my money, so I try to spread the effort, as well as the postage, envelope and printer ink cost across multiple cards. I don't know why I look at it this way, it's not as if I'm selling the cards.
Anyway, here are today's successes:
Danny Cater signed his 1973 Topps for his $5 fee. A couple years ago he started abbreviating his first name with just his initial.
Rick Cerone signed his 1985 Topps. While Mr. Cerone does not charge, he only signs one card per request. I sent an 85 Topps to him about a year ago, but I never received it back. He is a very reliable signer, with a success rate of over 90% on SCN, so it must have gotten lost in the mail or misplaced. I would also like him to sign his 87 Topps, so that will be my next request to him in a few months.
Mike Hedlund signed and personalized his 1973 Topps. I'm not sure when he started personalizing, but I have successes prior to 2010 where he didn't. He doesn't have a fee, but I included $5 to see if he would just sign it without the personalization. He kept the $5 but still personalized, so that didn't work out. I thought perhaps he was personalizing to prevent people from getting free autographs from him and then selling them. He has a very neat and stylized signature.
This card is one of about a dozen high-number cards from the 1973 Topps set that I bought recently to make some more progress on it. The Cater card isn't in the high number series, but I had just procrastinated sending it, probably since I didn't already have the unsigned card and he charges a fee.
Whitey Herzog signed his 1960 Topps nicely for his $5 fee. Not a bad deal for a Hall of Famer! I really need to send a ball to him for my collection.
And finally, Luis Melendez signed his 1971, 1974 and 1975 Topps from his home in Puerto Rico. It took about a month to make the round trip, but only 3 days from the postmark date on my return sase.
I have been sending out a lot of requests so far this year. I have sent 255 requests, which doesn't include sending away to private signings. I sent 370 all of last year. If I were to stop now, this would be my 4th-most requests since I started the hobby in 2003. I'm not sure I can keep up this pace all year from both a time and money perspective.
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