I received four ttm successes today, as well as some purchases.
I made a little progress on my 1975 Topps set with the addition of Bob Hansen on his card as well as the Brewers team card from that year.
I tried to upgrade a couple cards with Vern Law with mixed success. The previous 1963 and 1965 Topps he signed for me were signed with black sharpie. These are signed with blue sharpie, with a lot of inscriptions, which is great, but the pen appears to be running out of ink. The 63 is okay, but the 65 is pretty light.
Mr. Law also wrote me a note about some artist's rendering of his Cy Young award which costs $450, with most of the proceeds going to the artist. I had a little trouble reading his handwritten note, so I don't quite understand what the art is exactly. A painting? If so, how big? Anyway, $450 is out of my price range right now so I'm not planning on trying to gather any more information.
Hall of Famer Mike Mussina signed his 2008 Topps Heritage and added his HOF inscription (which I asked for in my note). He didn't answer a question I had asked in my letter. I included $10 with my request.
I recently saw on SCN that Hall of Famer Larry Walker is signing through the mail for a fee to charity. The fee for cards is only $25, which I thought was very reasonable. The fees go up quickly from there. It's $75 for everything else. I suppose that's reasonable for a jersey or a bat, but a bit steep for a ball, I think. Plus, he charges $25 for an inscription, so a baseball (that you supply) with the HOF inscription would be $100. That's more than I want to pay right now, but the $25 for a card was a no-brainer to add another Hall of Famer to my collection. I really like the 2003 Topps Heritage set and am not too interested in other sets from the 90's or 2000's, so it was an easy decision to get this card signed.
The note said to allow up to a year for your request to be returned, so I was prepared to completely forget about this one and be pleasantly surprised sometime in 2024. But it only took 16 days!
Lately, I have been impressed with Twin's catcher Ryan Jeffers. He's been good defensively but has really started hitting well lately as well. It seems like every time I tune in, there's Jeffers getting a hit and driving in a run.
About a week ago, he hit a go-ahead home run against the Rangers. with a pretty obnoxious bat flip. The kind of bat flip that makes you immediately think, "oh, he's going to get beaned for that." And sure enough, the next day he did. But it's very possible it wasn't intentional because there were runners on first and third, and their pitcher (Dunning) was struggling with his control. Regardless, the Twins decided it was necessary to retaliate by hitting my previous favorite Twins catcher, Mitch Garver. I think the whole thing was unnecessary, starting with Jeffers bat flip.
Anyway, I decided to stock up a bit on some Jeffers autographs. I wanted certified cards and was surprised to find a lot of very affordable ( < $5) cards on eBay. I've already got four, with at least two more on the way. I'll continue to keep my eyes peeled for more. These are sticker autographs, not on card, but for this price, I'm okay with that. I do already have a Heritage Real One auto of his from the 2022 set.
Buying these cards has reminded me why I don't buy any new cards except Heritage and Ginter cards: there are just so many cards and series and variations, etc. In this case, I'm happy about it, but if I was seriously trying to complete a current set or series, it would be a very frustrating endeavor.
Other than being a good catcher, I liked Mitch Garver because he was a good ttm signer. Here are a few he's signed for me the last few years.
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