Wednesday, January 8, 2014

A Koufax Autograph...... I had to do it




I'm not really an autograph collector. Oh I have some, and many of them mean a lot to me, but if I were to list things I covet memorabilia-wise autographs wouldn't be one of them.

But I do like to have one signature of each of my favorite players. I have many Brooks Robinson autographs, most of them I obtained directly from Brooks one way or another. I have one Johnny Unitas aoutgraph that I won through a charity auction and had framed with a picture.

But one autograph I have wanted for a long time was a Sandy Koufax. They are prohibitively expensive for the most part. And I am dubious of some of the cheaper ones. But I have patience. Recently three of these 1998 Donruss Significant Signature Koufax cards were on eBay. I used an auction snipe program and loaded up all three auctions with lowball bids. I figured I had nothing to lose.

Luckily one of them hit and here it is. Before I bid I did a bit or research into the set. Apparently there are a couple of variations of this card. Some picture Koufax with an LA Dodger cap. These Brooklyn versions were supposedly to be used as replacements or something. Some were sold via auction when the defunct Donruss' inventory was liquidated. I'm not sure about any of this and I don't really care. It's legit, it was reasonable, and it's on-card.

I'm pretty happy.

8 comments:

  1. Very nice. One of my greatest memories is getting Koufax on a ball during spring training in the '90s.

    The guy exudes class and professionalism.

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    1. Getting a 'graph in person would be really cool but I blew my one chance. I saw him in the lobby of a hotel once but didn't want to intrude. You're right, he's all class.

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  2. Pretty cool to have a Koufax auto.

    I never liked the design of this card -- yes, I know it's Koufax and it's his autograph -- but the design has really prevented me from looking these up ... well, that and my wallet.

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    1. I pretty much agree, there are much better cards to have signed. I don't care much for the huge silver lettering, but I wanted one I was sure was authentic (or a sure as one can ever be short of witnessing the signing) and this was fairly reasonable. There are tons of hall of Fame postcards on eBay and I could have gotten one of those cheaper but this fit what I was looking for.

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  3. Great set of players on a terrible design. I have the Duke Snider for sure. Still I'd take that Koufax any day. One thing, it is a big on card signature.

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  4. Congratulations on picking up this card. I love this set. I know it's hard to see the autograph... especially in the scans, but the checklist is amazing and since they produced so many of these cards... they're very affordable.

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