Last night I completed my fourth straight days signings. Today, on one of my few days off in recent memory, I will try to get you all up to speed on what has been going on. Last Wednesday (is it that long ago already?) I took the first flight out to St. Louis. We had just locked up Tony LaRussa and Jeff Suppan to exclusive deals and I was flying out there to expedite the first signings with them. As soon as you walk off the plane you are bombarded with Cardinal merchandise. I picked up a few cool items for our auction site and then caught a taxi to the airport. I had never been to Missouri before so I made sure to take some photos along the way. I took some great images of the famous arch. My hotel was right across the street from the ball park. It appears just as it does on television. It is and looks brand new and clean....a far cry from Shea Stadium (though it does lack the nostalgia and history. People can say what they want about to Shea but the bottom line is that Game 6 was played there and nowhere else)
After spending a few hours setting up for the signing Jeff Suppan was the first to arrive. He is a great guy. We immediately got into it about the Mets series. I have never hid my affiliations with any athletes I have been with. I feel that may be one of the reasons that I have gotten along so well with these guys. It pained me a lot, however, to ask Soup to inscribe "NLCS MVP" on some of the product. I had not realized until the CS how good a pitcher this guy is. He has been a big game pitcher for years. If not for him we all would have been at a parade in New York last week. Instead, Soup was lights out and was able to steal a Game 7 on the road. He deserves all the accolades and, honestly, it could not have happened to a nicer guy. I truly enjoyed talking with him.
About an hour after Soup finished Tony LaRussa walked through the door. He could possibly be the smartest baseball man I have ever spoken with. We talked, in length, about the playoffs. He explained to me so much about momentum and things like that. I have heard players use the term "good baseball man" alot. It usually applies to an older guy who has been there and has a ton of knowledge. I never 100% understood the term until I spoke with Tony. LaRussa and I also talked about the charitable work that he does. He is very involved with ARF which is a foundation dedicated to animals. It deals with animal adoption and rescue. It is such an important cause and Tony is quite passionate about it. If you have a chance check out the website at ARF.net. He is doing incredible work.
After LaRussa finished signing I spent a few hours boxing up the product and prepping it to ship back to New York. Thankfully I was able to get a few hours of sleep before waking up at 3:00 AM to catch the first flight back to LaGuardia.
It really was a great trip. I will be posting all the photos shortly. We got some amazing new product signed including World Series baseball, Tony LaRussa tip cap photos and Jeff Suppan 06 NLCS MVP inscription baseballs.
Check back later for a recap of last Thursday which includes signings with both Chien-Ming Wang and several members of the 1986 Mets.