Weird question

[digglahhh]

Okay, this is a weird question...

I was watching Real Sports the other day and saw an incredibly moving story about Manute Bol. Basically, he spent almost all his earnings on supporting his people in civil war in Sudan and now he's back in the U.S. and broke. He had severe car accident and had no insurance, NBA players organized a fundraising event to pay his $200K medical bills.

Now, this kind of thing happens. Former players end up broke, and sometimes and its not from throwing their money away. They often have no other skills to make a living. Now, Bol had a lot of friends in the NBA who are wealthy. I wouldn't say Charles Barkley should give Bol his money or something. But couldn't he just sign like 50 basketballs every month and give them to Bol so he could sell them?

If Pujols takes a liking to a young rookie who isn't good enough to stick around the bigs. Couldn't he just sign thousands of balls, bats and cards and give them to this guy to sell as a nice source of income?

Is there some sort of law, or unwritten code that prohibits players from doing this to help out less fortunate players? I'm curious if anybody else ever had this thought...

[Yankees]

Personal feelings aside, there would be (and already is, in fact) a flood of signed items that would just drive the price down. $20 for a pujols ball? (although with nine hours left) That's not going to get someone very far, espessially if the price was driven even further down.

[digglahhh]

Yeah, I figured that was a likely outcome.

I know some players sign balls and stuff and then sell them for a cause, donating the money to a charity or an organization. Personally, I wish this was the bulk of the memorabilia "industry."

[The Commissioner]

Okay, this is a weird question...

I was watching Real Sports the other day and saw an incredibly moving story about Manute Bol. Basically, he spent almost all his earnings on supporting his people in civil war in Sudan and now he's back in the U.S. and broke. He had severe car accident and had no insurance, NBA players organized a fundraising event to pay his $200K medical bills.

Now, this kind of thing happens. Former players end up broke, and sometimes and its not from throwing their money away. They often have no other skills to make a living. Now, Bol had a lot of friends in the NBA who are wealthy. I wouldn't say Charles Barkley should give Bol his money or something. But couldn't he just sign like 50 basketballs every month and give them to Bol so he could sell them?

If Pujols takes a liking to a young rookie who isn't good enough to stick around the bigs. Couldn't he just sign thousands of balls, bats and cards and give them to this guy to sell as a nice source of income?

Is there some sort of law, or unwritten code that prohibits players from doing this to help out less fortunate players? I'm curious if anybody else ever had this thought...

The problem is that even having been on the same team with him, if the balls weren't authenticated they wouldn't sell for too much. It's a nice thought on your part, though. It's too bad more ballplayers don't have that streak of kindness in them that you do.