Back to 100%! Unpossible Autograph Friday- Dick Luebke, Oriole #184

With the addition of Dick Luebke, I am (once again) back to having an autograph of every player who has appeared in a game for the Orioles, and this time, I believe all 942 of my autographs are authentic signatures. There are a few that are very difficult to confirm without sending them into a professional certification service, but that probably isn't going to happen and I'm satisfied, so I guess that's what counts.

Dick Luebke was the final signature I needed for my collection, and his autograph was very hard to track down. To the best of my knowledge, it seems like there are only a few examples floating around for sale, and none of them are cheap. Luebke was included in two card sets, 1983 Fritsch One Year Wonders and 1991 Orioles Crown, but both of them were issued well after his death in 1974. I'm very happy to have this cut autograph of his, as I have yet to see any sort of image of him during his playing days that might have been around for him to sign during his lifetime.

After pitching for about a decade in the Orioles minor league system, Dick made his O's debut on August 11, 1962 and finished out the season with the team. Over 10 MLB appearances that season, he had an 0-1 record with a 2.70 ERA, in what would prove to be the extent of his big league experience. During that following off-season, he was traded to the Reds for Joe Gaines.

I wasn't able to find a cause of death for Dick, but he passed away when he was just 39 years old in 1974. There are three factors as to why his autograph is so hard to come by; the fact that he died so young, that he passed away well before autographs became big business, and that his time in the big leagues was so limited. RIP Mr. Luebke.


While I now have autographs of all 942 players who have appeared in a game for the Orioles from 1954-2012, I am still looking for a handful of upgrades. If anyone out there can help me with any of these guys, I would really appreciate your help! I have a bunch of autographs to trade, so we might be able to help each other!

John Anderson- Orioles Crown
Luis Ayala- 2012 Topps Update
Bret Barberie- 1995 Collector's Choice, Flair, Leaf, Topps Traded, Upper Deck
Chris Brock- 2002 Upper Deck 40 Man
Mark Brown- Orioles Crown
George Brunet- 1964 Topps, Orioles Crown
Luis DeLeon- Orioles Crown
Howie Fox- 1954 Topps
Luis Garcia- 2002 Fleer Box Score, Upper Deck 40 man
Jason Hammel- 2012 Topps Update
Lou Jackson- 1964 Topps
Stan Jefferson- Orioles Crown
Mark Lewis- 2001 Pacific
Matt Lindstrom- 2012 Topps Update
Ed Lopat- Orioles Crown
Terry Mathews- 1998 Pacific Online
Darren O'Day- 2012 Topps Update
Chuck Oertel- Orioles Crown
Ronny Paulino- 2012 Topps Update
Carl Powis- Orioles Crown
Vern Stephens- 1954 Topps or Wilson Franks, 1955 Bowman
Pedro Strop- 2012 Topps Update
Joe Taylor- Orioles Crown
Valmy Thomas- Orioles Crown
Marv Throneberry- Orioles Crown
David Wells- 1996 Flair, Fleer Update, Ultra, Upper Deck Update, 1997 Fleer, Score, Topps
Jaret Wright- 2007 Topps, Topps Heritage, Upper Deck

To briefly explain the misspelled/made up title of these weekly posts: Every Friday, I profile a former Oriole who has passed away. I've substituted the word unpossible for impossible as an homage to a line from "The Simpsons". Young Ralph Wiggum, who is not very smart, says "Me fail English? That's unpossible." 

Taking Care of J.C.

When I wrote about J.C.'s Orioles debut back in mid-August, I had hoped to get him to sign his 2012 Norfolk Tides card in person at an Orioles game, but that never happened. His tenure with the Orioles lasted just about two weeks, from August 13th-27th (the O's were out of town for about half of that time), and was cut short due to his relatively ineffective work out of the Orioles bullpen as their situational lefty, or LOOGY if you prefer. He appeared in five games, totaling four innings and pitched to the tune of a 6.75 ERA. He gave up seven hits including one home-run, walked one and struck out one.

Since I wasn't able to get J.C.'s signature during his time in town and he didn't latch on with another team at the end of the season, I was resigned to buy his autograph online. He has a number of certified autographs, which really helps out a collector like me, but none of them are particularly attractive, and pretty much all of them are plastered with a sticker signature. This Upper Deck ProSigs Diamond Collection certified autograph was one of the better looking of the bunch, mainly because the grey sticker kind of blends in with the grey background, although my scanner makes the sticker stand out much more than it does in person. Anyway, his name is now knocked off my need list and I'm back down to needing a single autograph for my collection to, once again, sit at 100% complete. Anyone have an extra Dick Luebke autograph sitting around?

Moving the Collection Backwards

I'm totally relatively kind of fine when I add newly debuted Orioles to my need list. While I try to collect as many Orioles minor league autographs as possibly, sometimes players bypass the two affiliates closest to me (the AA Bowie Baysox and hi-A Frederick Keys) and go directly to AAA Norfolk and on to Baltimore as was the case with two of the newest Orioles, Luis Exposito and Bill Hall. I will gladly trade for autographs of players on the Tides' roster, but I refuse to buy autographs of AAA guys who might never make it to Baltimore. Even though I'm highly-focused on my Orioles autograph collection, I won't take it that far.

 Anyway, moving along to the point of this post, I recently found out that two of my rarer Orioles signatures  seem to not be of who I thought they were. A knowledgeable long-time collector of rare baseball autographs recently alerted me that my Carl Powis and Dick Luebke autographs are no good.

Many of the long-ago Orioles' autographs are tough to come by, and tougher still to find another signature to compare them with if I do happen across one for sale, so many times I'm flying blind when it comes to knowing if a signature is actually that of the player. I always do a google search to see if I can find a comparison, but when I can't I'm generally left to rely on the honesty of sellers. Most of the time it works out for the best, but occasionally, it doesn't. I think sometimes it's an honest mistake while other times I come across an under-handed dealer.

According to the collector who knows these things, Carl Powis's autograph looks nothing like this, so this is likely a forgery.

While this is an authentic autograph of Roy Luebke, not Dick Raymond (or as I thought) Ray Luebke.

Long story short, these guys are back on my need list and my collection is likely to be under 100% again for some time. While Luis Exposito and Bill Hall should be easy enough to knock off, I have no such hopes for Luebke or Powis.

TTM Success- Joe Gaines

Joe Gaines 1963-64

Joe was traded by the Reds to the Orioles for Dick Luebke and minor leaguer Williard Oplinger on December 15, 1962 and was a fourth oufielder for his one and a half seasons in Baltimore. He played all three outfield positions but spent most of his time in left. He appeared in 82 games and hit .263 over his time in the orange and black. On June 15, 1964, the Orioles traded him to the Colt .45's for Johnny Weekly, who never appeared in a game for the O's and was returned to the Colt .45's a few weeks later. So it seems that the O's traded Gaines to Houston for nothing. I guess that some money must have changed hands for this to make sense.

Overall, Joe played in 362 Major League games over seven seasons for three different teams. It looks like he spent most of his career as a backup outfielder but it's still cool that he made it to the Bigs.