Some Phillies Links for You, June 28, 2010: Juggling Lineups, Hey Mister Sign This!
by WholeCamels on Jun 28, 2010 8:16 AM EDT
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PrintAutographs: What casual fans may not know. - Phuture Phillies
Reading Phillies' reliever Michael Schwimer contributes this interesting piece on the etiquette of autograph seeking.
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From the autograph article…
Second – Sharks: The term "Sharks" is a baseball term that refers to people who want your autograph only to sell it on eBay, or to other persons, to make a profit. This just isn’t right . These people all promise they are collectors and would never sell anything ever. . I can usually spot a shark because they ask for you to sign on the sweet spot of a ball in perfect condition. They also might ask you to sign things that will make it more valuable, like my baseball card, or a team bat, or something of that ilk. To make sure I was not just being paranoid about this, I did an experiment. I bought my own autographed ball on eBay from a seller in the Reading area and arranged a meeting to pick it up. The guy that brought it to me was one of the guys that swore to me he would never sell anything. I confronted him and he tried to offer an excuse, but I had caught him red handed. These are the people that ruin it for everyone else. The moral of this story is I will no longer sign cards or perfect condition balls with just my name on the sweet spot.
I don’t believe his Ebay story for a second, for a whole slew of reasons.
Formerly Bye, Dawk :(
In that case I think you should identify your reasons, because you are flatly calling him a liar. You don’t get to do that without being specific.
1.Ebay, as I understand it, is a service in which people can sell things online using Pay Pal accounts, in which the buyer pays for shipping. This is unlike a service like craigslist, where people are sort of on their own to arrange meet-ups to finalize transactions. Now, I don’t doubt that meet-ups for these transactions occur every once in a rare while on Ebay, but it seems rather curious to me why the seller would go out of his way to meet someone so they could sell a $4 autographed baseball.
2.Schwimer went a hell of a long way to conduct this “experiment,” as he says it…
To make sure I was not just being paranoid about this
Really?
3.I just don’t buy this line…
The guy that brought it to me was one of the guys that swore to me he would never sell anything. I confronted him and he tried to offer an excuse, but I had caught him red handed.
So Schwimer remembers every face of every person he gives an autograph to? And the guy that Schwimer inconvenienced wasn’t a little bit irked that his time had just been wasted, and instead tried to come up with an excuse as if some 20-something minor league ball player was his father?
Lot’s of holes. I just don’t believe him, that’s all.
Formerly Bye, Dawk :(
The seller may not have gone out of his way. Assuming the seller lives in or very close to Reading and Michael agreed to meet him at a store or restaurant or maybe even after a game, it may have been no inconvenience to either side. Not to say that guarantees the story as true, it may not be, I have no idea.
That’s pretty weak sauce. I’ve bought and sold on eBay. All you need to do to try to arrange a meetup is send the seller a message. And how did Schwimer go “a hell of a long way”? He lives in Reading. He says the seller lives in Reading. Unless Reading is a lot bigger than I thought it was, I don’t see how this would have taken much effort.
All you need to do to try to arrange a meetup is send the seller a message
Sure, it might make sense if you’re selling a refrigerator for $300, your buyer wants to make sure it works, and they stop by… But to leave your house and meet a stranger so you can sell a baseball signed by a AA player, for what… $5? No.
And how did Schwimer go "a hell of a long way"? He lives in Reading.
Wrong phrasing. I didn’t mean in geographically-speaking. I should have written… Schwimer went to a lot of effort. Thinking of the dumb idea in the first place, searching for paraphernalia with your name, bidding on the item, contacting the seller, arranging a meet-up, taking time out of your day to drive to the meet-up place, and scold a complete stranger that just trying to make an extra buck or two. So yeah, that’s quite a bit of effort just to (again, as he says)… “make sure he wasn’t paranoid.”
My BS radar went off. Apologies to Schwimer if I’m wrong, and personally , I enjoy reading your stuff taco pal, so I don’t really want to get into a big thing here. But I just don’t buy it. That’s my opinion, and I’m sticking to it. As Ron Burgundy would say… “Agree to disagree.”
Formerly Bye, Dawk :(
I just don’t understand what motivation Schwimer might have here to make this up. You think he’s bound and determined to be some sort of vigilante crusader against the nefarious forces of Shark Man and his e-Bay ilk?
Schwimer has an established track record of blogging some very introspective stuff about the life of a minor league pitcher that it would seem to me to be impossible to make up (and I’m someone who’s tried to do it). Why start now?
Plus what about the other vignette about the woman screaming obscenities at him after he took a “politeness” stand against her kid?
by Wet Luzinski on Jun 28, 2010 12:27 PM EDT up reply actions
From Seinfeld...
GEORGE: Elaine, I once told a woman that I coined the phrase, “Pardon my French.”
JERRY: I once told a woman that I don’t eat cake ’cause it goes right to my thighs.
GEORGE: I once told a woman that I really enjoy spending time with my family.
So who knows why people lie? I think that’s kind of a much bigger question that we’ll never solve here. I had a friend that said he had 3 jet skis, yet he had no explanation of where they were, what kind they were, where he got them, etc. Great guy – well liked – randomly told a ridiculous lie – we couldn’t figure it out. I think he was trying to impress us? Not sure. Anyway, people don’t always have very sound reasoning for lying about something dumb.
Personally, I have nothing against this Schwimer guy. Frankly, before this morning, I never heard of him – He could be the best guy in the world for all I know. If you say his blog is good, I’ll tip my cap and take your word for it. And when I clicked on the link today, I didn’t read his blog entry looking to pick it apart just for the hell of it, but as I read his e-Bay story, my first thought was… “That’s total BS,” for the reasons I noted above with taco pal. Maybe he’s lying, maybe not – Again, apologies if he’s not, but I think he is.
Formerly Bye, Dawk :(
A friend of mine was at Tigers spring training and witnessed some of these sharks in action. It definitely happens. One lady had duffle bags full of stuff to be signed. Stacks of little plastic collectible helmets among other things. Believe it.
by michellemtsu on Jun 28, 2010 10:25 AM EDT up reply actions
So what did you sell to Michael?
My issue with this is why should Michael care what the fan is doing with his signature (short of identity theft, which is why you always sign autographs in a significantly different manner than you sign legal documents and maintain clean copies of both in a safe deposit box in case you ever need to supply them to handwriting experts for court cases)?
I understand it if Michael were selling his own signature, but the “shark” isn’t really doing Michael any harm by selling it, if Michael is not trying to sell it as well.
I think the feeling that some creep is using you is the deterrent here. Even if you’re not, strictly speaking, getting money taken out of your pocket, it still sucks.
How are you being used though? If I make a beautiful painting and give it away and the person turns around and sells it for a profit, how does that affect me? That’s the part that doesn’t make sense to me, as an uncaring prick, once I give something away, why should I care what that person does with it? If I found out people liked me enough to pay money for my autograph on eBay, I’d be thrilled.
other issues
1. A player’s autograph is an actual commodity. Although Schwimer isn’t a big deal now, he may be in the future. If you flood the market, so to speak, with your signature, you reduce demand, and thus the value of the signature going forward.
The autograph market is a big big BIG money-maker for ballplayers, and I’d imagine there’s lots of peer pressure within the team’s to strike a balance between “signing just enough not to look like a prick” and “not giving it away to everyone.”
2. I’m probably biased here, but I really can’t stand grownups who hound ballplayers for autographs. It’s kind of pathetic, really. I mean, you’re a grown man/woman, you should be over the hero worship thing by now. The lowest of the low are guys who use their kids as bait to get signatures, and then sell the resulting memorabilia.
http://www.thegoodphight.com
I agree 100% on #2. And #1 doesn’t seem germane to his argument. If you sign 3000 items then your signature is out there 3000 times in the marketplace, potentially, whether the people were “sharks” or not. I hear the point you’re making, but it sounds like herding cats to me.
The one thing a player can control is exactly how many times he puts Sharpie-to-ball and signs an autograph. And by doing so he can at least have some impact on where his signature winds up, and how.
There’s a tendency to think of professional ballplayers as multimillionaire spoiled rich folk but the vast, vast majority of them barely scrape out a living and, for the majority of the small number who do make it to the majors, they get a couple years of a very nice income with no other real discernible life skills.
http://www.thegoodphight.com
I think we’re arguing semantics here, frankly. I know plenty of touring “successful” musicians to know that once Schwimmer gets done paying the Government, his agent, lawyer, accountant and any other parties (PR rep, personal trainer during the offseason, etc.) his 400K salary will amount to slightly more than I make in a year, at best.
really?
If you knew that everytime you signed something, somebody would pay $5 for it, and then you had a slew of people asking you to sign things so that they could sell them, not because they wanted it?
That would bug me.
It’s the problem of the for-profit people swamping out the for-want people.
Two people walk up to you wanting your autograph. One is a 12 year old fan, one is a 40 year old with a bag of balls, helmets, etc…
You have time to sign one ball. Which do you sign?
And then the problem becomes when the 12 year old can’t get to the front row because there’s all those sharks elbowing him out of the way.
To me, that hypothetical is a different issue. If I can only sign one item and I have a choice between a kid and a full grown man (“shark” or not) I’d sign for the kid. Now if it was a 12 year old kid or Alyssa Milano, the hell with the kid. But assuming the “shark” is the only person asking, I would sign one item for him, no problem.
For the record I have never gotten an autograph from anyone, as it always seemed like a weird thing to me for anyone to want.
That’s fair (and I’d agree with the Alyssa Milano, in theory).
In reality, you’d never really have “just one item” that you could sign, but your time is a finite commodity, and to be signing autographs to people as a favor, and have them make money off your willingness to be accessible and friendly is kinda crappy, because they’re not genuinely interested in your famousness, they’re interested in you as a commodity.
I have a few autographed baseballs, but not many. One is from Alan Knicely, who was a backup catcher that I got to autograph a ball at a game at the vet. I also have one from Pete Rose (that I had to stand in line and pay for…wouldn’t do that again) and one signed by Mantle/Dawson/Martin/Snider/(maybe 2 more) all at another show (my parents got me that one, as they stood in line for all the signage)
The Pete Rose one means the least to me. Alan Knicely the most because he signed it in person and gave it back. It was an actual gift from an MLB player to me. The multi-HOF people one carries more nostalgia for me because my parents stood in line to give it to me as a present, than it does because of all the guys that signed it.
I was dying to go to a Bulls game this weekend (in spite of the 100+ temps) to see Brown play, but they were pretty well sold out (except for lawn, and I’m not that much of a masochist). He’s playing again today about 5 miles from my office, but again, I can’t afford to take off (damn job always interfering with my BS).
Bobby Valentine must be doing something wrong because as ESPN explains it to me his a brilliant baseball mind one of the best managers in the history of all sports, and yet he can’t get a job
by jemagee on Jun 28, 2010 10:45 AM EDT reply actions
It seems from what I’m reading that the Marlins also denied his self-proclaimed candidacy by sending the message back through the media. I thought this 14th century diplomatic approach was a wholly appropriate way to handle it.
by Wet Luzinski on Jun 28, 2010 12:15 PM EDT up reply actions
Sounds a lot like why I never wanted Avery Johnson to coach the sixers :)
by jemagee on Jun 28, 2010 12:24 PM EDT up reply actions
He did an interview with mikey miss where basically he interviewed for the sixers job (and said willie green was a starter)
by jemagee on Jun 29, 2010 2:01 PM EDT up reply actions
Ruiz
Sounds like he’s getting better, the Phillies website says his headaches have disappeared. He should begin rehab assignments in early July.
Moyer
I wonder if there might be some (perhaps?) suble psychological effect Moyer might be having on the umpires to expand the zone, if only out of respect to inertia/ seniority/ and/or the fact that he works pretty fast in broiling weather.
I didn’t realize that there were people who cared enough about Minor Leaguers to buy one of their autographs…I can understand a Dom Brown or someone of that caliber, but Schwimer? Really? In the world of baseball, he’s a nobody, and should be flattered that anyone cares enough, not insulted. If the person is desperate enough to waste their time getting autographs, only to sell them for 5 DOLLARS, then they probably really need the money
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