- What is this? TOM: That's a bench and a table. Tell me about this. I started making
these benches in 1999. It's a history of not only
the Los Angeles Dodgers, but going back to Brooklyn. And I was commissioned by
another major league team to make an autograph
bench, and that's where this idea came from. Yeah, but it
looks like garbage. [laughs] No, seriously. It says Dodgers all over it. TOM: Not a Dodgers fan. The San Francisco Giants. TOM: I'm coming
into the pawn shop today to sell my
Los Angeles Brooklyn Dodgers autographed
baseball bat bench with a matching coffee table. I've slowly collected
these autographs and finally have it put
together as a whole piece. My goal was for all
of these Dodgers to have touched this bench
and touched the table. And it's almost
religious in a way. So how many cards and
everything do you have? TOM: There are about 170
autographs altogether. OK.
That includes the bats? TOM: Yes.
Bats and baseballs. One thing you got me
massively concerned here, you took all the
bats and the balls, you drilled holes in them. Which is, as far as a condition
goes, is not really great. If you understand
what I'm saying. And you want to sell all this. TOM: I want to sell
the set as one. OK, and how much
do you want for it? - I want $60,000.
- Ooh. Quite frankly, I have no idea
if your price is right or not. Let me call up a buddy and have
him take a look at this stuff. Let me get an idea from him. I mean, you just have
so much stuff here and I need a little help. So if you don't mind hanging
out, I'm going to get him down, he'll look at
everything, and we'll try and figure something out.
- OK. - All right?
- Thank you. Hearing that an expert is coming
in is going to be a good thing. It will help me understand
what the real value is for this piece. He wants a whopping
$60,000 for this. I think that's way
out of left field, but maybe he's just
starting real high. So I called Jeremy
down to see what this thing is really worth. So we have a
Dodgers furniture. I'd figured I'd have
you take a look at it. He wants a lot of
money for them, but there's a lot of stuff here. Just from what I can
see here real quick, this is absolutely fantastic. So what are some of the
best pieces we have in here? Well, Charles Ebbets, I
think, is the number one. I found out there is
only one other photograph that he had signed. And then Jackie Robinson,
that was dated 1954. Well, just like
he said, by far and away, the best piece
in this entire collection has got to be the
Charles Ebbets autograph. This is, by far, the
most scarce autograph in the entire collection. Ebbets owned the team
in 1900 and opened Ebbets Field in 1912. Being that he passed
away in the 20s, that autograph-- especially
on a photo like that-- is exceedingly rare. On the bottom row
right here, there's six different cards in the 1955
season that are autographed. 55 being the key
year for the Dodgers. Their first World
Series victory. So this is just one
hell of a collection. I'm assuming I'd have to
break this up to sell it. It would be a shame to, but it
would be incredibly difficult, in my opinion, to
find somebody that would be spending top dollar
on something like this. And I mean, I can think
of thousands of collectors and fans that would just love
to have an authentic autograph, from the 50s, of
Jackie Robinson. The problem is you're not going
to really find too many people that are going to pay you
premium so they can have autographs of Wally Moon,
Rick Monday, and some of the other Dodgers from
throughout the history of the club. So what do you think
all this stuff is worth? Well, the
autographs themselves, they all have
considerable value, but beyond that, quite honestly,
I'm at a loss of words. What you've done here to
the bats and the balls, in my industry, it's extremely
careless and quite honestly, it's sacrilegious. You're not supposed to
alter signed memorabilia when you have it. So as far as the value, because
of the condition, the fact we have about a 1/2 inch drilled
through the entire section of bats and balls, maybe
about $10,000 to $12,000 is what we're looking at.
- Thanks, man. I appreciate it.
- You got it, man. Thank you for showing it to me.
- OK. With sports memorabilia,
the one saving grace is no matter what you have, how
rare, how unique, how obscure, there's always somebody out
there looking to buy it. With this piece in
particular, there would be people that would
absolutely pay top dollar to have it, but we're
talking about a very limited, very small market out there. All right. What you've got here
is really, really neat. It's a great collection. But I would have
to break this up. I understand. When it comes down
to making money, that's what you got to do. So I don't think you're going
to take $8,000 for all this. Not at all.
No. I have a lot more. I have three times that,
just in the autographs. It's a neat set,
there's a lot of history. It's really, really cool. But I got to make money. So thanks.
- Thank you. Thanks for looking at it. I'm very surprised by the
value the expert has given me. It's a one of a kind art piece. I know there is
a buyer out there that would pay
what I want for it, and that's what I'm going for.
