For the moment, ShopGoodwill.com remains one of the web’s hidden gems. It’s sort of like what eBay was like twenty years ago, in that it’s still basically just old stuff, none of the auto-generated T-Shirts and automatic cross-posts from Fanatics stores that plague eBay nowadays, but there’s also very little quality control and less of a sense that something needs to be sellable in order to be listed. It’s not quite the experience of walking through a Goodwill store (even though I must say I’ve only ever had fairly mediocre Goodwills everywhere I’ve lived), and you don’t get everything, but there’s a wider variety of stuff you wouldn’t look for on eBay here and more of it can get put right in your face if you want.
What do most people naturally go to a thrift store for? Used toasters? Novelty coffee mugs? VHS Tapes? Old jackets that curse you with the memories of those who owned them? Yes, and those are there in wide swathes. Do not discount the odd piece of sports memorabilia that might end up in a ShopGoodwill listing.
These have a few things in common: they’re typically devoid of any sort of certificates of authenticity, they’re often of dubious quality with regard to wear-and-tear, and they’re all the type of memorabilia that tends to get given away. I once worked at a sports memorabilia store where we made a $1000 sale on a football jersey signed by the late Derrick Thomas. Those sorts of things do not end up on ShopGoodwill online. What follows is a sampling of the types of sports memorabilia that do –
1997 Bobby Hoying Autographed Mounted Newspaper Wall Art
Bobby Hoying’s 2nd highest honor earned as a professional football player was placing #8 on the NFL Network’s list of the Top 10 Quarterback Teases. The highest honor that he earned as a professional football player was that I remembered he was on that list of the Top 10 Quarterback Teases. Bobby Hoying had one good game in his career, a 1997 game against the Cincinnati Bengals wherein he passed for 300+ yards and four touchdowns to win the game. This is the game referenced on the signed newspaper printout on this listing. So I guess it’s fortunate that they chose to print this copy of the Philadelphia Inquirer sports page on the plaque and no copies from any of the future games he played in, most of which were losses.
It’s a curious thing, though, the piece of memorabilia from an otherwise not all that inspiring player. I wonder about those. What happens to the signed Brodie Croyle footballs? The signed 8×10 glossy photographs of Ken Dorsey? The mini-helmets autographed by Blair Thomas? I don’t know. But I know that I want them.
For what it is worth I do own a framed signed photograph of Freddy Adu. Allow that knowledge to affect your interpretation of my work here in whatever way you must
9.5 Grade Mint Colt McCoy Rookie Card
Putting valuable things in slabs of acrylic plastic is just hilarious to me for some reason. Especially stuff like sports cards. It’s a reflection of the artificial value placed on to something, I understand that a slabbed product’s value necessitates its protection, but that connotation can work the other way around too, like something in an acrylic slab also must be valuable, which this Colt McCoy rookie card is not.
You know, my brain has not accepted that Colt McCoy is just never going to have a really significant NFL career. I got to watch him a lot in college, because he was in our conference with Texas, so I got it in my head that he was very good as a college player. When he got to the NFL, though, he rarely played (and was often hurt), so my brain never got to watch him grow and develop as a quarterback. He was in the same draft class as Sam Bradford, for example, but I’m well aware that the peak of Sam Bradford’s career has passed and he’s never going to be a hall of famer, and that’s because I watched Sam Bradford play a number of games when he was with the Vikings briefly and it became clear that he’d reached his ceiling as kind of pretty good as an NFL quarterback. But I got to watch that happen. I never watched him progress or fail or hit his ceiling in the NFL so my brain still has a little kernel of “Maybe he’ll become a good NFL quarterback one day…” left in there.
He actually started two games for the Giants last year, and I watched them, and I watched him underwhelm in them, but that kernel’s still apparently there – Maybe we’ll see Colt have a breakthrough year one day… Maybe one day this card, a 9.5 grade card in mint condition, will be worth more than $6.95. Maybe one day.
Kennewick General Hospital / Tri-Cities Fever Signed Football
I had to show you both sides of it. I didn’t recognize the “FEVER” logo off the top of my head so I had to google “Fever football team Kennewick” to match a logo to an organization. The Tri-Cities Fever were an Arena Football team that played in Kennewick, Washington, from 2005 to 2016. They played in a variety of indoor leagues, some of which have also folded, some of which still remain – the National Indoor Football League, the af2 (which was the minor league of the Arena Football League), and the Indoor Football League (which still exists).
I found a highlight reel of one specific receiver from the 2005 Tri-Cities Fever season.
So, presumably, this was a football signed by the Tri-Cities Fever team and staff and given as a gift to the Kennewick General Hospital. Which makes sense, football is a game that sends a lot of people to the hospital, it’s the least they could do as a show of thanks. One interesting extra thing about this is that the Kennewick General Hospital is no longer operating under that name, since 2013 it has been named ‘Trios Health’. So what we have here is a football signed by football players who have all likely retired, from a defunct team, from a defunct league, for the sake of a hospital now operating under another title. And at time of writing, it’s still available for a starting bid price of $7.50!
John Elway Coors Beer Poster
Be Original. John Elway. Coors Beer.
Super Bowl XXXII Helmet Phone
Was the smartphone revolution worth it? Was it worth it for us to lose the ability to use phones made out of football helmets that are signed by John Elway by the looks of it? Well, maybe we didn’t lose the ability but you’re not gonna use a landline now, right? Maybe I would if I could use this football helmet phone signed by John Elway. Actually definitely I would. I would trade all of this internet smartphone bullshit away anyway, if I could get a Super Bowl XXXII helmet signed by John Elway out of the deal it’d just be icing on the cake. Oh, and if that’s not enough?
I believe the other side of it was signed by Brett Favre. Obviously I don’t know for sure because I don’t have a Coors Beer poster with a signature on it to compare it to like I did with Elway but it’d make sense, that looks like it says “Brett Favre.” He was the other quarterback in Super Bowl XXXII. You can’t beat that. You can’t beat a Super Bowl XXXII helmet telephone signed by John Elway and Brett Favre. I don’t want to be one of those “This Is What They Took From You” guys, but would you take constant nightmares through your phone screen everywhere you go all the time? Or would you take a phone call, exclusively when you’re at home, with your Super Bowl XXXII helmet telephone signed by John Elway and Brett Favre?
Signed Brown Football
There’s nothing like a collection of anonymous signatures. I can recognize a few of the names. There’s a David in there, I think. David Rivers, maybe? David Rivas? One of them wore the number #13. There was a situation where all of these men signed this football. Like a meet-and-greet, or a charity thing, they passed the ball and a white pen around and all signed this football. Maybe it got auctioned off for charity. And if that’s the case, here it is getting auctioned off again. For what its worth, it isn’t there anymore. So, maybe somebody leapt at it. Maybe someone recognized the names and saw it as a steal at $7.99. Maybe somebody had ulterior motives with it, somehow! That could be a funny white elephant gift exchange gift, a football with a bunch of unidentifiable signatures?
National Football League Signed Framed Photo
Who were you?
You wore number 70. Your team wore navy blue, by the looks of it. Plain white helmet on the knee. Could be Penn State, but you look older than a college player.
A faded signature to match the faded photo. I can make out a ‘Best Wishes’ across the thighs. I think that’s a ‘G’ and an ‘l’ in the signature. Glen? Were you Glen? Were you Glen who played football?
Joe Bush dot Net 