Scribble milestone

 

I have been pursuing a collecting milestone in the most lazy way possible, and in perfect lazy fashion, I let someone else get me to that milestone.

I mentioned a couple of months ago that I had come within one card of having signed cards for 200 different Dodgers players. Bob of the best bubble helped me to the doorstep of that achievement by getting me to 199.

Well, Bob's at it again. In a recent envelope, he sent three cards signed by Dodgers. One of them was the Charlie Hough '79 Topps card. I have a couple of Hough-signed cards already, but getting one signed on a '70s cards makes me think of how glorious it would be to have every '70s Dodgers card signed, not that this will happen ever.

But the other two signed cards were from players that I did not have in signed form in my collection until I opened the envelope. That means ...

 

🎉🎈🎇200!!! 💙💙💙

 

That is some kind of feat for someone who never actively seeks an autograph. Not only do I not stand in line at autograph sessions or go to the ballpark to gather them or send cards to player addresses for them, but I hardly ever look for them online or list certified autos in my want lists.

 

As part of my policy of seeing autographed cards as extras -- a happy little bonus -- I'll take whatever comes my way and then move on to the serious stuff, whatever set I'm trying to complete.

But let's take a look at the player and the card that got me to 200!

Congratulations Eddie Stanky, you are the 200th Dodger player in my autograph collection!

That is a pretty impressive signature for someone who played in the 1940s and died more than 20 years ago! It definitely is Stanky's signature from what I've seen and my guess is it was scripted quite awhile ago, sometime in the '80s or early '90s.

The card I know well and have a few dupes of it, it's a 1983 TCMA reprint of the 1944 Play Ball set. I think it's rather nice that the milestone card is a TCMA issue! Take that, you certified auto snobbies!

Here is the other autographed card featuring a player I didn't have in signed form:

A 1958 card, sweet. Walker's status as a backup catcher is well-known in Dodgers lore. And he signed it with his nickname, "Rube Walker," which was how he was known pretty much. The only time I've seen "Al" is on his baseball cards.

So that's No. 201. Road to 300? Yeah, I imagine that particular number is way far off in the future, if it ever happens.

The rest of the cards Bob sent were not autographed, which is just fine by me.

 

The "Ferris" card is a good one, from Big League a couple of years ago and really should have been in my clutches already. The shiny 1983 Donruss tribute gets me even closer to my next milestone, 900 Clayton Kershaw cards! The Podres card is well-timed as I just added that card to my want list as I was updating 1999 and pretty disgusted with how many Fleer Sports Illustrated Dodgers I need (so many Steve Garvey collectors). And the Scherzer is another card of the short-timer and my first Panini Dodger Scherzer!

A nice, fun envelope from Bob.

He's also sending me Royals, which he doesn't need to do. I should start a page of Royals cards that were sent to me because they were mistaken for Dodgers.

Oh, and here's the updated list of my 200-PLUS Dodgers autographs:

Don Aase

Reggie Abercrombie

Victor Alvarez

Jacob Amaya

Chris Anderson

Dave Anderson

Andy Ashby

Billy Ashley

Kym Ashworth

Pedro Astacio

Pedro Baez

Bob Bailor

Dusty Baker

Daniel Batz

Joe Beckwith

Adrian Beltre

Josh Bell

Chad Billingsley

Mike Blowers

Bobby Bragan

Yhency Brazoban

Rocky Bridges

Greg Brock

Ralph Bryant

Bill Buckner

Walker Buehler

Brett Butler

John Candelaria

Tom Candiotti

Roger Cedeno

Ron Cey

Steve Colyer

Alex Cora

Tony Cuccinello

Glenn Davis

Rubby De La Rosa

Rick Dempsey

Blake DeWitt

Victor Diaz

Ben Diggins

Al Downing

Darren Dreifort

Don Drysdale

Cory Dunlap

Scott Elbert

John Ely

Carl Erskine

Andre Ethier

Joey Eischen

Kyle Farmer

Chad Fonville

Carlos Frias

Eric Gagne

Greg Gagne

Karim Garcia

Onelki Garcia

Yimi Garcia

Steve Garvey

Dave Goltz

Jose Gonzalez

Victor Gonzalez

Dee Gordon

Kevin Gross

Alex Guerrero

Pedro Guerrero

Wilton Guerrero

Garrett Gould

Mark Guthrie

Jeff Hamilton

Tim Hamulak

Dave Hansen

Chris Hatcher

Mickey Hatcher

Danny Heep

Carlos Hernandez

Kirby Higbe

Koyie Hill

Todd Hollandsworth

Kody Hoese

Burt Hooton

Charlie Hough

Ken Howell

Chin-Lung Hu

Mike Huff

Kaz Ishii

Kenley Jansen

Stan Javier

Blake Johnson

Tommy John

Von Joshua

Eric Karros

Matt Kemp

Clayton Kershaw

Jay Kirkpatrick

Mike Kinkade

Landon Knack

Paul Konerko

Hong-Chih Kuo

Ken Landreaux

Andy LaRoche

Zach Lee

Josh Lindblom

Jon Link

Paul Lo Duca

James Loney

Dave Lopes

Gavin Lux

Matt Magill

Devin Mann

Mike Marshall

Russell Martin

Dustin May

Pratt Maynard

James McDonald

Ken McMullen

Andy Messersmith

Aaron Miller

Rick Monday

Raul Mondesi

Wally Moon

Danny Mota

Manny Mota

Max Muncy

Mike Munoz

Jim Neidlinger

Tom Niedenfuer

Ricky Nolasco

Hideo Nomo

Jose Offerman

Justin Orenduff

Claude Osteen

Antonio Osuna

Willis Otanez

Andy Pages

Chan Ho Park

Dave Patterson

Joc Pederson

Alejandro Pena

Angel Pena

Antonio Perez

Joe Pignatano

Johnny Podres

Luke Prokopec

Eddie Pye

John Raglani

Gary Rath

Jeremy Rathjen

Doug Rau

Jerry Reuss

Dennis Reyes

Rick Rhoden

Adam Riggs

Eric Riggs

Dave Roberts

Orlando Rodriguez

Paco Rodriguez

Ricardo Rodriguez

Preacher Roe

Bill Russell

Kyle Russell

Juan Samuel

Dennis Santana

Steve Sax

Scott Schebler

Corey Seager

Rob Segedin

Jeff Shaw

John Shelby

Reggie Smith

Duke Snider

Cory Snyder

Don Stanhouse

Eddie Stanky

Ross Stripling

Franklin Stubbs

Eric Stults

Don Sutton

Derrel Thomas

Gary Thomasson

Brandon Trinkwon

Ramon Troncoso

John Tudor

Ismael Valdes

Fernando Valenzuela

Jesmuel Valentin

Alex Verdugo

Cory Wade

Al "Rube" Walker

Tim Wallach

Allen Webster

Gary Weiss

Bob Welch

Mitchell White

Reggie Williams
Todd Williams

Maury Wills

Tom Windle

Chris Withrow

Steve Yeager

Delwyn Young

Matt Young 

That's 201. Feel free to count them yourself.

 

And just to counter all the back-patting, I am reminded that I had hoped to find a big, big name for the milestone autograph and in another post I had listed some notable Dodgers that I do not have in autograph form -- key names like Orel Hershiser, Mike Piazza and Shawn Green. I guess that would happen if I did things myself.

 

But I'd have to be a lot more focused on autographs to put all that together. I sure would like an Orel Hershiser autographed card but maybe that'll be for No. 300.

 

Ha.

 

I have Hostess sets to chase.