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Scandal? What’s that? Candles? Who said something about candles I don’t smell nothing? Candles?
Seriously though guys… Is this really a story? Are we really doing this right now?
Who buys memorabilia anyway? Seriously who gives a shit about a game-used helmet? What are we even talking about here? Are we going to lose our minds because some 54-year-old WFAN caller sitting in his man cave in Northern New Jersey is looking at an Eli Manning practice helmet instead of the helmet Eli used in a mid-October game against the Tennessee Titans. Dude if you’re using your money to buy game-used memorabilia you deserve to get ripped off. Spending any amount of money on memorabilia or autographs or anything like that that’s been outrageously marked up because it had someone’s signature or was worn by someone in a game is so fucking preposterous to me. If you’re older than the age of… I’ll give it ten… if you are older than ten years old and care about autographs and memorabilia I hate you. I truly, genuinely hate you.
And while we’re here, can we just blow this lid off of how stupid this entire industry is in the first place?
I mean seriously… think about how ridiculous it is that people are willing to pay large sums of money for used equipment and signatures. Yes, signatures. Not autographs. They are signatures. A person signed something, probably illegibly, and now that thing has somehow multiplied in value tenfold? twentyfold? thousandfold? What planet are we living on that we’re like “Yes. That makes total sense. Let’s bid on it. I can be a little late on the rent.”
Honestly I could search “JR Smith autograph”, buy a basketball, sign it like JR, put it in my living room, and none of you would know the difference. People pay thousands of dollars for that.
And that’s really the kicker. Like… you all do realize that like 90% of this stuff is fake, right? Literally almost every single piece of memorabilia is fake.
Manufacturers make extra helmets and jerseys and such and give them to the team. The team obviously needs extras to use if players rip their jerseys or crack their helmets or whatever. Equipment managers and major manufacturers work out deals to have more equipment than they could need sent to the teams. And guess what? All of those unused pieces of equipment get passed off as real. All of them. What do you think they’re just recycling these things? Give me a fucking break.
Think about shoes. Think about how many pairs of shoes NBA players must get sent throughout the course of the season. I’d venture to say that any player with a shoe deal gets 300 pairs sent to him per season. And that’s a strategic move by the shoe company because they know that player can sign those never-worn shoes, give them to kids, and look like a really good guy while also marketing the shoes for free. Just this Wednesday night we saw Carmelo, in what was probably his last game as a Knick, walk back out and hand out like fifty pairs of shoes to fans. Do you honestly think all of those saw game action? Of course not.
Do you know how many people have a “game used” Richard Sherman jersey or “game used” Matt Ryan helmet? About ten times as many as the actual number of games that either of those guys has ever played in. The entire industry is a fucking sham. It’s a joke.
If anything, Eli is a good guy for making sure these people at least got something that touched his head. These helmets might not have seen game time, but that doesn’t mean there’s not still a little Eli magic on them. How many athletes have gone that far? Everyone knows the industry is a sham and just turns a blind eye. Eli is such a great guy that he made sure that they were at least selling something that had touched his head. And now instead of an untouched Giants helmet, some kid fat old weirdo has a real, genuine, Eli Manning-worn helmet to… look at? or show off? or whatever people do?
You know what – I’ll even go so far as to consider Eli a hero for this. In five years we’re going to look back and thank Eli. Thank you Eli, for disrupting this corrupt industry. Thank you Eli, for bringing to light a major issue. You are a hero. Not just for being the only person who could beat Tom Brady and the Patriots, but also for starting the movement to stop these scumbag memorabilia people. I’d even go as far as to call him the Rosa Parks… excuse me, I mean the David Dao of the autograph industry. Eli Manning is a hero for this. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.
*walks off stage*
Okay so… Did that work? Did any of that work? I’m sorry I can’t see straight yet I’m still spinning. Wait is my mic still on?
P.S. On a more serious note, a lot of what I said above does apply here. These memorabilia people are SCUMBAGS. Fucking scumbags. The lowest people on earth. Sewer rats in human form. They make their living selling completely worthless signatures and used equipment at outrageous mark ups. They rip people off ALL the time. They sell fake merchandise ALL the time.
So excuse me if I’m on the side of the guy who just won Man Of The Year for raising MILLIONS of dollars to fight kids cancer. I’d still bet dollars to donuts that he’s being set up by one of these scumbags. But even if it was true. Even if this whole thing is true. I’m absolutely fine with Eli ripping off a bunch of scumbag memorabilia guys. I don’t care. Is it wrong to commit fraud like that? Sure. But the people Eli is ripping off are ten times as scummy as he’ll ever be.
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