Saturday, August 11, 2012

Michigan Garage Sale 2012: in which I buy some sweet stuff

A few of you might remember that I made the short trip last year down to UM's Indoor Track building to experience the annual craziness of the Michigan Athletic Garage Sale.  Dustin and I got to hang out for a bit there, and I also got to meet Jeff and some of his family in-person, which was cool.  All of us bought some stuff and a good time was had.

This year's version was today, and I came away with some fun stuff again.  As I've already told a few people, I just missed out on picking up some nice wood bats for cheap, and I was only able to dig up one new baseball jersey, but I still had a great time and ended up with all this:

A chest protector and shin guards.  Why?  Why not?  Definitely used, I'm just not sure if they're game-used, but they could prove useful somehow.
A composite, used fungo bat (35 inches/22 ounces).  I love going to the park and hitting fly balls, and this should be a lot of fun to use--I've always wanted a fungo bat, and not just because the name is awesome.
Five t-shirts for $5!  I'll probably be giving most of these away but may keep one or two for myself.
A size 50 gray baseball jersey.  Not sure who #34 was since nobody on a recent roster had that number--maybe a coach?  Anyway, I'd been wanting a gray jersey since I spotted them last year but missed out.  Too bad it's so enormous, but I usually get my jerseys pretty large anyway, so I'll enjoy wearing this one, and it'll be a good replacement for one I'm sending Larry at ECDG since he obviously couldn't make it all the way out here this weekend.  You gotta respect a guy who preaches the Maize and Blue all the way out in the Pacific Northwest!
The surprise of the day was definitely this autographed ball. As I was flipping through the cheap t-shirts, I noticed this ball and picked it up out of curiosity, then noticed the autograph.  I brought it to the checkout with me just in case and found out that it was just $5.  SOLD!  Turns out the signature belongs to sophomore pitcher Jake Engels.  The signature may be a bit smudged and I may not know a lot about the guy, but it's still a pretty cool piece of memorabilia to have, and at that price, too!

Next year I'm looking to get there earlier--not because the lines were bad, they moved--but to make sure I can get my hands on some much-wanted stuff, including the aforementioned wood bats and more baseball jerseys.  As for this year, I again enjoyed the craziness and chaos of an indoor grab-all-the-memorabilia-you-can-carry sale, including multiple grown men carrying closets worth of game-worn jerseys of teenagers, sitting on the floor and sorting through them in hopes of selling them at a mark-up on eBay.  Hmmm, maybe the chest protector, shin guards and bat will come in handy next year after all....

6 comments:

  1. I appreciate you getting me some UM to wear out here. I could be wrong, but that auto on that ball sure looks like it is JJ Putz formerly of the Mariners. I could be wrong but it looks like his. Thanks again!

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    1. No problem. And as cool as that would be, the timing and jersey number the guy signed, along with the signature plausibly reading "Jake Engels" points me to him and not J.J. Maybe I'll get one of Putz eventually, though!

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    1. Haha, figured you'd like that! For as cheap as they were, I just couldn't live without them. Either I'll try using them at some point, or I'll get them signed by a former UM catcher--hopefully Jake Fox. Tools of ignorance FTW!

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  3. Jake Engels here. I was doing some self-googling (I'm a narcissist) and stumbled across this. I'm pretty sure that is my signature. Sorry for not becoming famous. Also, that jersey probably belonged to Matt Husted, who was our catching coach. Thanks for filling up my google results with stuff that is actually about me. The other Jake Engelses will be so jealous.

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    1. Thanks for commenting, Jake--it's very cool to finally learn the origin of that ball and possibly the jersey too. If you were able to google yourself and find something then you're at least internet famous, which is pretty good. And regardless, you're a Michigan Man, which is way more important!

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