CLRyan5's Success Thread

[Riggs]

love the Coby Fleener returns.. Guys going to be a stud!

[clryan5]

Great Ackley stuff... hes a phenomenal signer and I can't believe I havent sent out to him yet... Bri

yeah I sent those back in May so I'm happy to get them back. Always happy to get a return from former Lumberkings!

[clryan5]

The Arizona Diamondbacks' Class A affiliate South Bend Silver Hawks came to Clinton this weekend for a 3 game series against the Lumberkings. On the Silver Hawks is the 2011 7th overall pick Archie Bradley. All the stories I heard of how nice he is and how much stuff he'll sign for you were all true!! He is 1 of, if not the nicest, athlete I've met so far in this hobby. Along with Archie Bradley, JR Bradley, another pitcher is also on the team, as well as pitcher Jake Barrett. The Silver Hawks didn't have any position players that were considered top prospects, but they had 3 good pitchers and that's who I focused on. Archie Bradley did not pitch in the series, and charted pitches the last 2 games so he was more than willing to sign as much as you had for him. Here are my successes:

Archie Bradley: 27/27
Saturday 7/14 (Game 1):17/17
1/1 game-used MWL ball, 1/1 Arizona Diamondbacks hat, 3/3 Bowman prospect cards, 1/1 custom Gypsy Queen, 10/10 8x10s, 1/1 signed ticket, picture with
(This is what I intended to get signed during the 3 games. I was only going to get the hat and ball signed but then I noticed he saw my cards and photos so I said if you have time and don't mind signing I have some cards and photos and he didn't mind at all. I seriously couldn't believe he signed so much at 1 time!! Printer was acting funny again so photos printed a bit off but after thinking I had purchased 4 defective printer ink cartridges in a row I discovered it was a problem with the printer and cleaning the printerhead worked so the rest of my photos and customs for the series turned out great. I used basically a whole cartridge of ink on this series alone! Expensive series!)
Sunday 7/15 (Game 2): 4/4, all 8x10s
Monday 7/16 (Game 3): 5/5
3/3 custom 8x10s, 2/2 Regular 8x10s


JR Bradley: 8/8
Saturday 7/14: 2/2 8x10s, picture with
Sunday 7/15: 3/3 8x10s
Monday 7/16: 1/1 custom 8x10, 2/2 8x10s



Jake Barrett: 4/4
Saturday 7/14: 3/3, picture with
Monday 7/16: 1/1 on custom 8x10s



South Bend Silver Hawks: 1/1 Team Sheet



I also graphed the hometown Lumberkings a bit.

Dillon Hazlett: 5/5, 2/2 8x10s, 3/3 custom Gypsy Queen cards
I gave him several custom cards after he asked for a copy of 1 at a previous game. He loved them. I also gave cards to Dan Paolini, Nathan Melendres, and Mike Dowd upon request.


Dan Paolini: 3/3, 2/2 8x10s, 1/1 custom Gypsy Queen card


Nathan Melendres: 1/1 custom Gypsy Queen card
Mike Dowd: 1/1 custom Gypsy Queen card
Anthony Phillips: 1/1 custom Gypsy Queen card
Jabari Blash: 3/3, 1/1 custom Gypsy Queen card, 2/2 Bowman prospect cards

[clryan5]

My TTM returns have picked up considerably lately. Today was a monster day netting 7 returns (4 were from a postage due notice). Here are my TTM returns

TJ Yates: 2/2 c/o home, pumped to get these back as a diehard Texans fan!


Bryan Augenstein: 2/2 4x6s, pitched in the Midwest League so I wanted to get him


Harrison Smith: 2/2


Matt Harrison: 2/3, 2 8x10s, returned 2012 Topps Opening Day card unsigned


Mitch Moreland: 1/1, I like getting former Lumberkings in the pros


Jameson Taillon: 1/1 GU ROMLB


Heath Shuler: 1/1, completely forgot I even sent to him!


Chris Parmelee: 3/3, photos I took at a Twins game

[lambeauleap87]

Glad to see Yates came through for you! Archie Bradley sounds like an awesome guy...I might send a TTM his way; need to drop one to Taillon too! Did Parmelee sign your last photo twice?

[clryan5]

Glad to see Yates came through for you! Archie Bradley sounds like an awesome guy...I might send a TTM his way; need to drop one to Taillon too! Did Parmelee sign your last photo twice?

Archie Bradley is very cool, he's a must to send to haha and I'm glad I finally got Yates and Taillon. No the Twins scoreboard display has their autographs on it next to their picture so he only signed once haha

[clryan5]

Today brought Amanda Beard 1/1
Really admire how open she has been about her past struggles with depression. I recently bought her book and can't wait to read it!

[clryan5]

Slow TTM lately but here are a couple returns from yesterday and today

Zach Britton: 2/2, custom, Allen & Ginter


Lucas Giolito: 1/1

[clryan5]

So I'm slowly starting to pack for moving to downtown Minneapolis in September. As I was packing my books I remembered I have several signed books so I thought I'd show them off on here

Bought this at Barnes & Noble. A "bargain price" sticker was over the sticker that said "autographed copy" by author Donovan Campbell so it wasn't until I got home that I realized it was autographed. Pretty awesome surprise.

Helen Benedict came to my college to give a speech about women, sexual assault/rape, and the military. I really enjoyed her talk so I decided to buy her book and get it signed afterwards.

Bought this off Amazon and when it arrived it had a sticker on the front saying it was signed by the author. Awesome book as well

Vince Flynn is my all-time favorite author!! If you haven't heard of his Mitch Rapp series read it!! It's an amazing series about a covert CIA operative

Vince is a graduate of my school, the University of St. Thomas, so of course I wore a St Thomas shirt to the signing and he wrote Go Tommies and we talked about our mutual hate for our rival the Johnnies

President Obama signed this for me when he was in Clinton, IA campaigning leading up to the caucuses in 2007 back when he was trying to gain the Democratic nomination

[clryan5]

The Quad Cities River Bandits (Class A affiliate St. Louis Cardinals) came to town Wednesday through today to play the Lumberkings. Here is who I was able to get:

QC, definitely not one of the nicer teams I've graphed. Only a few seemed like it wasn't a nuisance to have to come sign

Custom cards I made signed by QC: Casey Rasmus, Robert Stock, Tyrell Jenkins...Clinton: Nathan Melendres, Daniel Paolini


Tyrell Jenkins, super nice guy!! My oldest sister lives in Davenport where the River Bandits play and she is friends with him. But I was under strict orders not to tell him that since my sister is a little embarrassed hahaha!


Team Sheet


Stephen Piscotty, last 2 I got signed after the 1st game, the 1st pic was signed before game 1 and he was in a hurry so he just signed but after he asked who it was to so he could personalize it. Hope he doesn't personalize everything. They come back in mid-August and I'd like to get him on a Midwest League ball


Casey Rasmus, picture taken by me at a previous game earlier in the season, awesome guy!


Robert Stock, Stock, Rasmus, and Jenkins were the 3 genuine players that didn't act like it was a burden to sign. Piscotty was fine, didn't say much first time I got him but asking to personalize when you're only in A ball kind of rubbed me the wrong way


Custom card signed by Heath Wyatt, Heritage Minors signed by Tyrell Jenkins, and Topps Pro Debut signed by Robert Stock

Clinton:

Top 20 Mariners' prospect P Jordan Shipers inscribed with his no-hitter date 7/11/12, asked him to inscribe it and I had to remind him of the date hahaha he was cool. Always nice to get his autograph and chat with him


Jabari Blash: 16/16 Bowman Chrome, 1/1 Topps Pro Debut, I handed him the stack and told him whatever he had time for and he signed all of them. He was like are these all your cards because sometimes guys at the games will have their kids get cards signed so they sign more. I was like yeah none of my friends or siblings get my autograph hobby so they're all mine and he laughed. then he said he hopes they're worth something someday and I was like yeah RF just opened up in Seattle with the Ichiro trade because he is a RF


John Taylor, Jordan Shipers: cards from the 2012 Lumberkings team set, Tyrell Jenkins Topps Pro Debut, Kevin Rivers Bowman card, he is a recent addition to the Lumberkings after being demoted from High A

Was a bit of a down series in terms of number of autographs but I'm hoping to get more as the Wisconsin TimberRattlers are here 7/28-7/30. Not sure if I'll go tomorrow since it's my birthday but we'll see. Nothing like getting some autographs for a birthday present hahaha