Featured autograph: Garret Anderson

I really haven't blogged about anything autograph related, though I see myself as more of an autograph hound - rather than merely just a baseball card collector.

One of my ideas was to do a dayf style blog about autographs - however, I feel like I wanted to focus on baseball cards more because I can talk about them freely. With autographs, you have questions coming up about authenticity and where you got the item, particularly if isn't a pack pulled autograph. Maybe for 2009, one of my goals is to showcase more of my autographs I've picked up through the mail and in-person [or at least talk about them more in general].

This autograph of the former Halos batting star - was acquired by mailing Anderson an 2008 spring training autograph request through the mail.

I watched an in-depth interview show by Fox Sports West [In Their Own Words], featuring GA - on the show [Nomar Garciaparra, Luis Gonzalez, Jeff Kent, Juan Pierre of the Los Angeles Dodgers, Gary Matthews Jr. and Scot Shields of the Angels are other baseball subjects I remember], home town stars are interviewed by host Bill MacDonald to talk about their lives in a candid one-on-one way.

They reveal their personalities and talk about their careers [besides the usual locker-room speak cliches] - for Angels fans, 'GA' has come across as aloof and not someone you can snag an autograph from in-person [he's virtually automatic TTM however].

In the show, Anderson came across as a pretty humble, low-key guy without the ego of a 'me-first' athlete - or a guy whose been affected by much of the criticism he's endured for being lazy, not showing the right hustle, et al.

Here is a Cliff Notes version of what he spoke about:
1.) By his definition, he is gamer - citing guys who've tried to beg out the lineup one way or the other. For all the critics, GA said to check out his numbers - they speak for themselves.
2.) He can't change the way he plays the game - his body language isn't going to allow him to be like Darin Erstad. He isn't going to show much emotion, because he is going to disrespect the other team.
3.) At one point when he was younger, he didn't know how to play 162 games a year - his body language did show it. At times he said a veteran [Tony Phillips] would get on him for it.
4.) If you are in the media and expecting a sound byte - you've gotta get to know him or else you probably won't be getting it. He said the 'Page Two' guy [T.J. Simers of the Los Angeles Times] is one guy who gets it since Simers might talk to GA for 30 minutes without even having a purpose.
5.) On the 1995 Anaheim Angels, which collapsed after an 11-game lead - GA said it just wasn't a good enough team and he implied these days there is so much pitching depth available, compared to the 1995 team, where you had guys [filling in] and making [too many] spot starts [to be a serious contender], when the they faced teams like the New York Yankees and Baltimore Orioles.

Hopefully GA can continue his career - to build upon an opportunity to reach or get close to 3,000 hits before he decides to hang them up for good.