Not involving an autograph request, but still worth mentioning...I had just entered Wrigley Field on a summer day in 1997 to take my spot on the thrid base foul line to "play the line"...ballhawk-speak for catching line drives, bouncers, and rollers along the wall. A security guard that I know and I start talking, and the stadium (fortunately) is almost empty, as the gates just opened a few minutes earlier. Kevin Orie (Cubs 3B) smacks a line drive that appears on target to bean the guard. I shout for him to move, he freezes, but the balll detours around his noggin, and, expecting that it was going to hit him I don't have my mitt ready, and I "catch" it...right in the family jewels. I bend over in agony after the direct hit, and, with the nearly-empty stadium, my howls of pain reverberate across all of Wrigley, causing players on the field, many of whom I knew, to stop and look.
Despite all the pain, I was thinking clearly enough to start wondering "where's the ball"? After all, if the line drive was gonna make me unable to father any children, I'd at least like to have the ball as a consolation prize. I agonizingly shift around in place, see no baseball on the ground, and then feel something in the affected area...the ball was lodged between my crotch and my left leg. I grabbed it, held it up, began cracking up through my moans of pain, and saw more than a few snickering faces in blue BP uniforms looking over, as well. And, since the ball never touched the ground, it was a legitimate (albeit very painful) catch!! And...the type of catch I'd never see Ryne Sandberg, Mark Grace or Sammy Sosa make. I had Orie sign the ball the following year when the Cubs played the White sox in interleague games at New Comiskey. I told him the story, and he smirked and said "oh, that was you"?

Dave M.
Chicago area