Arod game used bats

[justinlm24]

With all the scrutiny surround A-rod these days. What would you guys say a typical arod gamer should sell for? I am kind of contemplating picking one up, but the prices always seem so overdone it's almost not worth it. I've seen game used yankee bats listed around $850-$900. Autographed models as high as $2000. And I am eying an autogrpahed HR bat as well. I am leary to spend that kind of money considering the whole steroids scandal. Just trying to get some thoughts from fellow collectors....

[Sheffield11]

I have a nice 07 signed arod game used bat with an mvp loa. I can get it to you for much less then $2000. my email is abragg112@aol.com let me know

[suave1477]

Justin in all honesty the whole steiroids thing is going to blow over for several reasons.

1) AROD has another 9 years to go - which means by the time he is done the whole roids thing will be done and forgotten about.
2) The blow has been softened in the public eye for coming out and apologizing. - even though yes it is still in the back of all are heads (that is why prices are dropping a bit plus bad economy) but because he came out and admitted it, it will eventually be over looked
3) You cannot deny his due, especially since he is just about breaking every possible record there is and he is doing it in record time (youngest to break most records)

THIS IS THE PERFECT TIME NOW TO PICK UP AROD ITEMS - IT IS A BUYERS MARKET.

In a few years the roid scandal will be forgotten, the economoy will be up, and more records will be broken.

Just based on his numbers today if he was to retire he is a sure fire hall of famer. Imagine he has another 9 years to go to add to those numbers.

So everything will for sure go back up!!

[justinlm24]

I agree with you, but I still think the prices are overstated. The average selling price of an arod gamer is around $900 from what I have seen. Then one with an autograph goes up to $1500-$2000. I just think that is quite a jump for an autograph. Considering some of the autographed bats I've seen show significantly less use that the ones not autographed. So how do you justify the $500+ jump in price? I'd much rather have a bat pounded with use without an autograph than one autographed with light use. And there are so many of his bats out there it's crazy. Maybe I just see things differently.

[suave1477]

I agree with you, but I still think the prices are overstated. The average selling price of an arod gamer is around $900 from what I have seen. Then one with an autograph goes up to $1500-$2000. I just think that is quite a jump for an autograph. Considering some of the autographed bats I've seen show significantly less use that the ones not autographed. So how do you justify the $500+ jump in price? I'd much rather have a bat pounded with use without an autograph than one autographed with light use. And there are so many of his bats out there it's crazy. Maybe I just see things differently.

Justin I understand what your saying. I think for the most part why his bats jump so high with his autograph is usually it comes from one of his sources that sells his items. So people will feel more comfortable with knowing it is coming from him.
So when you see a bat with out his normal sources paperwork I think people feel a bit more reserved to just jump out there and buy it.

[Sheffield11]

Justin I understand what your saying. I think for the most part why his bats jump so high with his autograph is usually it comes from one of his sources that sells his items. So people will feel more comfortable with knowing it is coming from him.
So when you see a bat with out his normal sources paperwork I think people feel a bit more reserved to just jump out there and buy it.

Thats exactly why the autographed ones go for more, It is the best way of authentication, and arod uses a ton of different bats so many real ones arent very pounded. Other players such as cano, jeter, pudge, and giambi have been know to use arods bats.

[mr.miracle]

Suave:

Although I am not really in either boat on the whole A-Roid discussion, I am not so sure it is an absolute slam dunk that he will break every record. See the story below. He turns 34 in July an age that most players begin to decline sometimes very sharply as this issue points out off the cliff at least in terms of power. Who knows what the future holds but unless he wants to go back to the Pharmacy and start loading up again, the only guy who was showing the kind of productivity necessary to keep jacking homers into his 40's was Bonds and we all kind of know which direction his legacy has been headed.

Originally Published: February 23, 2009
BP Daily: A-Rod likely to miss HR mark


Comment (http://myespn.go.com/conversation/story?id=3927591) Email (http://insider.espn.go.com/mlb/insider/news/story?id=3927591#) Print (http://proxy.espn.go.com/espn/print?id=3927591&type=story) Share (javascript:void(0);) var stobj = SHARETHIS.addEntry({ title:"Silver:%20A-Rod%20likely%20to%20fall%20short%20of%20Bonds", url:"http://insider.espn.go.com/mlb/insider/news/story?id=3927591", published: "2009-02-26" }); stobj.attachButton(document.getElementById("espnstlink"));
http://a.espncdn.com/i/insider/insider_95.png (http://insider.espn.go.com/insider/index)
By Nate Silver
Baseball Prospectus



We're less than two years removed from Barry Bonds' somber, strange and soulless quest to break Henry Aaron's lifetime home run record. It was a spectacle most sports fans -- even the few like me who were relatively sympathetic toward Bonds' plight -- would go to great lengths to avoid experiencing again.


Gene Woj with Nate Silver

var podplayer = new flashObj();podplayer.flashFile = "http://assets.espn.go.com/swf/espnradio/09/audio_player_circular_v2.swf";podplayer.flashVars = "&soundLink=http://podloc.andohs.net/dloadTrack.mp3?prm=2596xhttp://query-origin.andohs.net/8000A6/content-root3.andomedia.com/origin/mp3/espnradio/woj/woj090222.mp3";podplayer.width = "86";podplayer.height = "70";podplayer.scale = "noorder";podplayer.salign="lt";podplayer.wmode = "transparent";podplayer.allowScriptAccess = "Always";podplayer.allowNetworking = "All";podplayer.DenyIEdl = "TRUE";podplayer.FlashVer = 8;podplayer.cabVersion = "8,0,0,0";podplayer.altTxt = "";podplayer.ID = "flashPodcastSwf";podplayer.render(true);
Gene Wojciechowski catches up with Nate Silver of Baseball Prospectus about how he created the PECOTA rankings, how he picked the election and more.
More Podcasts » (http://sports.espn.go.com/stations/player?context=podcast)




Unfortunately, it seems history is getting ready to repeat itself. Alex Rodriguez already has hit 553 home runs, by far the most for a player who just completed his age-32 season. He needs only 203 more to surpass Aaron and 210 to best Bonds. Rodriguez has hit an average of 42 home runs per season since joining the New York Yankees in 2003. If he maintains that pace, he'll overtake Bonds' mark on the last day of the 2013 season. And he seems to have plenty of time to spare, being under contract with the Yankees through 2017.
But player haters can rejoice: Rodriguez's breaking the career home run record is nowhere near the foregone conclusion it appears to be. The reason boils down to that fine print you ignored when you invested your daughter's college fund in Citibank stock a few years ago: Past performance is no guarantee of future results.

Rodriguez certainly has been among the best players in baseball over the past couple of years. And chemically enhanced or not, there are a lot of indicators that ordinarily would be favorable toward his continuing to perform well. Among them:

http://a.espncdn.com/i/headshots/mlb/players/65/3115.jpg (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?playerId=3115) Alex Rodriguez (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?playerId=3115)

#13 3B
New York Yankees

2008 STATS

GM138
HR35
RBI103
R104
OBP.392
AVG.302

All-around athleticism. Rodriguez is far from a one-dimensional player. At an age when most guys refrain from challenging themselves on the basepaths, he still averages about 20 stolen bases a year. He plays a fairly difficult defensive position and plays it pretty well. He is a complete hitter, able to draw walks and hit for average as well as aim for the fences. Multidimensional players, generally speaking, age better than unidimensional ones.
The Benjamin Button Principle. This is the concept that the beginning of a player's life sometimes resembles the end -- guys who start their careers with a bang sometimes tend to end it that way. Rodriguez, who arguably was already the best player in baseball by the age of 20, started his career like few others in history; he has a better-than-usual chance of finishing it that way.
Perverse Incentives, Part I. Rodriguez stands to make a $30 million bonus if he breaks the all-time home run record. If he gets close, those are 30 million reasons for him to extend his career until he does, rather than consider early retirement.
On the other hand, another set of indicators implies uncertainty in Rodriguez's future:
The aging curve. The steepest part of the aging curve -- when a hitter experiences the most decline in his abilities -- tends to come between ages 32 and 34. Rodriguez, who turned 33 this past July, now is about halfway through that period. And he hasn't come away completely unscathed. He hit 30 home runs in the first half of the 2007 season and 24 in the second half, then 19 home runs in the first half of the 2008 season but 16 after the break. That could be just a fluke -- or it could mean he has started on a fairly steep downward trajectory.
http://a.espncdn.com/i/mag/design08/images/headers/also_see_IL.gif
Shaun Assael: A-Rod and the HOF (http://sports.espn.go.com/espnmag/story?id=3896763)
Peter Keating: A-Rod's fiscal future (http://sports.espn.go.com/espnmag/story?id=3897257)

Injury risk. Although Rodriguez generally has been the picture of health, that trend somewhat reversed itself in 2008, when he missed 24 games, the most in any season since 1999. Injury problems sometimes can be compounding, especially when a player reaches his mid-30s. There also is some anecdotal evidence that players who have experimented with steroids are more inclined to have chronic injury problems.
Perverse Incentives, Part II. Unless he was investing with Bernie Madoff, Rodriguez already has all the money he'll need for life, and it's highly unlikely he'll ever be on the market again. Most of us, given a guaranteed salary for the next nine years that requires us to do nothing other than show up and put on a uniform, might become somewhat lackadaisical in our work habits. Many professional athletes are different -- but others aren't.
The favorable and unfavorable indicators are reflected to some degree in Rodriguez's series of PECOTA comparables (http://www.baseballprospectus.com/pecota/rodrial01.php). His list includes many Hall of Famers, such as Dave Winfield, George Brett, Frank Robinson, Reggie Jackson, Tony Perez and Hank Aaron himself, who were elite athletes late into their 30s or even their early 40s.
But it also includes some other players whose careers did not end all that gracefully. First are the guys who succumbed to injury, like Jeff Bagwell and Albert Belle. Next are a couple of players who, like Rodriguez, were known or suspected to use performance-enhancing drugs: Sammy Sosa is A-Rod's No. 1 comparable, for instance, and Ken Caminiti his No. 4. Finally, there are players like Ryne Sandberg whose skills simply atrophied sooner or more suddenly than expected. http://a.espncdn.com/i/mag/design08/images/headers/insider_IL.gif
Peter Keating: No, no. A-Rod will get to 763. (http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/blog/index?entryID=3930783&name=keating_peter)


Chasing Bonds

Will Alex Rodriguez catch Barry Bonds? A PECOTA (http://www.baseballprospectus.com/glossary/index.php?mode=viewstat&stat=476)-based analysis doesn't think so.

A-Rod yearly projectionsSeasonHome RunsCareer2009335862010306162011276432012256682013 18686201416702201512714201687222017472620183729201 91730
I took Rodriguez's top 20 PECOTA (http://www.baseballprospectus.com/glossary/index.php?mode=viewstat&stat=476)-comparable players and averaged their performances over each remaining season of their careers. Actually, the process was a little more complicated than that (each comparable's performance was adjusted for his park and league context, as well as his previous track record, and we had to make an accommodation for guys like Manny Ramirez who made A-Rod's comparables list but have yet to conclude their own careers). But the basic idea is simple: Comparables like Frank Robinson, who aged well, have a favorable effect on Rodriguez's forecast, and players like Caminini just the opposite one.
PECOTA's best guess is that Rodriguez will finish with 730 lifetime home runs, running out of steam after another three or four seasons and leaving him just shy of the marks established by Aaron and Bonds. Of course, there is a lot of uncertainty in this estimate. If Rodriguez follows the path charted by Aaron or Frank Robinson, he could finish with well in excess of 800 home runs (and possibly as many as 900). On the other hand, if he draws Albert Belle's ping-pong ball, he might not top 600. Overall, the system puts Rodriguez's chances of surpassing Aaron at only about four in 10 and of surpassing Bonds closer to three in 10.
One needs to remember the ways Aaron and Bonds finished out their careers were far from typical. At least as common are folks like Jimmie Foxx (before Rodriguez, the fastest player to 500 home runs), who hit just 34 home runs after turning 33. Only about a dozen players have hit 200 or more home runs from their age-33 seasons onward; Bonds and Aaron are the only two to have hit at least 300.
In other words, Rodriguez still has his work cut out for him if he wants to pass Bonds and Aaron. Say what you will about his past performance -- for him to get across the finish line still would represent a remarkable accomplishment.

[mr.miracle]

http://insider.espn.go.com/mlb/insider/news/story?id=3927591

Here are the rest of the links for review.

[suave1477]

Suave:

Although I am not really in either boat on the whole A-Roid discussion, I am not so sure it is an absolute slam dunk that he will break every record. See the story below. He turns 34 in July an age that most players begin to decline sometimes very sharply as this issue points out off the cliff at least in terms of power. Who knows what the future holds but unless he wants to go back to the Pharmacy and start loading up again, the only guy who was showing the kind of productivity necessary to keep jacking homers into his 40's was Bonds and we all kind of know which direction his legacy has been headed.

Originally Published: February 23, 2009
BP Daily: A-Rod likely to miss HR mark


Comment (http://myespn.go.com/conversation/story?id=3927591) Email (http://insider.espn.go.com/mlb/insider/news/story?id=3927591#) Print (http://proxy.espn.go.com/espn/print?id=3927591&type=story) Share (http://javascript<b></b>:void(0);) var stobj = SHARETHIS.addEntry({ title:"Silver:%20A-Rod%20likely%20to%20fall%20short%20of%20Bonds", url:"http://insider.espn.go.com/mlb/insider/news/story?id=3927591", published: "2009-02-26" }); stobj.attachButton(document.getElementById("espnstlink"));
http://a.espncdn.com/i/insider/insider_95.png (http://insider.espn.go.com/insider/index)
By Nate Silver
Baseball Prospectus



We're less than two years removed from Barry Bonds' somber, strange and soulless quest to break Henry Aaron's lifetime home run record. It was a spectacle most sports fans -- even the few like me who were relatively sympathetic toward Bonds' plight -- would go to great lengths to avoid experiencing again.


Gene Woj with Nate Silver

var podplayer = new flashObj();podplayer.flashFile = "http://assets.espn.go.com/swf/espnradio/09/audio_player_circular_v2.swf";podplayer.flashVars = "&soundLink=http://podloc.andohs.net/dloadTrack.mp3?prm=2596xhttp://query-origin.andohs.net/8000A6/content-root3.andomedia.com/origin/mp3/espnradio/woj/woj090222.mp3";podplayer.width = "86";podplayer.height = "70";podplayer.scale = "noorder";podplayer.salign="lt";podplayer.wmode = "transparent";podplayer.allowScriptAccess = "Always";podplayer.allowNetworking = "All";podplayer.DenyIEdl = "TRUE";podplayer.FlashVer = 8;podplayer.cabVersion = "8,0,0,0";podplayer.altTxt = "";podplayer.ID = "flashPodcastSwf";podplayer.render(true);
Gene Wojciechowski catches up with Nate Silver of Baseball Prospectus about how he created the PECOTA rankings, how he picked the election and more.
More Podcasts » (http://sports.espn.go.com/stations/player?context=podcast)




Unfortunately, it seems history is getting ready to repeat itself. Alex Rodriguez already has hit 553 home runs, by far the most for a player who just completed his age-32 season. He needs only 203 more to surpass Aaron and 210 to best Bonds. Rodriguez has hit an average of 42 home runs per season since joining the New York Yankees in 2003. If he maintains that pace, he'll overtake Bonds' mark on the last day of the 2013 season. And he seems to have plenty of time to spare, being under contract with the Yankees through 2017.
But player haters can rejoice: Rodriguez's breaking the career home run record is nowhere near the foregone conclusion it appears to be. The reason boils down to that fine print you ignored when you invested your daughter's college fund in Citibank stock a few years ago: Past performance is no guarantee of future results.

Rodriguez certainly has been among the best players in baseball over the past couple of years. And chemically enhanced or not, there are a lot of indicators that ordinarily would be favorable toward his continuing to perform well. Among them:

http://a.espncdn.com/i/headshots/mlb/players/65/3115.jpg (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?playerId=3115) Alex Rodriguez (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/profile?playerId=3115)

#13 3B
New York Yankees

2008 STATS

GM138
HR35
RBI103
R104
OBP.392
AVG.302
All-around athleticism. Rodriguez is far from a one-dimensional player. At an age when most guys refrain from challenging themselves on the basepaths, he still averages about 20 stolen bases a year. He plays a fairly difficult defensive position and plays it pretty well. He is a complete hitter, able to draw walks and hit for average as well as aim for the fences. Multidimensional players, generally speaking, age better than unidimensional ones.
The Benjamin Button Principle. This is the concept that the beginning of a player's life sometimes resembles the end -- guys who start their careers with a bang sometimes tend to end it that way. Rodriguez, who arguably was already the best player in baseball by the age of 20, started his career like few others in history; he has a better-than-usual chance of finishing it that way.
Perverse Incentives, Part I. Rodriguez stands to make a $30 million bonus if he breaks the all-time home run record. If he gets close, those are 30 million reasons for him to extend his career until he does, rather than consider early retirement.
On the other hand, another set of indicators implies uncertainty in Rodriguez's future:
The aging curve. The steepest part of the aging curve -- when a hitter experiences the most decline in his abilities -- tends to come between ages 32 and 34. Rodriguez, who turned 33 this past July, now is about halfway through that period. And he hasn't come away completely unscathed. He hit 30 home runs in the first half of the 2007 season and 24 in the second half, then 19 home runs in the first half of the 2008 season but 16 after the break. That could be just a fluke -- or it could mean he has started on a fairly steep downward trajectory.
http://a.espncdn.com/i/mag/design08/images/headers/also_see_IL.gif

Shaun Assael: A-Rod and the HOF (http://sports.espn.go.com/espnmag/story?id=3896763)
Peter Keating: A-Rod's fiscal future (http://sports.espn.go.com/espnmag/story?id=3897257)
Injury risk. Although Rodriguez generally has been the picture of health, that trend somewhat reversed itself in 2008, when he missed 24 games, the most in any season since 1999. Injury problems sometimes can be compounding, especially when a player reaches his mid-30s. There also is some anecdotal evidence that players who have experimented with steroids are more inclined to have chronic injury problems.
Perverse Incentives, Part II. Unless he was investing with Bernie Madoff, Rodriguez already has all the money he'll need for life, and it's highly unlikely he'll ever be on the market again. Most of us, given a guaranteed salary for the next nine years that requires us to do nothing other than show up and put on a uniform, might become somewhat lackadaisical in our work habits. Many professional athletes are different -- but others aren't.
The favorable and unfavorable indicators are reflected to some degree in Rodriguez's series of PECOTA comparables (http://www.baseballprospectus.com/pecota/rodrial01.php). His list includes many Hall of Famers, such as Dave Winfield, George Brett, Frank Robinson, Reggie Jackson, Tony Perez and Hank Aaron himself, who were elite athletes late into their 30s or even their early 40s.
But it also includes some other players whose careers did not end all that gracefully. First are the guys who succumbed to injury, like Jeff Bagwell and Albert Belle. Next are a couple of players who, like Rodriguez, were known or suspected to use performance-enhancing drugs: Sammy Sosa is A-Rod's No. 1 comparable, for instance, and Ken Caminiti his No. 4. Finally, there are players like Ryne Sandberg whose skills simply atrophied sooner or more suddenly than expected. http://a.espncdn.com/i/mag/design08/images/headers/insider_IL.gif

Peter Keating: No, no. A-Rod will get to 763. (http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/blog/index?entryID=3930783&name=keating_peter)

Chasing Bonds

Will Alex Rodriguez catch Barry Bonds? A PECOTA (http://www.baseballprospectus.com/glossary/index.php?mode=viewstat&stat=476)-based analysis doesn't think so.

A-Rod yearly projectionsSeasonHome RunsCareer2009335862010306162011276432012256682013 18686201416702201512714201687222017472620183729201 91730
I took Rodriguez's top 20 PECOTA (http://www.baseballprospectus.com/glossary/index.php?mode=viewstat&stat=476)-comparable players and averaged their performances over each remaining season of their careers. Actually, the process was a little more complicated than that (each comparable's performance was adjusted for his park and league context, as well as his previous track record, and we had to make an accommodation for guys like Manny Ramirez who made A-Rod's comparables list but have yet to conclude their own careers). But the basic idea is simple: Comparables like Frank Robinson, who aged well, have a favorable effect on Rodriguez's forecast, and players like Caminini just the opposite one.
PECOTA's best guess is that Rodriguez will finish with 730 lifetime home runs, running out of steam after another three or four seasons and leaving him just shy of the marks established by Aaron and Bonds. Of course, there is a lot of uncertainty in this estimate. If Rodriguez follows the path charted by Aaron or Frank Robinson, he could finish with well in excess of 800 home runs (and possibly as many as 900). On the other hand, if he draws Albert Belle's ping-pong ball, he might not top 600. Overall, the system puts Rodriguez's chances of surpassing Aaron at only about four in 10 and of surpassing Bonds closer to three in 10.
One needs to remember the ways Aaron and Bonds finished out their careers were far from typical. At least as common are folks like Jimmie Foxx (before Rodriguez, the fastest player to 500 home runs), who hit just 34 home runs after turning 33. Only about a dozen players have hit 200 or more home runs from their age-33 seasons onward; Bonds and Aaron are the only two to have hit at least 300.
In other words, Rodriguez still has his work cut out for him if he wants to pass Bonds and Aaron. Say what you will about his past performance -- for him to get across the finish line still would represent a remarkable accomplishment.

I compltely understand this and I am sure in most cases of course statiscally it is possible he could miss the mark, but that is if he hit his home runs in a conventional consistant matter.
This study is going based on averages.

Which he doesn't. He hits his home runs in spurts. One year he produces 30, the next 50, the next 40. So he is up and down. All he has to do is have 2 more seasons where he hits 50, which I am sure in his body can still produce. He will be on more than enough track to break Bonds.

I mean technically for him not to break bonds he would have to hit maybe 30 this year and next and dwindle down from there which I highly doubt is going to happen.

[Sheffield11]

It would be tough for arod to play another 10 years and not get enough HR to break the record. He only need a little over 200 more. And if you decide to get an unsigned Arod just be careful and get a good one. There was one on ebay recently that looked a little strange to me. It had a ton of pine tar which arod really doesn't do. maybe you can find an authenticated unsigned one a good price.

[mr.miracle]

It would be tough for arod to play another 10 years and not get enough HR to break the record. He only need a little over 200 more. And if you decide to get an unsigned Arod just be careful and get a good one. There was one on ebay recently that looked a little strange to me. It had a ton of pine tar which arod really doesn't do. maybe you can find an authenticated unsigned one a good price.

I know AROD is under contract that long but I would seriously question his ability to continue to play at the age of 43 or 44. This season when started is AROD's 16 year in the majors. Assuming that he would play nine more years that is a 25 year career. In the history of the game, very few players that have gotten their starts at his age have been able to remain productive beyond 20 total years. See Robin Yount, Roberto Alomar, Ken Griffey as a few examples. Whether injuries, etc. the general thinking seems to be that everyone has only so many games and or years in them of production. If you start early, you end early etc.

Not saying he can't do it, it would just be completely off the historical trend of what 16,000 plus major league players have done over the course of their careers. That being said, I suppose it depends on what level of production AROD is satisfied with as he ages and if he can in fact buck the trend and stay healthy.