A few days ago I heard back from Mr. Donald Zimmer, aka "Popeye," aka "The Gerbil." I heard his wife has been known to ghost sign for him, which I think is kind of sweetly intriguing. I have seen some hard words directed towards players who charge or don't sign ttm, but that's the prerogative of the player. If Zimm's wife will occasionally sign some of his mail, given that they are both in their 70's I'd imagine, I picture them doing that over coffee in the south Florida morning, sharing the work.
This is a card Daddy D was gracious enough to gift to me. I'm glad to be able to gift it back to him in the near future!
Before I sent that out, I went digging for Zimm cards I have from when I was a young warthog. Zimm's stint in Chi town roughly coincided with when my family first got cable, so I'll always think of him as the Cubs' manager.
Zimm was a great manager, and I love the fact that he always seems to be smiling, at least across these two cards. I pulled these two cards out today because they cheer me up. He was almost killed by a pitch when he was a minor leaguer, but he still made the bigs, had a successful career, and went on to be a great manager.
Thanks Mr. Zimmer!
I have that same '59 Topps card that I have been wanting to get signed. I'll see the Rays one more time this year and hopefully I will succeed. I was planning on sending it to him if I failed, but I'm not too big on getting an autograph from his wife.
ReplyDeleteThose are some really great cards! I love the fact that the auto on the '59 looks just like the one printed on the card. I agree with you about being cheered up by Zim. For some reason he just looks like the kind of guy you would want to be sitting in the dug out with spittin seeds.......
ReplyDeleteThat '59 is beautiful!!! You got it right on time too. Zimmer is having surgery tomorrow and will not be with the team until next year. I sent him a letter recently, but I don't own any cards of him. I remember him as a manager, I hope to own a card of him in a rays uni someday, I think its awesome that he changes his jersey number every year. He is a cool cat, er gerbil...
ReplyDeletegot any auto don cards you would like to trade??
ReplyDeletewicked, sorry man. The '59 Topps is for Daddy D and I'm keeping the '89.
ReplyDelete