Player Appearance / Signing Recap : Chan Ho Park @ Frank and Sons On January 17th, 2015

As a lot of you remember back in the 90's the Dodgers had an international pitching staff. A Japanese here, A Mexican there and then you had the winning est Korean pitcher to ever player in the MLB, Chan Ho Park. It being the 90's I was not collecting autographs just yet so I never was in search of his. A couple of years ago I finally did acquire Mr. Park's autograph for my collection in ball form. As with all the rest his got sold last year so he was on my list to reacquire but he doesn't do many in public appearances. He did show up at Dodger Stadium last year but I couldn't attend the game so he remained on my to reacquire list. Thankfully he finally came back to town for a public signing and I made sure that I would be able to attend.

Chan Ho was scheduled to appear at Frank and Sons yesterday and I arrived right at 10 when he was supposed to start signing. Hopped in line which put me as number 20 ish as I pre purchased my ticket so I wasn't in the general group but the VIP. Chan Ho showed up about 20 minutes late so I killed time by talking to familiar faces in line. Once he arrived though the line moved quickly. I had two items to get signed though only one was for me. My friend Austin is in Hawaii on a nice family trip (lucky guy) so I was getting a card signed for him. Though not for me here is the card :

Nice blue sharpie auto. I think it came out pretty good. For my item I went with an 8x10 and thankfully I went with this one and not the one I originally was planning. I wanted to have him sign a photo of him kicking Angel pitcher Tim Belcher in their infamous fight back in 1999. It was announced right before he started signing he would not sign anything depicting that incident. So thankfully I had this one for him to sign.

The wife pointed out that Mr. Park seems to want the focus on his crotch area. I didn't notice it till she mentioned. Good eye Mrs. Javier.

I had heard about Chan Ho not being the friendliest person and he did not disappoint. When I approached the table where he was signing I said hello and asked him to sign on the green area of the photo (which he did not). During the whole time of him signing the two items he never looked up and when he was done I said thank you but received no acknowledgement back. As long time readers know that is a major pet peeve of mine especially when it is a paid signing. A little "you're welcome" and courtesy smile would go a long way with fans. None the less, thank you to Chan Ho for showing up and signing.