Greg's Blog: My Autograph Bonanza!!! Taj Gibson, Dan Hampton, Jimmy Butler, Richard Dent, Lee Smith and Ron Kittle

On Saturday August 27th, 2011, my dad and I took a trip down to the AllState Arena for the best autograph signing I have ever been to to date. It was a Goodwill function where if you donated some items such as clothes or household items you would receive a wristband to receive one players autograph. I selected to get Taj Gibson because he plays for my favorite team, the Chicago Bulls. Dan Hampton, Ron Kittle and Taj Gibson were there from 9:00 a.m. until 11:00 a.m. and Jimmy Butler, Richard Dent and Lee Smith were there from 11:00 a.m. until 1:00 p.m. I waited in line for Taj Gibson as my dad and I were the first in line at about 8:00 a.m. that morning. We arrived at the AllState Arena at 7:30 and waited for them to open up. After waiting in line for about an hour and chit chatting with various people in the line, Ron Kittle arrived and no one was in his line. A lady that worked for Goodwill came over and said we could all get his autograph seeing he was there and Taj Gibson was not, plus no one was in Kittle's line. So everyone got autographs from Mr. Kittle, after I got my baseball and a picture signed, along with a picture with Ron Kittle, I went back and waited for Taj Gibson to get there. I was expecting a ton more people to be down at this function, but there was barely anybody. I waited and my dad and I not only got Taj Gibson, but we got Dan Hampton as well. With the very low amount of people there, we got to go through each of the lines very quickly and got numerous autographs from each player. They were signing these very nice 8 x 10 glossy photos which are never really given out at signings. After getting all of those signings I went and talked to Taj Gibson seeing no one was around him and he was just on his phone. I went over and I talked to his agent and I got Taj Gibson's agent's phone number and e-mail address so I can contact him for an interview for The Xavierite paper that I write for. I was so excited and I told my dad let's wait for everyone else to get here so we could get more autographs. We waited and 104.3 FM radio was there with Eddie and Jobo, I went over and got their autographs as well as a picture with them. We then waited and we again got multiple autographs from Richard Dent, Lee Smith and Jimmy Butler because of the low amount of people there. We ended up leaving with twenty-eight different items signed by those six players. I also left with contact information for a Taj Gibson interview and we also got two free Ron Santo books that they were giving away. It was the best birthday gift I could have ever asked for, my birthday was on the 28th and it was just amazing!! What an autograph signing, I'm not quite sure any other autograph signings will top this one. Here are some of the pictures from the event!!

Taj Gibson