Weird stuff

[solarbird]

So for various weird reasons I won't go into here, I have a 1978 Sports Illustrated poster of Pete Rose that was autographed in some kind of thick black marker by him. ("Best Wishes - Pete Rose.") There's also a similar-era jacket, but it's probably a few years later. (1982? I honestly don't know. I only know the age of the poster because it's printed in the margins.)

I know at least one or two people who read my livejournal know baseball things, so: any of you know about stuff like this? How much it'd be worth, stuff like that? (I say "how much" rather than "...if anything" because Pete Rose signatures seem to go for $20 on eBay, but most of those are much newer.)

Anyway, I was just kind of wondering. If you know, let me know. ^_^

Comments

Pete Rose

[kirbyk.livejournal.com]

Pete Rose, as you may or may not know, is one of the most infamous figures in modern sports history. He's a bit like Oliver North - he's almost certainly guilty of doing what he's been accused of, it was totally counter to what someone in that uniform ought to have been doing, he's lost his post because of it, and yet a vocal minority absolutely love him.

There's no doubt that he's a gambling addict, and because of this, he's been a fixture on various home shopping networks and sports memorabilia tours, signing things for money. So, the supply is higher than average, unfortunately.

But vintage stuff from before the days where the bottom fell out of his life might be valuable, especially if you can reach the Cincinatti market.

All that said, the Sports Memorabilia market is strange to me, and I don't really know what it's worth. Just that there's bizarre factors on both the supply and demand curves at work for this guy.

[flashfire.livejournal.com]

What Kirbyk said. Probably not too valuable considering his rather sordid recent past and generally large supply of memorabilia available now.

I don't really know how his autograph's changed over the years, if at all. Some people make theirs shorter the more they sign, so it's quicker to do. I'm not sure how you could authenticate when it was signed, but in general that shouldn't matter very much.

[solarbird]

I guess I'll just stick it up on eBay and see what happens. Being nowhere near Cincinnati, it's not like I'd find any Reds fans around here!

Thanks both for the info; I knew he was kind of a flake, I just didn't know how it affected stuff like this. ^_^

[amethyst-dancer.livejournal.com]

During my year and a half working for a collector's magazine, I picked up a little info. (And a lot of phone calls, many of which were asking, "How much is this worth?") My best suggestion is to go to your local bookstore, if it's big enough to have a good selection of collecting publications, and see if you can find your poster in one of them.

General info about autographed items (the magazine had at least one article about those while I was working there): Of course there's supply and demand, and condition, as with anything. Usually, the more personal and unique an autographed item is, the more valuable it is. A personal letter, handwritten and signed, will usually be very valuable. Things like posters -- if the person wrote a personal note on it, it's more valuable than if it just has the autograph. If it's something related to whatever the person is famous for, it's more valuable than something unrelated -- a baseball signed by Pete Rose would be worth more than if you had asked him to autograph your grocery list. (His grocery list, on the other hand, might be worth something signed.) Preprinted "autographs" aren't usually worth anything, so if Pete Rose had signed the poster before it went to print, forget it.

If you want to get all you can from it, wait until he's dead. :-)