As soon as we arrived at Dodger Stadium we met up with our friends Franz and Josh who are both regulars at Dodger Stadium. They were both at the Adrian Gonzalez signing at T-Mobile on Saturday and they still came out today to get some additional items signed by Adrian. That's what I call hardcore graphing and I admire their patience and overall will to get autographs. It was nice to chat it up with the guys before the stadium gates opened under 100 degrees heat. Boy was it hot today and the last thing I wanted to do on a nice Sunday was to stand out in the sun all day. However I still had my jerseys to get signed which is what made me go through with this today.
As soon as the gates opened we rushed into Lot 6 at Dodger Stadium where Viva Los Dodgers was taking place.
There was already a huge crowd waiting in line to get inside as bags were being checked. As soon as the event started Adrian began to sign. I'd estimate that I was about 20th in line. Franz ended up getting a black ROMLB signed.
Josh aka Dodgerbobble ended up getting a jersey signed as well.
As for me I was finally able to get one out of my two Adrian Gonzalez jerseys signed today.
I hopped back in line hoping that I could also get my Adrian Gonzalez Padres jersey signed as well. However Adrian signed for about another five minutes and left since the game was about to start. The signing literally took about 10 minutes. I wouldn't even consider this a signing due to the short duration. I'd consider this to be an appearance. In total i'd guess he signed about 30-40 autographs today max. A lot of folks left empty handed. I wish he would have signed longer. I felt extremely lucky to even get his autograph today. I hope next time they invite him as a guest for Viva Los Dodgers he signs more than 10 minutes.
Luckily the graphing family all got their items done today and nobody that I knew personally left home empty handed.
Afterwards Benson and I decided to go inside the stadium to see if we could catch anyone signing inside. Sunday is a terrible day to graph at the stadium since there is no BP but it was still worth a shot since we were already at the stadium today.
As soon as I entered Chris Capuano signed a photo for me near the bullpen. He was particularly fond of the picture since it was a rare photo of him batting. I told him it was a photo of his homerun swing.
Then we went over to the Phillies side to see if we could get some of the pitchers to sign for us. The Phillies are a notoriously bad signing team as noted when I tried graphing them in Florida last month. Today was no different as none of the Phillies would sign for us.
On a side note by buddy Josh got beaned by a pitch by Jonathan Papelbon during warmups. The ball flew right between me and Benson and hit Josh in the shoulder. The baseball bounced towards me and I picked it up. After realizing it hit Josh I ended up giving him the baseball. What makes this situation worse is that Jonathan never even apologized to Josh for hitting him. He ignored the entire situation and didn't even come by to check how Josh was doing. The ball hit Josh pretty hard. What a way to stay classy Jonathan. What made matters worse was that when Josh reported it to guest relations they were being sarcastic asking him if we needed to call the ambulance. How classy is that? The entire incident left a bad taste in our mouths in what was an otherwise great day of graphing at the stadium.
Afterwards I headed up to the Robert Woods signing in Lomita.
Nice job getting your AGon jersey signed! Sucks Josh got beaned! Even worse is that nobody seemed to care.
ReplyDeleteMartin
Thanks Martin. I was a bit upset how nobody did anything about it too. Papelbon should have at least apologized and said something or offer him an autograph to make it better. I've seen countless players do this when things like this happens. What really upset me was the way the Dodgers handled the situation.
DeleteI know from experience, guest relations themselves don't give a damn. At any stadium. Congrats on Gonzo. Wish I could've made it to one of them.
ReplyDeleteThanks Kyle. I just felt bad for Josh since he was the one who got hit by the ball. If I moved an inch closer the ball would have hit me in the head.
DeleteIt was nice hanging out with you Benson and Franz. Glad we got our autos with such a short signing session.
ReplyDeleteThe whole Papelbon incident sucked, but I wouldn't expect anything less at Dodger Stadium or from the organization.
I agree Josh. It was nice hanging out with u, Franz, and Benson again. It's always a good thing when the graphing family all get their items signed.
DeleteThe Dodgers need to step it up when treating their fans. Imagine if the ball hit an infant who ended up seriously injured. What really annoyed me was that nobody came over to apologize.
A few years ago, I got hit on the shoulder by Johan Santana when he was on the Twins at the time. I was holding my then 2 year old son whil trying to take pic. Johan came over, checked if I was cool, gave me the baseball and signed it. Then stayed ans signed a bunch more for others. Some are classy and some are Papelbon (hate him more after his comments about Puig).
ReplyDeleteThat's how players should be but I guess Papelbon goes the opposite route and doesn't care for the well being of other human beings. After his comments about Puig I lost respect for him even more. At least apologize or check if the guy you beaned is ok. I've seen players of higher caliber own up to their mistakes and apologize to fans that were accidentally hit by their pitches including Felix Hernandez who also signed autographs for fans after he accidentally hit a fan with a baseball. It's cool how Johan hooked you up like that after accidentally hitting you with a baseball. That's they way it should be but some players like Papelbon still have some learning to do.
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