Signing Day

They hunted as a pack.

Despite being out in the open, the six could only be described as lurking.

They pounced as soon as they caught a glimpse of their prey's distinctive markings.

It was a coordinated attack. One would approach from the front and others would come from the sides. If they missed just one of their unsuspecting targets, another would chase from behind and close in at a full sprint. Their hunger could only be satiated by ... an autograph.

The hunting ground was Downtown Disney and the prey was anybody wearing a cardinal-and-gold track suit with a VIP credential hanging around their neck. The autograph seekers probably couldn't tell the difference between John David Booty and Aubey Layno-Moses, but the important part seemed to be getting as many signatures from USC players as possible.

The whole team was strolling around, dressed the same, and killing time at a special event. It was a field day for some. Little kids asked the players for autographs, too. They may have known every statistic or merely that they were meeting a very large man who was part of their favorite team, but there was no doubting the innocence of the request. It was reminiscent of this article about Harmon Killebrew.

The six? They were a different story.

I approached one during a lull in the action, telling her I was a writer and I was curious about memorabilia. I asked if she was a dealer, but she started to run away.

"No, I'm doing this for somebody in my family," she snapped.

She was holding several items with dozens of signatures. I felt incredulous, but politely tried a follow-up. "That's some cool stuff you've got. Do you know where I can get information about that kind of memorabilia?"

She insisted she had no idea, then hustled over to a couple unsavory characters. Pointing back at me, she clucked, "Don't talk to this guy."

One of them was carrying a large duffel bag and carried two football helmets covered in signatures. Another held a pair of showcase footballs, fully deflated and folded to make them easier to sign. They had been sharing pens with each other.

It wasn't difficult to connect the dots.

I'm not sure why a couple innocuous questions would spook a dealer. It certainly didn't seem illegal, but she had made me curious.

In a surreal exchange, I approached a couple uniformed police officers who were casually discussing terrorist plots. I asked if there was any reason why I couldn't hound players for autographs. They shrugged. "It's public space ... people were doing that last year, too." Their conversation turned quickly to why a wet man was hustling through the street.

Back to square one. I was already convinced these people weren't doing anything wrong. Why were they acting like it?

A couple younger players didn't seem to mind the practice, even mentioning that they were cool with items bearing their signature items winding up on eBay.

That gave me something to laugh about. Dealers ask players for something and sell it on eBay. Writers ask players for something and sell it to a newspaper.

I still didn't have my answer. Casual research online hasn't turned up much, either. While the power players of the memorabilia industry go to great lengths to maintain their reputations, smaller operations have gotten a nasty rap. With this sort of behavior, it doesn't look like that will go away anytime soon.

Comments

[pk-in-the-mesa]

Trojans fight on forever, who cares about BCS it doesn't really show who is # 1 but a least we got the Rose and not EL Paso or LV

[K Helm]

In 2005 I saw a guy with a football helmet try to race Reggie Bush to the lockers with helmet and open pe in hand.

Unfortunately, he apparently didn't understand the meaning of "No".

BTW- Reggie won the footrace and the guy didn't get the autograph.