I’ll never forget the day: June 1st, 2007. I was playing tennis with my friend Peter, at ClubSport in Pleasanton. I had just opened a new can of Dunlop balls. We were hitting ground strokes to warm up. I bent down to pick up one of the balls. And there it was. . . a fucked up tennis ball.
I have been playing tennis since I was eleven. I have seen a lot of tennis balls. But I have never seen this. It’s the one on the right.
[missing image]
My first reaction was “This is a lucky omen.” Sure enough, I won. I have never lost a set using my lucky fucked up tennis ball. I retired it undefeated.
My second thought was “I wonder if this is worth anything.” There’s no point in having something special if you can’t sell it to a stranger. But how do you put a value on something like this? I became curious, and nothing good can come from that.
If this were a stamp, or a dollar bill, I imagine it would be worth a lot, and people would be eager to own it. I’m not so sure there’s a ready market for fucked up tennis balls. Maybe it needs a little extra. For example, I could autograph one of the other balls, and that would add another dollar to the value. I could take the third ball, rub it against my own balls, and include a signed statement to that effect, just to increase its conversational value. I’ll even throw in the container for free. It’s good for storing things, such as tennis balls.
You can almost imagine the conversational value once you have the three balls mounted on some sort of display rack in your living room:
You: Have you seen my special tennis balls?
Friend: What’s so special about tennis balls?
You: Well, for one thing, look at the label on this one on the right.
Friend: Wow. That’s fucked up.
You: The original owner of these balls never lost a set. They are undefeated.
Friend: They must be lucky or something.
You: The original owner was the guy who does that Dilbert comic strip. He signed this other ball, see?
Friend: Well, I’ll be darned.
You: This third ball is the most special of all.
Friend: How so?
You: The Dilbert guy rubbed his own balls on it.
Friend: You magnificent bastard.
You: That’s nothing. I got the container for free. I keep my coins in it.
Friend: I. . . I’m speechless.
You: By the way, your wife had her hand on my leg all through dinner.
As you can see from that hypothetical conversation, you would be able to win almost any conversation involving these tennis balls.
I could put these tennis balls on eBay, but first let’s see what value you, my blog-reading savants, can collectively come up with for them. What is an honest price that you, or someone you have talked to personally about them, would pay?
I assume the answer for most people is “zero.” But maybe there’s a collector out there who will surprise us.