Last of the TTM Requests...for now

Well, I finally ran out of stamps. With my last 8 stamps, I decided to send out these 4 requests:

1978 Topps Floyd Bannister RC
1974 Topps Ed Bane RC
1973 Topps Walt Patulski RC
1974 Topps Greg Pruitt RC

So, I did the same thing as my previous requests, and I asked each one to answer a set of questions. This batch of requests was sent out more recently in May. I erased my white board in my office, and I didn't write any dates down like I did previously, so this is all from my memory, but I believe I sent all of these requests out on 5/14/2025. Within 5 days I received a response! I noticed that the return stamp was from Cleveland, so I knew it was from Greg Pruitt. The Pruitt card was one of my dad's cards from when he was a teenager. I was pumped to see that Greg answered the questions I asked! Thanks Greg! For the next return, I had to wait a little while. 2 months to be exact. It came from Ed Bane! I remember pulling this card out of a 50-cent box and seeing his awesome glasses and I was sold! So pumped to get this card signed by him. If you would have told me back then that I would have this card autographed I would have laughed at you. Bane also answered the questions I asked him which was super cool! Thanks Ed! As for the Bannister and Patulski, nothing as of yet. I am holding out hope that they come back though. We will see. 

For my job, sometimes I send out paper marketing materials out to companies to put in their break rooms, offices, storefronts, etc. You never know who may need mental health help these days in FL, PA and OH. One day when I was mailing out some of these, I decided to do a separate order, and I bought 6 stamps. I figured I'd try to send out 3 more TTM requests. For these requests, I tried out sending to a hockey player. Here's the card/player I sent to, and this was on 7/18/2025 (these are still up on my whiteboard):

1977 Topps Richard Todd RC
1989 Donruss Rated Rookie Cameron Drew RC
1995/96 Pinnacle Zenith Jason Bonsignore

On the 31st of July, Jason Bonsignore sent me a return! However, he did not answer the questions I sent him which I was really looking forward to reading. Bummer, but I'm happy with the return. Thanks Jason! The next return was a few days later on 8/4/2025 and the envelope looked pretty beat up. I was really worried when I opened the envelope. When I finally dug the card out, it had shifted out of the Card Saver, I sent it in, but it was autographed. This return I am told is a tough one to get. It came from Cameron Drew. Drew did not respond to my questions either though, so I was a bit bummed out by that. However, to get a response from a tough TTM request, is pretty cool. He must have liked my kind words. I did butter him up pretty darn good in my letter. I still have hope that Richard Todd will sign that card I sent him. Please Mr. Todd, sign my card! Ok, anyways, let's get to the meat and potatoes here. The autographs!

Greg Pruitt:

Pruitt's Letter:

Pruitt noted that his favorite game time meal consisted of oatmeal, over-medium eggs and bacon. That sounds good right about now! His favorite teammate was his backup RB Cleo Miller. Pruitt says he hated to play again Tom Jackson. Pretty cool!

Ed Bane:

Those glasses...awesome!

Ed Bane's Letter:

Unfortunately, Ed never answered what his favorite game time meal was or who his first strikeout victim was. Upsetting. 

Jason Bonsignore:

Love the blue sig on the blue pants and socks. Sweetness! Thanks Jason!

Finally...Cameron Drew:

Thanks for reading.

TTM Requests - continued

Like I said in my previous post, I have a bunch of these. After my oldest son's birthday in January, I decided to gather up some more cards to send. This time, I also included a few football cards I had laying around. In this bunch I sent the following cards:

1989 Score Aundray Bruce RC
1994 Topps Finest Dave Staton 
1974 Topps Jerry Tagge RC
1980 Topps Steve Pisarkiewicz RC
1969 Topps High # Ted Sizemore/Bill Sudakis RC
1974 Topps Barry Foote/Tom Lundstedt/Charlie Moore/Sergio Robles RC
1975 Topps Steve Swisher RC

Out of all of these players, the only ones I am still waiting on (or have no hopes for) are Aundray Bruce and Dave Staton. The rest all signed stuff for me. So, this batch of cards were sent out on 1/17/2025. After 10 days, I saw a return in my mailbox. It was from Barry Foote! Mr. Foote also answered the questions I had for him. Thanks Barry! Then, a few days later, I received an envelope back stating that I had the wrong address. When I opened the envelope, I noticed that it was for Ted Sizemore. So, I did a little bit of internet research and realize that Mr. Sizemore had relocated a few years ago. Looks like the autograph book that I was using is a little bit outdated. So, I repacked another envelope and shot Ted Sizemore's request back out on 1/29/2025. On 2/10/2025, my wife came in my office and threw and envelope at me and said, "Looks like this one is yours." It was a little bit thick, so I opened it and noted that not only had Steve Pisarkiewicz signed the card I sent him, but he also wrote me a handwritten letter back! This was by far the coolest return I have received to date! The next return came from Teddy Sizemore. After I had researched his new address, he sent the thing back really fast! Sizemore's return came on 2/12/2025. However, he would not respond to any of the questions I asked him. He only signed the card I sent him...bummer. On Valentines Day, there was a bunch of junk mail, and I was about to throw it out when I felt something a little bit stiff in the mail pile. There was a return! This one was from Steve Swisher. Swisher however, only signed the card I sent. He did not answer any of my questions. It's ok though, I got over it pretty fast. The last return came from Jerry Tagge on 3/24/2025. This Jerry Tagge card was given to me for free in one of the Sportlots packages I received. It was used as filler because it had the letters "VX" written in blue pen on the back. I think I repurposed it well. Mr. Tagge also responded to the questions I asked him. All in all, a good batch of returns. Let's check them out below!

Barry Foote:

Mr. Foote has a pretty awesome signature. I may research the rest of the guys on the card to see if I can get them all to sign it. That sounds like a cool idea. I've seen people do it, but can I do it? That is the question.

Foote's Letter:

I thought it was pretty cool that Foote watched some Canadiens games when he was playing with the Expos. Also, stellar game day meal of Eggplant Parm. I like this guy. Thanks Barry!

Steve Pisarkiewicz:

His penmanship is unmatched to me. I may write to him again, we'll see.

Pisarkiewicz's handwritten note:

Pisarkiewicz played in cold weather in his days in the CFL. He also noted that dark chocolate was his favorite pre-game snack and that he flew to NYC on his draft day. His favorite teammate was WR Pat Tilley during his time with the Cardinals. Pretty neat! Thank you so much Steve!

Ted Sizemore:

Ted Sizemore has a decent signature. I'm happy with how it came out - even if it cost me an extra stamp.

Steve Swisher:

Looks like Swisher's autograph has changed a little bit since 1975, eh?

Finally...

Jerry Tagge:

Tagge's Letter:

So, a little bit about question 5: How many apartment buildings did you sell? Jerry said 6. The reason I asked this particular question is when I researched Tagge, it was noted that when he moved to St. Louis, he sold apartment buildings. This was after he had retired from football in 1979 due to a knee injury. After his career in real estate, he eventually settled down to start his own financial service in Omaha, NE. Pretty cool!

I still have 1 more post because I did buy 2 books of stamps and they needed to be used. I hope you enjoyed checking out my returns!

Thanks for reading!

TTM Requests

I hadn't sent out any through the mail requests in a while, so last August I bought a few books of stamps and went wild. I opened up my binder and grabbed a plethora of cards out that I thought would gain some successes and also typed out some letters (because my handwriting is atrocious). Each player was given a few questions in each letter that were asked by me and my 7-year-old son because he thought it would be cool. Here are the players/cards that I sent out and the date each was sent:

Request Sent: 8/24/2024

1973 Topps Dave Roberts RC
1965 Topps Rick Reichardt/Bill Kelso RC
1972 Topps Chris Chambliss RC

The first return in the bunch was from Rick Reichardt. Rick was nice enough to send his signed card back right away! Sadly, I wasn't able to get the full card signed as Bill Kelso passed away in 2009. Reichardt signed this card, answered my questions and sent it back by 9/3/2024 for a turnaround time of 10 days! Dave Roberts followed a few weeks after that and he signed my card and also answered questions for me. His return arrived on 9/27/2024 for a turnaround time of 34 days! Also, not shabby!

Reichardt's letter

What blew me away with Reichardt's letter was his answer to Question #5, which was: When you were drafted into the NFL, how were you notified? Telephone? I have always wondered about this.

Reichardt replied with: John Unitas called

WOW! Could you even imagine?

Dave Roberts (I bought this card because of the Rookie Cup and also his uni):

Roberts' Letter:

Mr. Roberts says Don Zimmer was his favorite manager to play for and he enjoys a good steak as his favorite pre-game meal!

As for Chris Chambliss, I think it's pretty safe to say I'll never see that card again which is upsetting because it was one of my dad's from when he was a kid. Definitely not cool Chris Chambliss!

After these returns, I did a few more because well, I had the stamps, why not? 

So, on 11/16/2024 I was at it again. I dug into my vintage box once again and dug out a few goodies. Most of these cards I sent were rookie cards I purchased a while back at card shows in 50 cent boxes, so I guess I repurposed them into something cool. Let's check the next batch:

1972 Topps Toby Harrah RC

1971 Topps Dick Mills/Mike Garman RC
1973 Topps John Felske RC
1977 Topps Pete Vuckovich RC (Clu Haywood from the movie Major League)

1972 Topps Buzz Capra/Leroy Stanton/Jon Matlack RC
1983 Fleer Ken Smith RC
1971 Topps Steve Dunning RC

Surprisingly, Vuckovich (former Cy Young Award winner and actor) signed first! The crazy part of sending something to Vuckovich is I know exactly where his house is! He lives on a road on the way to my grandparents' house. When I looked at the address I had to do a double take. I thought, "Holy crap! I know that street!" Pretty wild. Vuckovich signed in 8 days but did not answer the questions in my letter. I received his response on 11/24/2024. The next day, I remember talking to my mailman and he asked if I had sent something to Toby Harrah the baseball player and I said, "Yeah. I asked him for an autograph." He laughed and handed me some envelopes and Toby Harrah actually put his return address on the envelope to me. Stupid me tossed it though. Toby signed the card I sent him and also made me laugh with a response to one of the questions I asked him. Super cool guy that Toby Harrah is! His return came 11/25/2024 with a turnaround time of 9 days. A week had gone by, and I hadn't received another letter then out of the blue came another letter on 12/3/2024. This return was from Mike Garman with a turnaround time of 17 days. However, like Vuckovich, Garman did not answer my questions. I'm guessing they didn't read the letter I wrote which sucks. On New Year's Eve, I checked my mailbox and there was 1 letter in there with familiar handwriting. Yep, that's definitely a return. This one came from Jon Matlack. Matlack did sign my card and also answered the questions I had for him. Matlack's turnaround time was 45 days. A little bit after the new year, I did receive my card back from John Felske with a note from his son stating his father had passed away. I have to admit, I felt pretty awful that I sent him something because I always made sure to check the internet to see if any of the players on the vintage cards had passed and I didn't remember seeing anything about Felske passing. So, I checked the internet again and I saw that Felske had passed away on 11/30/2024, which was 2 weeks after I sent the card to him. RIP Mr. John Felske. As for Ken Smith, dude, remember I'm the guy who wanted to play catch with you in my post: Cards that bothered me as a kid  I thought we were cool, Ken. To Steve Dunning, c'mon man. I've seen he's hard to get to sign, but I tried. I really wrote him a heartfelt letter too. The card I sent him was one of my dad's, so I was a bit upset.

Pete Vuckovich:

Toby Harrah:

Harrah's Letter:

Harrah didn't care for Ted Williams as a manager as his response to my 1st question: What team did you have the most fun playing on? "Didn't care for Washington also because of Ted Williams." YIKES!

I also asked if Jim Leyland was a nice guy and Harrah's response made me laugh: Smoked too much!

Classic.

Mike Garman:

Garman's signature is really nice!

Jon Matlack:

Personally, not a fan of the marker Matlack used her, but what can ya do?

Matlack's letter:

Not super exciting with his responses here, but at least the guy took the time. Thank you, Mr. Matlack!

I have more of these coming...literally a years' worth of them, so be on the lookout for more. As always, thanks for reading.