Fan Base

I met a Realtor at a convention luncheon in the Bay Area who seemed to think I would be impressed by hearing she did all of her business with celebrities. I was half-listening when she said something about specializing in a certain type of celebrity.

“My first clients were Will Clark and Vida Blue,” she said. “Ever heard of them?”  I froze, with my sandwich in hand, mid-way from the table to my face. She was referring to my two favorite players from my all-time favorite team, the San Francisco Giants, late 1980’s version. The sweet-swinging lefty Will the Thrill, and the fire-balling southpaw pitcher Vida Blue. Oh, I’d heard of them alright. They were baseball gods.

I looked at her and nodded slowly, my mouth hanging open.

“This one time at Candlestick Park,” she chortled, “I was in the clubhouse during the seventh inning of a game, getting papers signed by both of them for their separate deals. They kept running back and forth from the what- do-you-call-it, the dugout, like a couple of kids sneaking out of class. What a hoot!”

She looked at me for a moment and said, “Are you okay? You’re drooling on your sandwich.”

I was imagining myself as the Realtor for those Giants players. I would ask Will about his famous inside-out swing; how he managed to always get the sweet spot of his bat on the ball. I would get Vida to show me his two-seam fastball grip and his change-up that buckled the knees of the best hitters in the game.

 “You’re a Giants fan, aren’t you?” the Realtor asked me.

“How can you tell?”

“Oh, just the Giants pen in your shirt pocket, the Giants logo on your jacket, and the fact that you’re wearing a full-on Giants uniform at a real estate convention.”

“Good call,” I said.

She told me she couldn’t care less about baseball; that working with Giants players was just like working with anyone else.

“So what if they’re good at baseball?” she said. “They’re like a bunch of overgrown kids.”

She’s not worthy!  She’s not even a fan!  I thought.  

“But that’s probably why they like me as their Realtor,” she said. “I don’t think they would want me blathering on incessantly about baseball. Celebrities need a Realtor, not a fan.”
 

If that’s the case, I guess I would make a great Realtor for Miley Cyrus.

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Questions or comments? I’d like to hear from you. Call 530-680-0817 or email escrowgo@aol.com. Doug Love is Sales Manager at Century 21 Jeffries Lydon.