A TTM That Time Forgot (Almost)
January 7th, 2011 by slangon

The last couple of days, pretty much since the calendar changed over to 2011 in fact, I’ve been thinking more and more about TTM autograph requests. I sent my first request sometime in September of 2009, and kind of went on a bit of a tear with it for a few months. Coincidentally (or maybe not) right around the start of the baseball season, the number of self addressed stamped envelopes leaving my hand decreased dramatically. As a matter of fact, between September of ’09 and March of ’10, I sent out 82 TTM requests. Between March of ’10 and now, I sent out 8. See, I told you it was quite a drop off.

Anyway, what got me thinking about them again was due in large part to an envelope that I found in my mail box on New Years Eve. One of the things I love the most about these TTM requests is that little bit of a rush that you get when you pull an envelope out of the mail box that’s addressed to you in your own handwriting. You know what it is, but you don’t know who it’s from or whether it’s a success or not. When I pulled this out last Friday, I really had no idea since it had been such a long time since I sent one out. Believe me when I say, I was quite pleasantly surprised at who it turned out to be.

It was none other than Mr. Cub himself, Ernie Banks.

Now, when I send out these cards to be signed, there’s always a handful that I never really expect to get back at all, never mind successfully signed. I might stumble across some players address and see that you either have to send a million dollar fee, or that they’re not very good about signing. If it’s someone I would really like to get, I’ll send one out on the off chance of success, but at the same time kind of writing it off as a lost cause and not expecting anything to come of it. I always figure the worst that will happen is I’ll be out 2 stamps. Ernie Banks was definitely in this category. To his credit, and my good fortune, he did sign it and send it back.

3 Responses to “A TTM That Time Forgot (Almost)”

  1. Great looking card and sig. Nice job.

  2. That is a sweet custom and a HUGE success!!! Great job!

  3. That sure was a pleasant surprise!! Thanks again!

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