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Post by TheGoodMan19 on Apr 25, 2018 2:14:01 GMT
Mantle was a dick. I knew a collector who met him at a show in San Francisco. He had a 1958 Mantle, graded at an 8. Probably a five figure item. He was wearing a Willie Mays jersey. Mantle noticed the jersey and went off "Another asshole who's going to say that Mays was better than me." The man said he had nothing but respect. Mantle grabbed the card, wrote and spun it back. He didn't sign his name but wrote "Fuck Willie Mays". The card show made it right and he actually got an interesting piece to boot, but there was no cause for that. He was drunk, of course. I've told my story before. When I was 6 years old, several Yankees lived in my home town for a while (Mantle, Maris, Boyer, Pepitone). Mantle had been my idol. One day, my dad and I were alone in Governale's Delicatessen and someone walked in. Dad says "Look, it's Mickey Mantle. Go over and say hi." I was scared. "You'll probably never get another chance." So I walked over and said "Hi, Mickey." It was a crushing experience. He was big and angry - there was fire in his eyes. He paid for his stuff, left, and I cried. The deli owner told me "It's not you, he's like that to everybody." I hated Mantle from that moment, and the adulation he got made me sick. Loved when Bouton outed him in Ball Four. A story I recently read. Joe DiMaggio ate a lot at this Italian restaurant in NYC. And never paid. It was good for business to have DiMaggio as a client. So during the Depression, a man making five figures mooched meals. One day, the owner came to Joe with a slip of paper. A young kid wanted the great mans autograph. DiMaggio replies, “You do know I get paid for my fucking autograph “. He was a wife beater too, his first. I don’t think he dared hit Marilyn. |
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