The End Of The Darren Clarke Saga

What once promised to go out with a bang, trickled out with a whimper. I'm left with more questions than answers. A little part of me is sad to come to that conclusion.

Truthfully, I had forgotten all about my bizarre encounter with Darren Clarke. Silence has a tendency to do that. I haven't heard any more developments in well over a year. No word from Topps. No word from Mr. Clarke, himself.

For some odd reason, Darren Clarke's name popped into my head today. I wondered what became of him. I hadn't heard anything about him lately, but that shouldn't be a surprise. National League relievers have a sneaky way of hiding from me. It's not their fault. It's just the nature of the game.

I went looking for answers, only to find nothing definitive. What I did find raised an eyebrow. After having a literal cup of coffee with the Rockies in 2007, he was back in the minors. I couldn't find any mention of him playing past 2008 with the Rockies AA team.

Baseball Reference even lists his final game as May 20, 2007. After eight seasons in the Rockies organization only resulting in two games pitched with the parent club, maybe Darren made peace with the fact that he wouldn't return. Maybe he focused on something else entirely. Maybe it wasn't his decision.

Whatever the reasons behind his leaving the Rockies, I wish him well. I hope that he appreciates that he pitched in two big league games. It's a lot more than most of us will ever accomplish. I am officially moving this saga to cold case. At least Darren Clarke can say that he has an unblemished ERA in the majors. Now that's something!

A Response From Topps?

Back on February 2, 2008, I had a run in with "Darren Clarke" on eBay. Click the Darren Clarke label at the bottom of this post to read the previous entries of this saga.

To make a long story short, I was harassed by someone claiming to be Darren Clarke. This person claimed that I was selling a fake autograph of him in my eBay store. I explained nicely to this person about pre-printed autographs on the Topps 52 cards, but apparently this person wasn't impressed with my knowledge of cards.

I wrote this to The Topps Company on the morning after.

I have been contacted by Rockies pitcher Darren Clarke through my eBay store. He claims that I am selling a fake signature of his. I am selling his 2007 Topps 52 card #157. He claims that the signature is not his and that he never signs his middle name. I explained back to him that it was a pre-printed signature and that it most likely came from a contract he signed. Looking at his blue autograph card from the Topps 52 set, the signatures look nothing alike. He claims the signature is not his on the base card and doesn't believe Topps would fake a signature. Can anyone explain where this signature came from?

Today, at 11:42 AM Central time, I finally got a response from Topps about the incident. The following is from (MARVIN).

Dear Mr. (last name removed),

Thank you for taking the time to contact the Topps Company. We truly apologize for the delay in responding to your email inquiry.

A copy of your email was forwarded to our sports department at Topps. They will review the matter regarding the autograph that appears on the base card in the Topps Rookies 52 product. If you receive any further communications from Mr. Clarke regarding this matter, please have him or his agent/representative contact the Topps corporate office at 212-376-0300 to speak with a representative in our Sports Department.

Again, I apologize for the delay in response. Do not hesitate to contact our Consumer Relations Team by phone at 1-800-489-9149 or by email at support@etopps.com if you have any other questions. A representative will be available to assist you between the hours of 8:30am-4:30pm (ET), Monday through Friday.

Sincerely,
Consumer Relations Team
The Topps Company

Umm... yeah. I feel very confident in that response. I'm not jumping for joy or holding my breath for an answer. I basically got a form letter peppered with specific references to my query. I didn't even get an answer to my one question. Where did this signature come from?

I will continue to keep everyone posted as this situation further develops.

A Darren Clarke Auto Pull

I didn't pull this Darren Clarke card. Patricia over at Dinged Corners did. I'm sure that Lucy helped. This is a genuine Darren Clarke autograph. At least I hope it is. It would be sad if the blue autograph that Darren Clarke claimed to have personally autographed turns out to be fake as well. At this point, I wouldn't put it past Topps.

I have received no response from Topps about my concern. Are they just not speaking out of embarrassment? Do they not care about my petty concerns? Topps may care more about Sidd Finch and Rudy Giuliani than they do about quality control. I guess gimmicks are more important to Topps than their consumers.

I have also not received another e-mail from"Darren Clarke". Maybe it was just a drunken rant. Maybe it was all a hoax on me. I don't know and I'm beginning not to care. All I know is that Darren's autograph above, looks nothing like his base card pre-printed autograph. I'm still curious about where that pre-printed autograph came from. I don't care what "Darren Clarke" thinks of me. It's not worth my time or energy, to waste it on an anonymous poster claiming to be a ballplayer.

If I ever get any more answers on this burning issue, I will post it. The topic seems to have reached a standstill for now. Maybe when I least expect it, an answer will fall out of the sky. I doubt it, but stranger things have happened.

Darren Clarke: The Saga Continues

This Darren Clarke incident has seemingly sparked a lot of interest. Kris over at Aardvark Trading Co. has written an article about the incident with an example of an in person autograph, which is pictured to the left. I'm inclined to agree that it really doesn't look like the same person's signature.

I'm still torn about the whole thing. I can't definitively decide if Darren is who he claims to be. I've contacted the other eBay stores that sell his card with a picture of the card in question. I seem to be the only one contacted by "Darren". This seems to be a count against his credibility. Then again, I could've just been the lucky chosen one. Heh, lucky me.

I was advised by other sellers to forward his first question to eBay security. I've done that because I think I was harrassed. Plus, if "Darren" is an imposter, it should be easy to spot. As funny as it ended up being, it still is a violation of eBay's rules.

Another mark against, supposedly, is the fact that "Darren" signed up to eBay the very same day he contacted me. He also provided me with a Hotmail e-mail address to contact him in his first question through eBay. A Hotmail address for a player who has reached the major leagues, albeit briefly, does not instill confidence in me to its validity.

The only point that I will say is probably in his favor is his anger over the wrong signature. I'd be pissed too if I thought someone was trying to sell a fake signature of mine. Not that my signature is worth anything, but if I were in a position where it was, I'd probably be angry too. Kris gave an example of two different players with the same name and the same signature on each of their Topps 52 cards. I wrote an e-mail to Topps this morning about this issue. Hopefully, I'll hear something back that will clue us all in to this mess.

Like Kris mused, with my luck, Darren is likely to be traded to the White Sox. Maybe Darren and I will be able to share a beer together and laugh about this someday. The only problem I see with that is that I hate beer. Maybe Darren can have my beer and I'll have a Mike's hard lemonade or something. One can dream.

My eBay Experience With Darren Clarke

Being an eBay seller, I run into all kinds of people. I run into the overly-informed and the under-informed. I generally run into nice people. Sometimes, I run into a kook. It just goes with the territory.

I've had the chance to converse with, through e-mail, many relatives of ballplayers. If I see that the last name matches or they come from the same city listed on the back of the card, I'll usually include a little note asking if they are that player's relative. I also say that if they are, to tell them good luck with their career. I especially do that if it's a rookie. They need all the encouragement they can get at that stage and I really do wish them well.

Tonight I had a strange e-mail from an eBay member who just signed up today. They included an e-mail address at the end of the message, but I won't include that here.

Why are you selling my cards with fake autographs on them? Trying to make a buck off that crap? You should have just sent one to me maybe if your lucky I would have signed it. Get a life. You can e-mail me if you have the balls.

That kind of took me by surprise. Nowhere in my description did it say autograph, but I e-mailed back.

Is this a joke? I never claimed there was a real autograph on the card. The card is printed that way by Topps. Look at any picture of a 2007 Topps 52 card of "yours" and you will see the exact same thing. If you are who you say you are, you should know that. But I doubt it.

I got a response back from "Darren".

Yea you should look at the topps 52 cards that are signed in blue. That s my autograph. I ve never signed anything like that let alone use my middle name to sign.

That sounded like he at least calmed down. I responded back in a friendly manner.

They usually use the signature from a contract. If they can't get that on the card, I would imagine they fake it for the base cards so they look like the 1952 cards. I've found some interesting base card reproduced signatures that look nothing like their actual autograph counterpart.

I should have left it alone, but I got a very immature response back.

You think topps fakes our autograph on our cards? I have my topps contract from when I first signed in 2001 and I have my contract from this year for the three thousand cards. Have fun with your terrible looking autographs.

Again, this shows how uninformed some people are. If this is actually Darren Clarke, then I feel sad for him. He, again, completely misses the point of my e-mails back. Don't blame me for that, "Darren", blame Topps for pre-printing such crappy autographs on their cards. If that's not your autograph, then someone at the company faked it. It's as simple as that. I had one last response that I sent to "Darren".

Topps uses a facsimile autograph on the Topps 52 line to make it look like their 1952 set. Sometimes the facsimile that they use is taken from a copy of a contract that you have signed with them. Wherever it is taken from, it is a pre-printed autograph. Your real autograph signed by your hand looks much better than the pre-printed ones.

I haven't gotten another response back from "Darren" yet. I don't believe that I will. If this is the real Darren's attitude, I don't think he'll make it unless he has electric stuff everytime. Somehow, I don't think he can do that. Everybody gets hit sometime. I don't care who you are.

He's kind of funny, in retrospect. I think I'll call him Larry, since he doesn't sign that way.