Talk about YOUR meetings with an MLB'er

[RichardSimon]

A friend of mine was friendly with Ted Williams' agent the notorious Vince Antonucci and my friend had chatted with Ted at a show.
One day he gets a phone call from Vince Antonucci inviting him to Florida to look at a huge autograph collection he had just gotten. My friend invited me along.
Vince owned a large hobby store. When we got there much of the collection was spread out in the store on showcases. Vince had many, many showcases in the store. Vince said we can purchase items the next day as he was busy that first day we were there.
Vince was also the agent for Monte Irvin who was in the store at the time. I had been told before hand that we had a chance to meet Monte so I brought along all the wire service photos I had of him. He signed every single one of them (maybe 20) and told me the story about each photo as he signed it. We then took him out to lunch and later to dinner. He came back to our hotel room. All day long he regaled us with baseball stories. What a wonderful man he is.
The next day we get to the store in the morning and my friend says to Vince "give Ted a call and tell him I am here." Vince calls Ted Williams. He then comes over to me and says that Ted is coming over but I should not bother him or ask him any questions as he does not want to talk baseball.
Well about 20 minutes later, driving up to the front of the store, in a jeep, is Ted Williams, literally larger than life. My friend introduces me to Ted, who after shaking my hand glances around at the store and sees all the items on top of the showcases.
He encourages me to join him and he does a walk around in the store and every time he would see an autograph item of someone he knew something about he would tell me about that player. This lasted for a full hour. When he found out I was a Mets fan he told me how he loved the swings of Darryl Strawberry and Greg Jefferies. He told me a story of a three game series, Tigers vs. Red Sox in Boston where he won the first two games with late hits. Then in the third game, bottom of the 9th, bases loaded, Williams coming up. Tigers bring in lefty Billy Hoeft and the count goes to 3-2. Curve ball after curve ball and Williams keeps fouling them off. Listening to him was just jaw dropping. Finally Ted says "that SOB throws me a fastball, and I took it for strike three. The next day the papers in Boston ripped me to shreds: WILLIAMS FAILS IN CLUTCH were the headlines." And this after he won the first two games .
One of the greatest times of my life. And of course he signed two photos for me but I won't show them because I have done that about 6 times already and my friend Shelly will just tease me about it again .