I would rate autographs acquired in person to be higher on my list than Famous Home Run Ball.  An autograph is supposed to authenticate an encounter.  I guess a HR ball is authentic if you actually caught the ball, put it in your pocket, and kept watching the game.

For the record, I have a very small number of autographs and no famous Home Run balls.

Good question, Sara.  While at first blush it seems like those should be completely defensible in terms of their historical significance, there’s probably more Berlin Wall and Moon in circulation than, say, bottles used to apply bug spray on Joba Chamberlain, so they lose in the rarity competition. 

Hmmmm . . . I think I’ll ponder this question while cradling my game-used Gorman Thomas bat and staring at that childhood picture of me on Al Kaline’s lap.

I was at a restaurant in Hollywood a few years ago, and Kevin Smith was seated across from me, having dinner with his daughter (I think?). 

Back in those days, a lot of people would mistake me for Kevin Smith, and I thought it amusing that here we were, sitting right across from each other.  I still failed to see the resemblance.

Then, two teenage girls came up to me and asked me to sign pictures… of Kevin Smith.  Which I did, because I’d rather they didn’t disturb him while he was spending time with his daughter.  I wrote my own name, though, and in parentheses I wrote “Not Kevin Smith At All, As It Turns Out.”

Craig, a missed golden opportunity for your second trough urinal reference this month.

During one Mets game last week (before last Friday) the announcers pointed out a ball boy giving the umpire special balls when Sheffield got up. They explained that the balls had a hologram on them to authenticate them if Sheff hit one out (for his 500th). This helps explain that, I guess. What a strange world this is.

Were I in charge, at the moment Sheffield’s ball was heading for the seats I would drop another 100 balls around the area and watch everyone scramble.

Each milestone ball has a unique serial number. MLB doesn’t need to track down the fouls, just the home run ball, and verify its serial.

The big deal ten years ago was the massive flood of fake AUTOGRAPHS in the memorabilia market. There was an FBI investigation, I cannot recall the codename, that spilled a lot of beans. So when the leagues and cardmakers and memorabilia dealers worked toward cleaning up (and tightening up) the ‘graph market, they decided to expand the mandate to everything. Thus, authenticated insecticide cans, which, yes, has to be a new low.

Moon rock in circulation? None. NASA lets some go around to museums or for research, but it still is all accounted for. Not even Neal, Buzz, and the rest of the moonwalkers got to keep any.