Recently two San Francisco-area men went to court to determine who has rightful ownership of a baseball that was hit out of the park when Barry Bonds hit his 73rd home run last year. One man claims that he caught the ball after which a strugle took place, at which point the second man in the case claimed the ball (and had a press conference afterwards). The ball might be worth a lot, but both men probably will have lighter pockets after this case is over. Why? One of the greatest abominations ever — lawyers. After lawyer fees, who knows how much will be left over for either man.
This is just one example of how the memorabilia business has gone nuts. Of course, many of us have bad memories of trading away a good (insert your favourite sport/cartoon) card for a bunch of junk cards. A piece of used chewing gum can now be sold for hundreds of dollars. Of course, it depends on who chewed it (I doubt any of you are willing to pay anything for a piece of gum that I chewed. Besides, I don't chew gum).
Many athletes used to spend hours signing autographs for fans and those people actually treasure them. These days, the first thing on many fans minds after receiving an autograph is "Hmm, how much will this be worth?". Of course, there aren't many of us whose signature is worth more than the paper it is written on.
Ordinary people aren't the only ones who have caught this bug, either. Even gazillion-dollar athletes can fall prey to this epidemic. Earlier this year, a baseball player stole a teammate's glove to sell it over the internet. He was caught and was bought out for $25000. He would have made $1 million had he made the team. Gosh, even Homer Simpson isn't that stupid.
This makes me realize that I should start checking under my desk/bed to see if there is anything collectable there (not that I'm much of a collector). After turning over a few tables, I found the following:
I'm sure there is more hidden stuff there. I just didn't dare to venture further. If someone actually considers any of the above to be worth more than $10, then we need to call the CDC (the U.S. Centre for Disease Control) fast, because we could have a full-blown epidemic.
Jason "the Screamer" Lau