Episode #9: A Journey Through My Sports Memorabilia Collection

Ever found yourself clutching onto a piece of history that takes you straight back to the heart of your fondest memories? That's exactly the case with my cherished sports memorabilia collection, which I'm ecstatic to share with you all on this episode of "Sound-off with Sinkoff". This trove of treasures isn't just a bunch of signed items; it's a snapshot of my youth, each piece steeped in stories from the DC area sports teams I grew up adoring. From the Washington Bullets to the Capitals, Orioles, and the Redskins — each autograph spins a yarn of the past that has shaped my love for sports.

Whether you're a sports fanatic or someone who cherishes a good stroll down memory lane, this podcast episode will resonate with that part of you that holds dear to the mementos from life's most pivotal moments. 

Join me, Brian Sinkoff, for a nostalgic trip that celebrates more than the game—it's a tribute to the memories that bind us to our passions.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Hello everybody and welcome to Sound Off with Sync Off. I'm your host, brian Syncoff. Thanks so much for checking out my podcast here. Wherever you get your podcasts, of course, sound Off with Syncoff sponsored by the Syncoff Realty Group Syncoff Realty Group located in the heart of Del Mar, new York, in the capital region of New York, just outside of Albany. All right, we are rolling on these podcasts, just absolutely lining them up and knocking them down. We've talked sports, we've talked pop culture, we've talked lots of things, and this is what I promised you the podcast would be Today.

Speaker 1: 0:38

I wanted to talk to you a little bit about sports memorabilia. As a sports fan everyone out there, I know you have a prized sports memorabilia. As a sports fan everyone out there I know you have a prized sports memorabilia possession. You have a prize possession in on you in your favorite room, locked away in a safe, whether it's like a, a rookie don mattingly or a mickey mannell or a tom siever, whatever it might be, uh, you know, is it an autographed baseball? Maybe a ticket stub? Perhaps a program of the first ever game you attended with your dad or with your friends? For me mine personally goes back to 1984, and it's actually four pieces of memorabilia. It is a. I want to show it to you and I think the cool thing about it is this was a gift from my mom for my bar mitzvah. So here it is, right here on the left side of your screen. This is my office, by the way, at the Sinkoff Realty Group, a little wall of fame with pictures of some famous people I've met pop culture and sports. There's Cal Ripken, there's the guy from the Office Walking Dead, stephen Mell from Arrow, mariano Rivera. But here is the prized possession, my sports memorabilia, prized possession, sports memorabilia, prize possession, and that is um, something that is near and dear to my heart. I'm gonna zip through all four of them here. But what? This is a gift from my mom to me for my bar metzvah.

Speaker 1: 2:18

These are four autographed um plaques I guess you could say autographed, really pieces of paper from each of the professional sports teams in the DC area where I grew up. So you have from the Washington Bullets, from the Capitals, from the Orioles and from the Washington Redskins, which, of course, was their team nickname at the time. So my mom, she actually this is pre internet, you know, you didn't have cell phones, so she went, she got the numbers of each of the teams made a phone call, said I'm going to be sending this to you for my son, will the team sign it? And amazingly they did and they sent it back and it and it's, it's. They're in pristine condition. They're in frames the original frames that they were in when I got them, and it is just an awesome collection, a thing for my collection. We're going to go through each of the teams individually and again they're personalized. My mom had the artist that did sort of the calligraphy for the bar mitzvah. You know everyone the sign-in board right, you've all been to a wedding or bar mitzvah, you've seen that. So this sort of matched the motif of the sign-in board but it was done in the team colors. So here you have the bullets right.

Speaker 1: 3:40

Probably of the four teams this might have been the worst team. They were a non-playoff team, maybe like a 500 team. It's kind of crappy. Gene Shue's the coach, the late Gene Shue. Jeff Rulon played at Iona. Coached at Iona as well. Bernie Bickerstaff, whose son is a coach, or was just got fired. Frank Johnson, ricky Mahorn, the Beef Brothers right. Greg Ballard, jeff Malone. Tom McMillan, darren Day, I think, played at UCLA. This was like the year before or the two years before. Moses Malone joined the Bullets Again now the Wizards, but back then they were called the Bullets. So that's the Bullets.

Speaker 1: 4:25

Next is the Capitals. This was actually a playoff team. I think this was like their third straight year of making the playoffs. Remember the organization only started in 74, so this is like a 10-year-old franchise here and this was an era. They first made the playoffs my caps in 82, and then kind of became playoff regulars from that point on.

Speaker 1: 4:46

But you can see there's a few Hall of Famers on this Bobby Carpenter, mike Gardner, 500-goal scorer. You got. Scott Stevens, former New Jersey Devil won a few cups with them. Rod Langway right here Remember, rod Langway didn't wear a helmet. Doug Jarvis is here. I believe he had at one point most consecutive games played in the NHL, I believe since been broken. Larry Murphy I believe he's a Hall of Famer. There might be three Hall of Famers on here. Dave Christian played on the US Olympic team, right, remember Dave Christian. Scotty Stevens we said. Gaetan Duchesne. Greg Adams, alan Hallworth I think that is Al Jensen, the goalie. I don't. It's hard to read Craig Lachlan, who is an announcer with the Caps. Now, to this day. That is the Caps.

Speaker 1: 5:46

Here is the Orioles. Cool thing about the Orioles and the Redskins, which I'll get to in a second the Orioles were coming off a World Series in 83, their last World Series title. I know that's pretty bad, but that was their last World Series title. So this is the following year after the World Series and you got to remember most of the teams in that era yes, free agency, not as big as it is now. So most of the teams, I mean they did have free agency, but not nearly what it is today. So most of the teams actually stayed together. So this is the year after they won the world series. This probably I I want to say I don't know the details of how my mom got it and when, but I would say these, these guys probably signed this in spring training of 84, and 84 is the year the tigers won the world series. Like they started 30 and 5 or whatever.

Speaker 1: 6:35

Anyway, here's hall of famer cal ripken, jr. Right here. Uh, you got eddie murray right there, hall of famer. Uh, also jim palmer, who was a pitcher on that team. So there's three Hall of Famers right there Mike Boddicker, joe Nolan, al Bumry, ken Singleton Many Yankee fans know him, a member of the yes Network for many years Tom Underwood, alrod Hendricks, legendary coach Jimmy Dwyer. Here is Scotty McGregor, tippie Martinez, coach jimmy dwyer uh, here is scotty mcgregor, tippy martinez. Uh, todd cruz, floyd rayford, len cicada uh, really cool. But there's ripken, there's palmer and there is eddie murray. So those three, those three hall of famers cited, and then you have the Redskins again their name, today the commanders, but back then the Redskins. But you could see just how cool this is. Uh, personalized to me from the Redskins. It was like the team wrote up, gave me a bar mitzvah card. Like that is just amazing, it is. It just warms my heart to think that my mom did that for me. Love you, mom.

Speaker 1: 7:49

This podcast, this episode's for you, because this is still one of my favorite things ever. But here's the Redskins. You got, I believe, two or three Hall of Famers on this one Tony McGee Hall of Famers. Or Art Monk, john Riggins, right there. Joe Theismann, george Stark, vernon Dean, dave Butts, curtis Jordan I mean I could read all these names Rich Malat they also helps to put their numbers Mark May you can see, he autographed it with the Hogs Alvin Garrett, mel Kaufman, charlie Brown, receiver Russ Grimm Jacoby, a great offensive line back then. Donnie Warren, jeff Hayes, the punter, mosley, the kicker, bostic, the center. Mcgee, defensive lineman. Mike Nelms was the kick returner, extraordinaire. Ricky Doc Walker, tight end. Vernon Dean, cornerback, butts was a defensive tackle nose guard and Curtis Jordan was a safety and then George Stark as well, the whole line. All the hogs signed it. So that is.

Speaker 1: 8:53

And then there is a shot of my office with those, with those pictures. So that is really an awesome thing that my mom did for me and I, you know I Somebody asked me because people have seen this, they've come into my office. It's a great talking point when I bring people in, whether it's clients or you know, talking to agents about joining the Sync Off Realty Group. But I don't know, like what the true value of it is, simply because it's personalized. You know it's got my name on it, it's got, you know, the date, which is pretty cool. But most memorabilia, the autograph stuff that's really worth a lot of money is just a straight autograph. It's not personalized, it's just just the person's name. So you know, as far as value it's, it's tough to say I'll never would sell it, I'd never get rid of it, cause it's just, it's a great memory, it's a great gift. I'll never forget I had the bar mitzvah in the morning, we had a little break and then we went to dinner and the party at night where I was break dancing and I opened that they were like wrapped up and I just couldn't believe, you know, because the question was, how did my mom do it?

Speaker 1: 10:21

Like remember, no Internet, none of that stuff Like there was a lot of effort to get the person to do the calligraphy of the congratulations, lot of effort to get the person to do the calligraphy of the congratulations, brian Scott, sink off and then have all the teams you know with getting that to all the teams physically mailing it to them and then having the team sign it. That's what I find the most remarkable about this is that it seems like almost every player signed it and the participation of the teams was tremendous. So, like props to my mom and whoever she talked to for making sure the team signed it, because today you couldn't have pulled that off. There's just no way. I don't think they, the teams, just get inundated right now. Um, you don't have to have a contact. You can just, you know, go to a website. You just mail something back. Then you had to make an a little bit of an effort to look up the address, to communicate with someone, but back, you know, now I don't think, I don't think a team would do that um, I could be wrong. You probably have to wait nine months. Maybe they do it only because it's personalized. But then you know, would everybody sign it? You know, if you were a Yankee fan, would Aaron Judge sign it? Would Cole sign it? Would Soto sign it? Like, I'm not dogging those guys, but you know, are they signing something like that? I don't know.

Speaker 1: 11:45

So that is what the participation, the fact that it was the effort to get it, and then just the you know the display aspect. It's just, you know, it's a 40 year old gift and it's also in like mint condition. That's what's so cool about it. It's still pristine. So not an autographed baseball, it's not a ticket stub, it's not a rookie card in mint condition. It's a bar mitzvah gift from my four favorite teams at the time, which, by the way, they still are. And I will admit, I'm still a Wizards fan. Bullets now, wizards yeah, that was a pretty bad team back then, but they participated. So credit to all those pro teams for making that happen. So thanks, mom, for the awesome bar mitzvah gift. I'm giving you props on that. Some 40 years later, really appreciate it.

Speaker 1: 12:40

So, that being said, what are what's your favorite sports memorabilia piece? You can comment, you can share this, you can. You can email me, you can message me. I'd love to hear what your favorite sports memorabilia piece is. But that is going to do it for this edition of SoundOff with SyncOff. I want to thank you so much for joining me Again. Soundoff, sponsored by the SyncOff Realty Group right here in Del Mar, for all of your buying and selling of real estate needs. I will see you next time. Make sure you check out all the previous podcasts and the future ones, because I don't know when the heck you're watching this. But have a great day everyone. Thanks again for watching.