Never had a real bad encounter. The worst I guess was Ed Kranepool, and he said he didn't want to sign because he was at a card show on Long Island and didn't want to get mobbed, but he did take a picture with me.
The best was Dainus Zubrus and Alex Ovechkin. They were visiting the coliseum last season and I happened to be out there with a few of my friends. I couldn't get a sitter so I took Kara with me, figuring that at 1 1/2 years old she was ready for her first hockey game (she liked the hot dogs at the coliseum).
My friends are autograph hounds and the weather was OK so I didn't mind waiting for them. The Isles came out pretty fast and then one of my buddies said he knew where the visiting team usually exited. So we go to this side entrance and there were about twenty fans, mostly Capitals fans hanging out there.
Slowly but surely the Caps started coming out. Kolzig was a real treat, he signed and took pictures with folks. Chris Clark was too. He asked my buddy if he was sure he wanted him to ruin his card... funny guy.
Ovechkin came out with a couple of interpreters and was talking to fans. I heard him say a few times "No, I'm only going to talk in English here". Pretty nice eh. Zubrus, who had a rough game, came out behind. I had this card of Zuby in a Flyers uniform but Zuby was more interested in my digital camera. He started talking about his cameras and why he liked this model over that one. I didn't have the heart to tell him I had borrowed the camera from my brother and had no idea what he was talking about.
Long story short, I have a picture of Kara and I taken by Dainus Zubrus. He and Alex both signed her jersey too (I had gotten her a little Islanders jersey before the game). Didn't seem to bother them that it was the other team's jersey.
100% class acts on both of them. I hear AO is a little tougher to get a signature from these days, but that makes sense given he is one of the big stars in the NHL, and if the NHL wakes up they will market him as much as Sid because this guy has the personality to be the face of hockey, Crosby hasn't shown that yet (but this isn't a bash Sid post).
Also, AO may not be the funniest person in the world, but he sure seems to think he is. While signing autographs he was telling jokes and screwing up the punchline and laughing hysterically. The kind of laugh that made it impossible not to laugh with him. Not sure if his jokes will improve as his English improves.
Go see a Capitals-Islander game and hound for autographs after if you can, you won't find a better group of players. Not one sour-puss among them that day.
|