I suppose a player can charge what the market will bear for his signature and some of the harder to find guys like Hall, Mike Marshall, Jim Ray Hart, Willie Tasby, Bobby Darwin, Rich Coggins and a few others who have shown up on Potter's list are probably more of a welcome site to collectors who badly want to add them to their collections and have not had any luck on their own.
What bothers me, and again it's a free market here, so I can opt out just as easy as the next guy, is that self-created scarcity that thrusts the cost of these players well beyond what should reasonably be the prices, especially considering their careers and contributions to the game. I collect Mariner and Dodger autographs and am trying to get ALL signatures from former Dodgers and more specific to the Mariners, only cards issued between 1977-1987 signed. I can rattle off a number of toughies, most of which had a cup of coffee at best. For example, I have seen exactly (1) Bob Giallombardo autograph on ebay since I started looking. I understand he charges $25 (according to a website I came across during a search) and although I would have scoffed at that price as recent as a year ago, I now realize that if I want to add him, I probably have to pay it. Maybe the price has lead to almost nonexistent supply, or maybe he just doesn't sign much to begin with. I would like to get his 59 Topps card and maybe his Target card if I was feeling especially rich that day. I don't want to pay $25. I really don't think his career warrants a $25 fee, but I would probably bid $40 if one popped up on ebay!
I'd like to see the common, everyday guys get some money for their fame, especially those playing before the mega contracts or those who didn't play long enough to get rich (However, I don't feel sorry for those that put all their eggs into their sporting ability basket and didn't plan ahead with school, job training, etc or were foolish with the money they did have, snorted it up their noses, etc). Free autographs are cool, but I am willing to pay a few bucks for even the most obscure players and I am glad to send that money straight into a former players pocket and not someone who happened to convince them to sign and now gets a cut. I would just prefer to keep them at a few bucks. If you think about it, $3-5 for a player to sign his name. That is pretty good money. Even the slowest of slow could manage 1 signature per minute and that is $180-300/Hr! The reasonable fee would hopefully draw more customers and/or repeat customer. Heck, for $3, I might try to get every card signed I could find of an obscure player, just because it was affordable and I try to do that anyway.
Now back to the topic of Chris Potter, since he has not presented a combination of right player and decent price, I have never considered buying from him yet. He has added a few real toughies, but their prices are still too high for my taste. He came as close as possible to wrangling me in as a customer with his most recent signing with Jimmie Hall. I just couldn't talk myself into the $35 fee though, as i already have the card signed i wanted. Still too high! Willie Tasby was also tempting at $20 and I would have jumped to get his 60T trophy card signed for my collection, but I already landed one. $20 is too much for me to add his 61T, but I like a bargain too.
He got Mike Marshall to sign more items, which is awesome, but at $185 a signature, SCREW THAT! Better than the $200-250 we saw before, but still ridiculous! If he could locate and land the Noe Numoz, Bob Giallombardo, Sergio Robles, Bob O'Brien, Ricky Wright, Reggie Walton or Kevin Pasley kind of guys and keep the costs down, then he would be my hero.
