The autographs by mail project

[MBZags]

I did something similar to this when I was about 9 or 10, and it ended up failing miserably. I did get a nice response from Griffey's people, though. Best of luck!

[K30]

Thought i'd contribute to this as well as i also send out cards mostly during spring training. heres my list that i did so far this year.

I sent out to:

Brandon Phillips
CC Sabathia
Marino Rivera
Jimmy Rollins
Edison Volquez
Carl Crawford
Evan Longoria
Hanley Ramirez
Alex Rodriguez
Ken Griffey Jr.(very long shot but a personal friend of mine was his grandfathers coach in high school in 1938, i added that in the letter hoping it may help my chances.)

Well i got my first one back Tuesday:



I was very surprised to see it in my mailbox, but very happy with it

[dougdirt]

Originally Posted by guttle11

There was an article about this in ESPN the Magazine a few weeks back. The writer sent something to every team in the four professional sports (star players, coaches and mascots). Got some autographs, but mostly the things sent back where letters, media guides, promotional items, and things like that. The best response came from Joe Mauer, a personally autographed letter. The article then becomes about Mauer and how he sits down with his mother every couple of weeks and actually goes through and responds to every piece of fan mail he gets. Pretty cool article.

I got a return from Mauer a few years ago. I believe I am up to over 100 guys now. My best and favorite is still Greg Maddux. I have also gotten Stan Musial, Mark Teixeira, Carson Palmer and plenty of other big names. Its usually best to send them to guys before they are stars, but every now and again a star will return one for you.

[texasdave]

I have a Manute Bol autograph. I am almost wondering if it was the only autograph he ever signed since he seemed surprised that I asked him. Me? You want my autograph? He is definitely the most memorable person I have ever seen in person. About 7'6" or so and skinny as a rail.

[savafan]

Here's a hint. If you are sending to a superstar player who has been rumored to not sign due to Ebay or fear that you will profit off their signature, ask to have the signature personalized to you (or your son). This sometimes worked in my favor.

[MasonBuzz3]

i used to send out cards to guys when i was younger. the best advice i can give is to hit up top prospects and major leaguers during spring training. Its sort of a risk v. reward with the prospects...ex. I have hit with Josh Hamilton, Beckett, Dunn, Sabathia, etc but I am also stuck with rob purivs, vladimir nunez, jason stumm, etc

[George Anderson]

Do you guys send your letters to the teams address or do you send them to their homes??

Do you just send a note asking for a autograph or do you include more??

When I did this years ago I would write maybe a half a page or so in an attempt to show the player I had a little bit of baseball knowledge. I guess I just kinda thought it was somewhat rude to just ask a guy for an autograph without showing him I was a fan.

[Eric_the_Red]

Originally Posted by George Anderson

Do you guys send your letters to the teams address or do you send them to their homes??

Do you just send a note asking for a autograph or do you include more??

When I did this years ago I would write maybe a half a page or so in an attempt to show the player I had a little bit of baseball knowledge. I guess I just kinda thought it was somewhat rude to just ask a guy for an autograph without showing him I was a fan.

I'm sending the letters to the players name, c/o their team, to the team address.

I also include a short letter personalized to the player to let them know I am not bulk mailing the same letter, but short enough not to take too much of their time.

[Caseyfan21]

I did this a ton when I was younger. I had a lot of success with it too. Off the top of my head I got responses from Mike Piazza (when he was a rookie), Jeff Bagwell, Mark Grace, and Joe Nuxhall. I found I never heard back from most of the big time super stars but a lot of the medium tier players (like Mark Grace's) would almost always respond. I also received a set of Reds cards from the late 1950's and early 1960's from my uncle and I sent all of them out to players who were still living. I got a really cool and interesting response to those. I got almost all of them returned autographed but one player had passed away - Ed Bailey (I had the address book and didn't know) but whoever lived at his house sent back one of the memorial cards from his funeral. And I also included a few questions in my responses and Claude Osteen wrote back a great letter to me about how he thought Pete deserved to be in the HOF and he threw a few jabs at Selig.

Overall, I'd recommend writing retired players, young players, or those medium level veteran players. Those were where I had the most success.

Almost forgot to mention....player with the quickest turnaround by far was Joe Nuxhall. I sent out his letter on a Monday and wrote a really nice letter about how much I enjoyed listening to him on the radio. This was during the season as well. I had a response from him in my mailbox on Friday of the same week. He autographed both the cards I sent plus threw in 2 more cards autographed and threw in one of those Kahn's post card photo's (black and white - had player name and fake autograph on 'em) from his playing days which he signed again over the fake autograph and on the back wrote "Thank you for the nice letter." Really awesome and made me love him till the day he passed away.

[George Anderson]

Originally Posted by Caseyfan21

I did this a ton when I was younger. I had a lot of success with it too. Off the top of my head I got responses from Mike Piazza (when he was a rookie), Jeff Bagwell, Mark Grace, and Joe Nuxhall. I found I never heard back from most of the big time super stars but a lot of the medium tier players (like Mark Grace's) would almost always respond. I also received a set of Reds cards from the late 1950's and early 1960's from my uncle and I sent all of them out to players who were still living. I got a really cool and interesting response to those. I got almost all of them returned autographed but one player had passed away - Ed Bailey (I had the address book and didn't know) but whoever lived at his house sent back one of the memorial cards from his funeral. And I also included a few questions in my responses and Claude Osteen wrote back a great letter to me about how he thought Pete deserved to be in the HOF and he threw a few jabs at Selig.

Overall, I'd recommend writing retired players, young players, or those medium level veteran players. Those were where I had the most success.

Almost forgot to mention....player with the quickest turnaround by far was Joe Nuxhall. I sent out his letter on a Monday and wrote a really nice letter about how much I enjoyed listening to him on the radio. This was during the season as well. I had a response from him in my mailbox on Friday of the same week. He autographed both the cards I sent plus threw in 2 more cards autographed and threw in one of those Kahn's post card photo's (black and white - had player name and fake autograph on 'em) from his playing days which he signed again over the fake autograph and on the back wrote "Thank you for the nice letter." Really awesome and made me love him till the day he passed away.

I do remember Nuxie was very quick about returning mail.

I got a nice hand written letter from Stan Coveleski telling me about pitching in the 1920 WS. Sparky Anderson also took the time to tear off the Jackie Robinson stamps I sent him on my original letter and wrote on them that he thought I would like to have them back. I also remembering getting an autograph back from Ray Morehart who was the last surviving member of the 27' Yankees. I also remember Charlie Gehringer and Ted Williams as two of my more prized autographs.

It really was a fun hobby. Nothing like running home from school to check the mail and seeing if there was a SASE in the mail from a baseball player.

[Eric_the_Red]

In the mail today I received one of my SASE's back, with a Chicago postmark. I opened the envelope to find this:



So, 1 of 25 back. Now I need to work on getting some more cards out.

[Joseph]

Hey,thats real cool ETR.

[Caseyfan21]

Originally Posted by George Anderson

I do remember Nuxie was very quick about returning mail.

I got a nice hand written letter from Stan Coveleski telling me about pitching in the 1920 WS. Sparky Anderson also took the time to tear off the Jackie Robinson stamps I sent him on my original letter and wrote on them that he thought I would like to have them back. I also remembering getting an autograph back from Ray Morehart who was the last surviving member of the 27' Yankees. I also remember Charlie Gehringer and Ted Williams as two of my more prized autographs.

It really was a fun hobby. Nothing like running home from school to check the mail and seeing if there was a SASE in the mail from a baseball player.

That was always really cool. I can still remember the excitement of tearing it open to see who responded. I will definitely encourage my kids to do this assuming I have kids and they like baseball.

[WMR]

Wow, I might have to send one to Beckham. One of my favorite young players.

[Eric_the_Red]

2 of the 25 cards have now been returned: