Faq

1) What is FAQ?

This page is to answer questions that I see frequently and as such FAQ stands for Frequently Asked Questions. I'm sure most know the term but possibly not all so here ya go.

2) Where do you get addresses for retired players?

I use Harvey Meiselman's Ultimate Address List which you can buy at his website... Sports Address Lists.com. I also use Sports Collectors.net.

2) How do you remove the gloss from cards?

There are basically two ways to handle it. The first would be to lightly rub some baby powder over the surface of the cards. After you've rubbed them down lightly, simply rub away the baby powder and that should still leave a light film of talc on the cards which will give the ink something to stick to. The second way would be to lightly rub an eraser over the surface of the cards until the gloss is diminished. I use the baby powder method and haven't had any problems.

3) Top loaders or no top loaders?

I don't put top loaders in with my requests any longer. In my experience it just doesn't make that much of a difference. I've had players keep the top loaders and others cause more damage to the card by trying to put it back in the top loader than it probably would have been damaged without the top loader. Also sometimes players will sign the top loader instead of the card. Plus there's a cost issue of course. If you have a 50% success rate and you send 100 requests, that's 50 top loaders you're never seeing again without even mentioning the players who didn't send it back. Since I'm not interested in selling my collection, I'm not too concerned about bent corners and such which does happen occasionally without top loaders. I've yet to send a request without a top loader where the card came back completely destroyed.

4) Typed or handwritten?

The best advice would probably be that it matters more what you say than whether or not you wrote it or typed it. I currently type all of my letters and haven't seen much of a difference in success rates. It's debatable whether some players even read their mail.

5) What is SASE?

SASE stands for Self Addressed Stamped Envelope. When collecting through the mail you should include a SASE with your letter in order for the players to return your items. It's highly unlikely your items with be returned without a SASE.

6) How do I send requests to Canadian teams?

I rarely send requests to Canadian teams but in the past I have been successful with using US postage. I place two stamps on the outgoing letter and one stamp on the SASE. I assume that the players simply mail the requests back to me when they're in the United States. I have had successes with Vladimir Guerrero and Tony Armas Jr. this way. The surest way to ensure a return without any postage trouble is to simply buy Canadian postage for your SASE. Canadian postage can be purchased from this website http://www.canadapost.ca/personal/default-e.asp.

7) How do you store your cards?

I used to put my cards in top loaders which I then stored in boxes however I've since changed to using plastic sheets and binders. Not only are the sheets and binders cheaper than buying a ton of top loaders but it allows you to look at your collection without having to look through a bunch of boxes.

8) Why do you write to minor league players? Don't major league players sign?

I write to minor league players mostly for many reasons. First, the success rate with minor leaguers is much higher than with major leaguers. It's at least 20-30% higher in my experience. Second, I just enjoy following prospects as they rise through the minor leagues and reach the majors. It's pretty cool to have gotten a player's autograph in A ball and then watch them as they become a major league player. Also, the autographs of minor leaguers are usually better looking than that of major leaguers. By the time a player has reached the major leagues and signed a bajillion autographs, it's likely his autograph has changed and even deterioated because of the demand for his autograph and the time it takes to sign an autograph. For a good example, you can look at my Cole Hamels autographs. In 2003 he signed his full name as a minor league player with the Lakewood Blue Claws but by 2007 with the Phillies his signature changed to basically C HL.

9) How many items do you send?

I usually send no more than two items but I have sent three items sometimes. I would send no more than three items unless there is some kind of a fee involved like for Dave Henderson for example where he was asking $2 per signature for charity.

10) How do you send a baseball?

You would send a baseball like you would any other request. Buy a big enough envelope to hold your baseball then buy a bigger envelope that can hold the smaller envelope and the baseball together. Address and put postage on both envelopes, the player's address on the outside envelope and your address on the inside envelope, and then seal the outside envelope and mail.

11) Where do you get cards of minor league players?

The Bowman brand of baseball cards usually carries the best selection of minor league players in their sets. I would stick to the Bowman Draft brand in particular. I buy most of my cards off of eBay but I have used SportLots.com and go to my local card store from time to time.

12) Will players sign notecards instead of cards?

There was a time when players were pretty good about signing notecards but the whole identity theft phenomenon has turned a lot of players off to signing them now. Some players will still sign notecards but the number goes down every year. Some folks have turned to printing up custom cards on photo paper which the players seem to like more than notecards. Players are wary of signing things on white paper surfaces so if you can make a custom card that has a team logo as a water mark or enough information on it so that a player would be signing over a picture or writing of some kind, your chances of success probably go up. One of the members of our message board is about the best around in designing custom photo cards and you can check his website out at Hemi's Autograph Collection.

13) I don't know what to write. What do I write to players?

I get this question a lot for some reason. Part of me wants to say that if you don't know what to write, maybe you shouldn't be writing. Anyway, I think most players understand why you're writing. They get a lot of mail and I'm betting 98% of it has to do with requesting an autograph so there's no need to re-invent the wheel so to speak when you're writing a player. I would stick to your personal experiences with a player, the more personal the better probably. Again, it's debatable whether most players read their mail but many do so you want to give a personal account of why you're writing. Telling every player they're your favoritest player in the whole world probably isn't a good idea. I try to stick to what I've seen or read about a player and whatever personal experiences I've had watching a player or following them or what have you. For example, one time as a kid I was at the Astrodome watching the Cubs play and Mark Grace (who was one of my most favorite players at the time) hit two home runs in the game and one of them was hit right at me so I obviously brought that up when I wrote to him and he signed for me. It's that simple.

14) Who are the best signers in sports?

According to my own statistics, the best signers in sports are retired football players although I hear hockey players are great signers. For myself, it's retired football players followed by retired baseball players followed by minor league baseball players.

15) Is it just luck or are there things I can do to make sure people sign for me?

There is certainly luck involved in who signs and doesn't sign for you but preparedness and good information goes a long way. In this hobby you're really only as good as your information so it's important to stay in the loop on what's going on in the hobby by following the better websites on the net which you can find on my links page. Some players might not sign their whole careers and then for whatever reason they'll start signing one summer and then stop altogether after a while. There are lot of common sense things you can do to ensure a higher success rate. One thing you can do with active baseball players is to send to them at the beginning of long home stands. Some players will take time during their longest home stands to start going through their mail. Another thing you can do is make your envelopes stand out in some way. If there are fifty envelopes in a stack and a player has time to sign one, he's most likely going to pick the one that stands out to him more than the others. Another thing you can do for minor leaguers in particular is to target players that don't have cards out yet. Most collectors will not send requests to players they don't have cards for and obviously this cuts down on the amount of mail a player will receive and therefore improves your chances of success. Someone that makes custom photo cards and targets players without cards out yet is probably going to have a pretty good rate of return.