Sunday, July 18, 2021

July 13-18, 2021 Graphing of Delmarva Shorebirds at Down East Wood Ducks

This just-completed series with the Delmarva Shorebirds might have been one where I was limited the most with what I could get signed.  Most of the Delmarva guys I had stuff for either moved up to Aberdeen or they were on the IL.  Plus, I had a lapse in my planning and missed that Dave Anderson had a ton of cards.  That ended up helping, because I was able to spread out looking for Anderson stuff over several of the games, and still got a good bit of stuff signed.

The biggest highlight was that I was finally able to get a Luisangel Acuna signed for myself.  Everything else that I have gotten has been for other people, and this custom that was part of a 50/50 from Instagram afforded me the opportunity to add one to my album.  Yes, Acuna is related to Ronald Acuna, Jr.  He is Ronald's little brother, and has really come on strong with the bat recently.
I got a good many of the customs done, which was nice.  A few were of guys I haven't gotten yet, and I am also happy to add another Cody Freeman to the album.
There's no problem with another Thomas Saggese in the album.  Hudson Haskin was the only Shorebird that I had cards of, other than the below Ryne Ogren Delmarva team card below.  I was bummed that Carter Baumler and Anthony Servideo were on the IL.
I had actually missed this Ogren in my box, but thankfully the 6-game series helped me be able to get everything done.
It also helped me have time to look through a ton of boxes in order to pull every Dave Anderson card I could find.  I'm sure that a few of these sets are very under-represented in my autograph album.
I was able to get Anderson's full run of Topps cards signed.  I wasn't going to go for the 87, since it was already crossed off in my set, but upon further review, I upgraded from black to blue with this one.  So, I now have an Anderson (in black) available for trade.
Anderson was really nice.  You can get him talking, and he is very interactive with fans.  I enjoyed that I was able to talk with him as much as I did.
Finally, my keen eye noticed the little league team in line ahead of me on Thursday.  I was looking at the names on the backs of the shirts, because each kid had a nickname, and noticed that the coach was listed as Mike Devereaux.  I saw the coach and knew he looked familiar, because of all the time I spent studying the 90s Orioles lineups when I was a kid.  So, I walked up to their coach and asked "Mike Devereaux, the former Oriole?"  He said, "Yes, I am!", so I thanked him for all of the years as an Oriole and how I was a big fan of the team.
Devereaux was very awesome and posed for a photo.  He also signed a pocket schedule, since, of course, all of my Devereaux cards were at home.  It was a really good series, even though I didn't get as much signed as I maybe could have.

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