Tuesday, July 28, 2020

Back at it again in July!

Good news, better news, and bad-becoming-okay news.

Good news is that I heard from a few more players-- David Byrne, Shane Schwab, and Tony Csiszar and mailed to them along with my sending to Mark Kerlin and Damir Haramina. Still nothing from Brian Enge, B.J. Esposito, Waad Hirmez, Doug Kriska, Dennis Mepham, Paul Peschisolido, Russ Prince, Erik Rasmussen, and Carl Valentine yet.  I also got a list from Ray in Baltimore of a few pages that have some emails for me to try on guys I haven't found on Facebook. I'll be trying those out soon.

Better news: I got Mark Kerlin back the other day, signing both of my cards. So I'm now down to just six left on the 1987-88 set. Still 55 to go on the 1990-91 set though.

Bad news: Byrne just got returned to me today with a yellow RTS-Refused sticker.  I saw on the back though that there was another yellow sticker-- Mail Service Suspended. And sure enough, South Africa has a pretty tough COVID-19 lockdown in place including major limitations on postal service with nothing international coming in or out. 

Okay news: I'm just glad I got my Byrne cards back at least so I can try again later.

Monday, July 20, 2020

By request: an updated Want List

First up, big thanks to Ray in Baltimore for helping me out again with a few unsigned cards that I needed from my previous post.

Over on my YouTube Channel, I had a request from Rob, an avid blog and channel follower and collector of indoor soccer and hockey (and maybe other sports too? I know those two at the least...), asking if I had an updated Want List for this project.  So I may as well just go ahead and post it on up here. I also put in some notes on any recent communications and such, plus any specifics for multi-player cards.

Lastly, I mailed in the latter half of 2019 to Waad Hirmez, Greg Ion, Kia, Dennis Mepham, Omar Gomez, Pasquale Deluca, Jan Goossens, Steve Kinsey, Dali, Dale Ervine, Chris Hundelt, and Chico Borja without success. So, you can figure out the placement of "Tried TTM with no response" on the list below with those guys.

1987-88
36 Dennis Mepham (No response to Facebook message)
38 Pasquale Deluca
48 Poli Garcia
57 Hugo Perez
61 Waad Hirmez (No response to Facebook message)
88 Steve Kinsey

1988-89
2 Stan Stamenkovic (deceased)
8 Slobo Ilijevski (deceased)
12 Erik Rasmussen (No response to Facebook message)
25 Victor Nogueira 
36 Alan Hinton
48 Frank Rasmussen
60 Slobo Ilijevski (deceased)
62 Billy Ronson (deceased)
65 Carl Valentine (No response to Facebook message)
66 David Byrne (Mailed recently after a Facebook message)
68 Desmond Armstrong 
70 Terry Rowe 
75 Erik Rasmussen (No response to Facebook message)
92 Waad Hirmez (No response to Facebook message)
95 B.J. Esposito (No response to Facebook message)
97 Joe Papaleo

1989-90
6 Waad Hirmez (No response to Facebook message)
26 Joe Papaleo 
33 Domenic Mobilio (deceased)
47 Pedro DeBrito (deceased)
66 Greg Ion 
67a Chris Hundelt / Kevin Hundelt ERR
67b Chris Hundelt COR
100 Dennis Mepham (No response to Facebook message)

1990-91
8 Arturo Velazco
9 Damir Haramina (Mailed recently after Facebook message)
18 Mike Reynolds (deceased)
28 Terry Rowe 
29 Gregg Willin
31 Keder
34 Slobo Ilijevski (deceased)
37 Claudio De Oliveira
39 Stan Terlecki (deceased)
47 Dali 
53 Steve Kinsey 
58 Dennis Mepham (No response to Facebook message)
75 Nenad Nikolic (deceased)
78 Ed Anibal
84 Barry Wallace (deceased)
98 Waad Hirmez (No response to Facebook message)
104 Domenic Mobilio (deceased)
111 Pedro DeBrito (deceased)
114 David Byrne (Mailed recently after Facebook message)
147 Pato Margetic 
150 Greg Ion
159 San Diego Sockers Champions (Need signed by all players)
161 Domenic Mobilio (deceased) / Wes Wade (Need signed by both)
166 Majid Jay
173 Tacoma All-Stars (Need signed by all players)
174 San Diego All-Stars (Need signed by all players)
177 Wichita All-Stars (Need signed by all players)
178 St. Louis All-Stars (Have signed by all except the deceased Ilijevski)
189 Domenic Mobilio (deceased)
202 Haaskivi/Quinn (Have signed by Haaskivi; need Quinn)
204 West Goal (Have signed by Ingram; need Kia and Segota)
205 Byrne/Fernandez (Have signed by Fernandez; mailed recently to Byrne) 
207 Wright/Smith (Need both)
213 Joe Papaleo
216 St. Louis Arena (not sure who to have sign it; perhaps a former team owner)
217 Earl Foreman (deceased)

1991-92
2 Waad Hirmez (No response to Facebook message)
20 Greg Ion 
37 Keith Weller (deceased)
40 Omar Gomez
41 David Byrne (Mailed recently after Facebook message)
47 Terry Rowe 
56 Domenic Mobilio (deceased)
68 Chris Simon
69 Chris Haywood
79 Pedro DeBrito (deceased)
83 Dali 
84 Marcelo Carrera
95 Carl Valentine (No response to Facebook message)
98 Paul Peschisolido (No response to Facebook message)
113 Rick Snyder
118 Claudio De Oliveira 
140 Gregg Willin 
153 San Diego All-Stars (Need signed by all players)
154 Baltimore All-Stars (Have signed by all but the deceased Mobilio and Ronson )
155 Kansas City All-Stars (Need signed by all players)
158 Wichita (Have signed by all but the deceased Weller)
160 Earl Foreman (deceased)

1991-92 Bonus Inserts
Claudio De Oliveira

1992-93
1 Eric Dade
4 Doug Neely
16 Chris Szanto
22 Jimmy Daka
27 Alex Tarnoczi
30 Teddy Krafft
34 Russ Prince (No response to Facebook message)
37 Tony Csiszar (Responded to Facebook message; mailing this week)
39 Zoran Karic
60 Tim Schulz
63 Pedro DeBrito (deceased)
75 Saeed Bakhtiari
80 Diego Mandagaran
82 Jason Putthoff
85 Jim Gabarra
87 Joe Kirk
89 Rene Ortiz
93 Terry Brown
94 Daryl Doran
98 Doug Kriska (No response to Facebook message)
99 Dan O'Keefe
102 Chico Borja
103 Brian Enge (No response to Facebook message)
104 Dale Ervine
107 Kris Peat
109 Kim Roentved

1992-93 Gold Inserts
3 Fahmi El-Shami
4 Zoran Karic
6 Joe Mallia
8 Victor Nogueira
9 Kia

Wednesday, July 1, 2020

Cleaning up the AWOLs

It's been a year now since the MISL40 event. Almost nine months since I mailed out multiple requests on the same day. Six months since I got any back. Four months since an IP outing. So I figure it's time to clean up a few that are back to being on the Want List again.

In November, I mailed to Bruce Savage and got him back.

In October, I mailed to Waad Hirmez, Greg Ion, Kia, and Dennis Mepham. Never got ANY of them back, and lost among those are the 1990-91 West Goal card (already signed by Ingram and Segota), the 1990-91 Tacoma All-Stars card (already signed by Preki and Schmetzer), and the 1990-91 San Diego All-Stars card (already signed by Segota). My only hope is that I remember seeing a few successes from Kia take over a year from others. My fingers are crossed, but I'm not holding my breath,

In August, I mailed to Mark Karpun and Tim Wittman, and got both back.

In July, I mailed to Bernie James, Dave Hoggan, Bill Crook, Steve Zungul, Dale Mitchell, and Bobo Lucic successfully. And I got nothing back from Chico Borja, George Fernandez, Chris Hundelt (lost the 1989-90 card with the wrong name signed by Kevin), Mark Kerlin, Dale Ervine (lost the 1990-91 Wichita All-Stars card signed by Borja, Moreland, and Fearon), Steve Kinsey, Dalibor Cvitanovic, Jan Goossens, Damir Haramina, Pasquale Deluca, and Omar Gomez.

In May, I got Heinz Wirtz successfully.

So, 2019 was NOT a good year for this project. While yes, I got ten players back, I got no response from fifteen, and even lost nine autographs in the process. Damn, that hurt. So, I figure it's time to reach out and try to contact players directly before just rolling the dice.  Yesterday, I went through Facebook to see what I can find.

Two responses thus far: Damir Haramina and Mark Kerlin. They're going out into the mail next week.

I also messaged David Byrne, Tony Csiszar, Brian Enge, B.J. Esposito, Waad Hirmez, Doug Kriska, Dennis Mepham, Paul Peschisolido, Russ Prince, Erik Rasmussen, Shane Schwab, and Carl Valentine with no response yet.

I need to find Ed Anibal, Desmond Armstrong, Saeed Bakhtiari, Marcelo Carrera, Eric Dade, Jimmy Daka, Pasquale Deluca, Claudio De Oliveira, Poli Garcia, Omar Gomez, Chris Haywood, Alan Hinton, Kevin Hundelt, Greg Ion, Majid Jay, Keder, Steve Kinsey, Victor Nogueira, Dan O'Keefe, Joe Papaleo, Hugo Perez, Jason Putthoff, Frank Rasmussen, Terry Rowe, Chris Simon, Rick Snyder, Chris Szanto, Alex Tarnoczi, Arturo Velazco, Wes Wade, and Gregg Willin.

And I need to retry Terry Brown, Dali, Daryl Doran, Jim Gabarra, Zoran Karic, Ted Krafft, Diego Mandagaran, Pato Margetic, Doug Neely, Rene Ortiz, Kris Peat, Brian Quinn, Kim Roentved, and Tim Schulz.

Finally, I need a more solid gameplan on finishing off these multi-player cards.

I also need a few unsigned cards again. the 88-89 Waad Hirmez; the 89-90 correct version of Chris Hundelt; the 90-91 George Fernandez ASG MVP; the 91-92 San Diego All-Stars card; and a whole bunch of 1992-93 NPSL cards (Fernandez, Kirk, Borja, Ervine, and most of the gold inserts).