My Favorite Childhood Player

The lastest of Fuji's blog-inspiring contest questions is Who were your childhood favorites (players)? Do you collect their cards & memorabilia? If so, what's your favorite item (of your favorite childhood player) in your collection?


As I've mentioned on my blog before, my favorite player was Mark McGwire. I can't even really pinpoint why, because I've always been a Cardinals fan. I think it might be because I got to see some A's games when they were in the playoffs in 1988-1990 and 1992. I liked collecting cards from the A's, so I also was a fan of Jose Canseco, Dennis Eckersley, and Tony La Russa. Needless to say, 1996-97 was great for me as the Cardinals hired La Russa, brought in Eckersley, and traded for McGwire in mid-1997.

As for my favorite McGwire-related Memorabilia, #1 is probably the rookie card I wrote about in this Fleamarkets post.

1989 Upper Deck #1 Ken Griffey, Jr.
1985 Topps #401 Mark McGwire

I don't have a picture handy, but one somewhat unique item is the St. Louis Post-Dispatch "Special Edition" that was sold outside the stadium after the game in which he hit #61. The funny thing about that is that early in the season, when he was on a tear, I tried to project in which game he'd hit #62 and got tickets to that game. He wound up hitting #61 to tie the record, so I was close. Anyway, I ran into a friend of mine whose dad works for the paper, and they were selling the commemorative copies for 50 cents. I grabbed either 2 or 4, and they're still stored away somewhere (I hope).

Finally, my most desired memorabilia right now would be an autographed ball. Prices went sky-high while he was playing here at the Cardinals Winter Warm-Up, their annual autographs-for-charity event. Every autographed ball I have was acquired in person, which feels like a bigger deal to me than buying one. Now that he's back coaching with the team, I'm hoping he'll be available at some point so I can add this much-wanted piece to my autographed ball collection, which currently includes Ozzie Smith, Lou Brock, Bob Gibson, Kyle McClellan, and 1 ball with a bunch of guys from 1998.