I have a category of favorite player that doesn’t really get talked about very much. Every Sox fan likes Frank Thomas, Jose Abreu, etc. I’m sure players like Juan Uribe and Ray Durham that had substantial careers have plenty of fans. But there are a few players that didn’t have very successful careers that I am very fond of. Some of these guys may not have gotten the opportunity they deserve. Or maybe they just weren’t any good. But for whatever reason, I consider myself a big fan. I’m talking about guys like Jordan Danks, Joe Borchard, Norberto Martin, and yes, Brian Anderson.
I’ve been a Brian Anderson fan ever since he first got called up. It drove me nuts that DeWayne Wise was getting playing time at BA’s expense. I really felt he just needed to be left alone and his bat would come around. The defense was always there, as evidenced by his catch to end the “Blackout” tiebreaker game in 2008.
I met Brian on numerous occasions. The first time I met him was at Soxfest in January 2009. He showed up looking like a movie star. He was so well dressed, and let’s just say my wife was swooning. We met him again at Picnic in the Park, also in 2009 I believe. My wife and I told him he reminded us of Michael Buble. The player sitting next to him (for the life of me I can’t remember who it was) turned to BA and said “Who is that?”.
BA answered “You know…” and started singing the Buble song “Feeling Good”, which is a really great song. And BA did the song justice! It was a fun moment that really cemented him as a favorite of mine.
So when I saw that Dana Dominion was doing a mail signing with him, I had to get some of my favorite BA cards signed. And much to my surprise, I had somehow neglected to get his 2007 Upper Deck card signed previously. So I knocked that out as well.
I have to say, I am absolutely thrilled with how these turned out. Every card is signed perfectly in bold blue sharpie. It seems like most of the recent signings have had something wrong. Some of these things were very minor, some were worse. But I have zero complaints about these!
