Your Local teams

[eric16841]

I was wondering how many people out there collect items from there local teams wether it be minor league or independent leagues. I live near a single A team in NY and work near a independent league in NJ and love to try to collect there items.

[godwulf]

Is the indy team in NJ the Camden Riversharks, by any chance?

I honestly do envy folks who live in a town that has a minor league ball club. From what I've seen, the opportunities for getting to know the players, and for obtaining game used items, are tremendous, compared with what we Major League city people are faced with. When I went to see the Mobile BayBears, a couple of years ago, my son and I got into the game free with our military IDs - that's something you won't encounter at any Major League ballpark.

[lcstate collector]

I live in Las Vegas and collect the occasional 51s game used item. I also make the trip to Friar Fest in San Diego to get Padres stuff each year.

[Insomniac186]

I collect San Jose Giants items since they are my local team. They have "shirt off the players back" and game used bats at the team store are very affordable.

[MarinersFan34]

Living in the greater Seattle area we have the short A Everett Aquasox and AAA Tacoma Rainiers, both affiliated with the Mariners. I have a few items from both teams but as some others know, getting items for a "reasonable" price is sometimes quite difficult. Most times you can only buy items via silent auction and I've seen some stupid prices for minor league jerseys of players who at best will have a cup of coffee in the bigs.

Same story for our 2 WHL teams, Seattle and Everett, though I think prices for those go much higher but I think that's a product of the sport as common hockey jerseys tend to sell for more than a common baseball jersey.

I like the look of minor league jerseys more since the team logos are often more colorful and entertaining than pro level. There's still a number of jerseys I'd like to add that aren't Seattle affiliated just because the logo or team crest is cool.

[eric16841]

My two teams are the TriCity Valleycats single A astros Team which i have watched and collected many young players including ben zobrist and hunter pence among many others. and the other is the Somerset Patriots which i started going to this year and hoping to get a few of there items soon. I love collecting these guys they are very good with the fan and friendly and you never know if they might make it big, and even if they dont its still a great local collectable.

[eisenreich8]

I love this thread. I lived not far from the Durham Bulls for the past 6 years but never snagged a jersey, albeit I didn't try too hard. I have around 100 MiLB jerseys which I prefer over MLB in most cases and now that I have 2 teen sons who love the ballpark, we will be attending many Richmond Flying Squirrels (AA Giants) next season.

About 50/50 my jerseys are split between all levels of (R%& S?@) at all levels, the rest are Aquasox, Barge Bandits, Wranglers, Hawks, Sea Wolves, Thunder, etc.

I think some of our members should form a club so we can do some trading now or next season.

I had a link bookmarked on my old computer with all ther MiLB websites. It is fun to cruise the sites for GU jerseys, although some are obscenely priced.

[cjw]

I live in Las Vegas and collect the occasional 51s game used item. I also make the trip to Friar Fest in San Diego to get Padres stuff each year.

If you have any items that you would like to move, I would be interested in seeing a list.

I live in Vancouver, BC and the local A short season team, the Canadians, have been active as single A since 2000 and were a AAA team from 1988-1999. Missed the AAA years but enjoy the old park and the games. This past season, the "C's" signed on as a farm club of my favorite MLB team, the Blue Jays and won the North West league championship for the first time - soma pretty exciting season! Picked up a jersey from "off their backs night" and got a players bay signed by most of the team.

[Klattsy]

I live in Las Vegas and collect the occasional 51s game used item. I also make the trip to Friar Fest in San Diego to get Padres stuff each year.

Keep me in mind next year at Friar Fest, i'm chasing a Josh Spence jersey!

I'm kind of lucky here, we have an Australian Baseball League which restarted last year, they have their own jersey's but aren't available, as far as I can tell. But the players that play in this league, a fair few of them play in the Minors, so I can collect their MiLB jersey/equipment and then get it signed without any problems during the ABL season.

I managed to score a team bat from my local team, the Brisbane Bandits, and I have some good contacts with them and have been dropping a lot of hints that I would be keen on some items...will see this year!

My local ABL team was charging $300 (!!!) for a RETAIL version of their jersey last season, i'd hate to think what they would want if they sold off Game Used jersey's...I think because the league is new, they don't have the best supplier relationships in place and hence items would cost them a lot to buy which they would pass on to the public, similar to what happens with the Independent Leagues in the states.

Mark.

[ncbadges]

My son and I attend most of the Carolina Mudcats' games (Cinn Reds' AA team) and he always makes friends with the guys. They are always chatting with him and giving him their used equipment! This is just a very small sample of this season's goods.
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David Cook HR bat
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e50/ncbadges/cookSIGN.jpg
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Felix Perez bat and gloves
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e50/ncbadges/PerezLeaton.jpg
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Another one of Perez's bats and a Neftali Soto bat
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e50/ncbadges/soto-perez.jpg
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Jake Kahaulelio's bat
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e50/ncbadges/kal2.jpg
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e50/ncbadges/kal1.jpg
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Quentin Berry bat
http://i36.photobucket.com/albums/e50/ncbadges/berry.jpg
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He also got a couple balls signed by Aroldis Chapman while he was here. Last year, he got bats from Dave Sappelt, Yonder Alonso, and Devin Mesoraco...just to name a few. I've been very surprised at how nice all the players are to him. They really seem to enjoy talking baseball with him!

ncb