Quote:
Originally Posted by sylbry
The story as told to me is that around 1988 Gary found religion, changed his hard attitude/partying ways, and changed his signature as well. If you ask him to sign with his old signature he will. Or at least he did a few years back.
Like Schmidt, Kirby Puckett's signature became better looking with time as well.
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What got me to thinking about this was the 1981 Negro Leagues reunion ball in the current Huggins & Scott auction. Willie Mays actually signed his name upside-down, and mostly on top of another signature. Really ridiculous. I compared the Mays signature to his older ones from the '60s, and to his current ones. Mays went from signing readably to signing barely-recognizably, to signing incredibly mediocre.
I always have my eyes open for team-signed balls from pre-1970 teams that I was interested in, and every now and then I'll see one where players from a '60s team, signed a ball more recently. Boy is there a world of difference. I wouldn't own a ball where I couldn't read the majority of the signatures.