a tale of two (ttm) successes, and one failure

derrel thomas was a super-utility guy for the dodgers in the early 80's.  and i mean utility.  he even played catcher.  more than once. as in started games at catcher.  that happened in 1980, early in the season, when joe ferguson was hurt and steve yeager was also banged up and mike scioscia hadn't been brought up from albuquerque yet.  i attended the april 18 game against the astros in which thomas, at catcher, hit his only home run of the season.  so, i have always thought that derrel thomas was a cool dude.  even more so now, after he twice returned my cards signed in black sharpie.

1981 donruss

hey look, it's another 1981 donruss card with a photo from wrigley field. how original.

1981 fleer

looking good billy ray! feeling good lewis!

1981 topps

classic topps/dodger spring training photo

1978 topps

as a giant.  boo.

i recently tried a third time to get a couple more cards signed, including this awesome 1983 topps chris speier card with thomas as a lurker sliding in to second.

unfortunately, thomas has stopped signing ttm (for free, anyway) as my cards were returned (in my sase) unsigned, and i have seen a couple other folks report similar results.  i'm not at all bothered by it - it's certainly his right and i have no expectations when i mail cards out - especially since i already had 4 of his cards signed.

thanks derrel!