GB Autographs is a blog written by one 'grapher from New England that shares stories about meeting athletes,celebrities, and politicians through the point of view of a collector.
I kicked off basketball season today in Providence, R.I. for a rare game at Alumni Hall.(Providence usually plays at the much,much larger Dunkin Donuts Center). This was an exhibition game, and Providence is generally very easy to graph. I was mainly focused on freshman, Kris Dunn, who tore up the CT high school circuit last year.
Overall, this was an easy outing. The only issue during the whole time was a little uptight security at the beginning moving us about 4 times to make room for various "special groups". Those seats never even filled in, but I ended up finding a more convenient spot anyway.
I got 5 Kris Dunn graphs, I gave one to a friend:
Kris was nice, seemed a bit shy.
Ricky Ledo:
Vincent Council:
Bryce Cotton:
Coach Ed Cooley:
-I had asked Josh Fortune to sign after the game, and instead of signing the ticket on top of the pile, he signed the photo -_-
What a crazy day. I put way too much time into this, but thankfully in the end it was way worth it. I went over to Uconn after my last class finished at 5 tonight, and waited in back of the venue for a few hours. Even up until 20 minutes before the show, Donald was nowhere to be seen, so I just went in and found a good spot. I was disappointed after waiting hours to no avail, but I sure as heck wasn't going to give up my shot after the show.
I went back to my spot, actually a better spot than earlier on, and a guy who was in charge of the event(uconn employee not Gambino's crew) talked to me.
Guy, "Can I help you?"
Me, "I'm just waiting for an autograph."
Guy, "Oh that's cool, you know it's going to be a while right?"
Me, "Yeah I'm used to this kind of thing."
Guy, "Okay, I mean like 45 minutes long."
Me, "Yeah no problem."
Guy, "Hey bro do you have a marker?"
Me, "Uhhh yeahhh?"
Guy, "Cool. Can I borrow it when I bring him out?"
Me, "Yeah of course."
After this I thought my chances were GREAT. I was the only one. Another guy I graph regularly with showed up which was cool.
Soon after that, a security guy came out, and said we had to stand on the side walk. (About 30-40 feet away from the door, if not more.)
I explained to him that the head guy thought it was okay for me to be there, but he wanted no part of that and had to be a tough guy.
Meanwhile, my buddy and I go over to the sidewalk, and as the show is getting over, more and more people started coming over asking if we were waiting for autographs. 99.999% of these people were drunk and just wanted pictures. They were being super loud, so my heart sank a little.
The Uconn police along with on site security tried to tell us that he came out already, which is never true. When we didn't move, someone came out and said that Donald would not be signing anything at all. Obviously after waiting so long, I wasn't going to leave.
Donald came out, and I called him over twice.
He came over, and the ink started flowing.
He had a realllly crappy black sharpie which was dead. I was the first person to get him so my album came out really bad, but I gave him my blue sharpie and said, "Just keep it for everyone."
He was happy about that and let me dip a good 3-4 times, he shut me down silently though after a while, but I ended up with 6 items which was incredible after my long, long day.
The album, which was with his bad marker:
I then had him do the album artwork sleeve:
Photos:
"I hate this photo haha, I'll sign it over my face."
When I got home, I noticed that he signed my photo package for some reason. I'll cut it into something.
Hey everyone, sorry I haven't had many successes to report lately, but since baseball season has ended opportunities are few and far between.
I thought it would be cool to post this John Smoltz card that I traded for a few months ago. It didn't take all that much to get it, and I think it is very nice. I actually got it from a reader who wanted one of my extra autographs from this summer. One thing I really like about this card, is how it is only numbered to 120.
Stay tuned to the blog as I may have a musical success to report Thursday, and maybe something HUGE over the weekend.
Tonight media legend, Dan Rather was at my university to lecture about the upcoming election. The lecture was pretty decent, and he offered some funny anecdotes. I had known about this event for months, so I had plenty of time to get my hands on a lot of his books for good prices.
I was kind of worried about getting everything done, but Mr. Rather held a signing after the lecture, which made things easy.
Dan was very accommodating, and enjoyed making conversation with everyone.
In total, I got 4 books, 1 magazine, and a picture with him.
When he saw the magazine, he said,"Man, that was a long time ago now."
Wow, this was actually my hardest graph in a VERY long time. I found this ironic because I go to a VERY small public university so I knew hardly anyone would try for him.
I left during his last song, and went to where I had seen his 2 Mercedes Benz vans earlier. I waited on the sidewalk, with maybe a total of 6-7 people. (The other 5 or 6 just wanted photos).
I saw him open the door, and I proceeded to walk up to him, making sure I would be the first one. I was maybe 4 feet away from him and his bodyguard yelled,"Back up!" and pushed me back. Wale did grab my album cover though, and signed it for me. I knew I had to get close to have that chance, so I didn't mind the push.
After he signed for me, he rushed to the vehicle and left.
After a long hiatus due to baseball ending/school starting, I am back with some IP graphing.
Former American Idol contestant, and current country singer Casey James was playing a show at Mohegan Sun last night, and was scheduled to sign his CD afterwards, and I have heard him a ton on the radio lately, so I figured I would go down and meet him. I got there way too early, so I ended up buying a cheap basketball ticket from a scalper and saw my first WNBA game, which happened to be the first game of the 2012 Playoffs.
I left after the 3rd quarter to get a good spot in line, and I was about 3rd or so. I'm glad I got in line then, because A TON of people ended up showing up. Casey kind of took a while to come out, but was very nice when he did. I got a nice picture with him as well.
Baseball legend, and 3x World Series Champion manager Tony LaRussa was in Connecticut yesterday to promote his new book, "One Last Strike". I could not make it to this event because of school, but my friend on the other side of the state who helped me with Kemba, also helped me with this signing.
He said he was one of the first in line, and LaRussa was very nice and signed whatever you had.
I am very, very happy to add this book to my collection, and he even added the inscription.
Once again, this will not be added to my "Total Autographs for 2012".
