Welcome and a very pleasant good day to tall!

I am Delighted you have joined us because I believe we have a dandy for you today.

We are gifted the pleasure of leaving reality, donning a cape, and flying side by side with our Baseball hero's of yesteryear. 

Lets welcome the man who paints our magical journey every time we look at his Baseball Comic Art, The Creator of Pop Fly Pop Shop, Mr. Daniel Jacob Horine.

Daniel's comic designs transform Superman and Spiderman into Dale Murphy and Rickey Henderson. Which makes me ask, could Dale and Rickey take Superman and Batman in a comic world battle?

We asked Rickey, "Rickey is the best, Rickey is the best, nothing is impossible for Rickey," .... We would never doubt you Rickey. 

You can't tell the players without a program so lets meet the team.

The backbone behind the magical art that Daniel creates would be his family. A foundation stronger than the He-Man family tree. (PLUG: You should see his He-Man MLB logo artwork on IG @danieljacobthemaker) 

Like all winning teams you need a superhero at each position to make the dream happen. Daniel credits his wife in all he does and he spoke very highly of his little Superhero. His  talented son carries a large cape and plays a large part in the production process that involves transportation and application.... and he just turned age 4. (Look out Juan Soto :)

Daniel was adopted by a wonderful family and grew up in the LA area moving from West Covina to Ventura roughly 10 years ago, but always lived where you would call The Dodgers your hometown heroes.

When I asked Daniel who his favorite Dodger was, he was quick to reference the early '80s and how wonderful the days were when we would sit down and listen to Vin Scully call a game on the radio, better than you can see it on tv today.

Daniel called the Dodgers his hometown team, but following a legend through his youth turned normality into a real life comic book journey. Those of you who grew up in the '80s know that WGN and TBS provided a looking glass into other parts of the country. 

The evolution of cable allowed us to discover the outside baseball world and transformed the ink from our newspaper box scores into actual baseball players bigger than life.  

Daniel's looking glass discovered the legend of The Atlanta Braves Dale Murphy. At some point the story goes from Daniel Chasing Dale to Dale becoming part of the Danny Horine story. Dale Murphy meets Daniel Horine is a story straight out of Hollywood, well, it's actually straight out of Beckett Price guide (I will provide a link below). The Dale Murphy and Danny Horine story will provide smiles and laughter, and I highly recommend you continue reading. 

With that said, we are going to slice a moment from that time and talk about Daniel's favorite baseball game he attended. As Daniel explains, "it was kind of two games in one, but spread out over time." 

Daniel's family got tickets to see the Braves and we are off to Dodger stadium! 

This is a big day in our life kids, this is the very first time Daniel gets to see Dale in person! 

It was all mapped out, no detail left to be spared for the occasion that would soon be a National Holiday. Daniel had his stack of 100 DIFFERENT Dale Murphy cards excited for Dale to sit down next to him and sign them all. 

As Daniel enters the stadium he hears the crack of the bat before peering over the light blue Dodger seats and blinded by the bright green grass. Batting practice had just started, and there he was, standing by the visitors dugout..... Dale Murphy. 

No sooner did Daniel spot #3 he then spotted the forming line to obtain the greatest single object on earth, a Dale Murphy autograph, the ink from his signature literally glowed. Daniel got his Flash Gordon sprint on running across 10 sections of stands to claim his spot in line. 

One by one, kids ran by him celebrating their anointed baseballs and baseball cards. Even a couple adults walked by looking like they experienced joy from another world. 

Here we go, 2 more kids, 1 more, and then.... the moment he had waited for all his life, with his heart in his throat, Daniel locks eyes with The Murph, extends his cards in one hand, and his pen in the other ....

Dale Murphy, "Sorry kids, Gotta get ready for the game!"

(Silence)...... 

(Shock sets in)

(Emotional build up.) 

There was no joy at Dodger Stadium that day..... for anyone in section 104.

If you would have asked his parents that evening how the plan worked out, they would have said, the story was more about how the world had just ended.

Ah! but a beautiful thing did happen that day, a wonderful story started to unfold, a story far too powerful for comic books and fairy tales, keep following along kids. 

On that day, God recognized a special love, a loud passionate cry (Daniel's parents would say, YEP! The entire stadium heard that passionate cry).

Daniel received a lifetime gift that day that still resonates loudly in his voice as he shared his story with me. 

At this point in the story though..........  Dreams, Crushed. Period.

This time the mapped out plan to meet Dale was not in Daniel's hands, in fact literal true baseball history was unfolding. 

All of us have a passion for baseball and anyone who is reading this has baseball in their home in some form or another. Even if it's just baseball on the TV a lot, we have a desire to get closer to the game and become part of the game. When baseball gods touch us, we all recognize it, and that moment never leaves us for life. 

A few years had passed, and Dale Murphy is now with the Colorado Rockies. 

Daniel's parents once again got tickets to go see him play. 

This is the first time seeing Dale in person since "The Incident." 

As they arrived for BP, a family honored tradition, Daniel walked down to toward the LF foul pole and right off the bat, no pun at all, literally right off the bat, a foul ball came his way. 

As Daniel explained with laughter, "that's the only time I ever caught anything at that stadium." This was starting out a lot better than the previous attempt to get Murph's auto.

It was all happening so fast, like a well written script, he looks toward the dugout, and it was happening again. In the exact same spot as the scene of the "The Incident", there was Dale and of course a line is starting to form. 

Once again Daniel sprinted to claim his spot in line to obtain all that is good in this world. This time it was a complete success, it finally happened. Daniel floated back to his seat and spent the next three hours looking at the Dale Murphy autograph on the foul ball he just caught.

Two days later, as he would do daily, Daniel got the LA Times and checked the box scores to see how Dale did. He would always clip out the games where Dale had a big day. Dale had the day off, and Daniel would wait for the next day's box score. The next day came, and Dale didn't play that game either. A couple more days of that and sure enough Murph announced his retirement. It didn't take long for it to sink in with Daniel. 

"By some happy, lucky. cosmic, random accidents, I caught a ball, had Murph sign it, and saw his last at bat."

Congratulations on being part of baseball history Daniel! Clearly Dale could not hang up his spikes until he signed your ball.

What a fabulous story, and there is much more to it, make sure you check it out. 

Transitioning back to Daniel's art, I asked Daniel to share a little of his journey to get to POP Fly Pop Sop.

The following will resonate with a lot of people out there and I know Daniel will be happy to hear that, because in his words, "The desire to resonate with people is my ultimate goal."

 

At an early age it was vividly clear that Daniel had an extraordinary talent to put his visions on paper for all to see, 

"There was never a moment in life that I didn't see myself as an artist, and I don't remember a time not doing it."

The Beauty within this Baseball Art community has been the constant desire to support others. Personally I have experienced it with a future guest and it was no shock when Daniel explained how a conversation with a friend helped him sway his decision to open shop. 

Daniel had done a Murph comic baseball art design and a friend who admired it, asked him to do a Will Clark, and it quickly unfolded..... Bill from Modern Baseball Art, we salute you for your positivity toward others. 

Pop Fly Pop Shop celebrated its opening on June 12th. Every Baseball Superhero comic print is sold for one week and then when they are gone, they are gone.  

Daniel's mentioned his thought process as, "I wanted to make sure that the output was consistent, urgent, and collectible. 

Daniel's desire to resonate with everyone who gets his art in their hand is abundantly clear to his collectors, and Daniel said when speaking of his work, "I want it to be nostalgic and relate to your childhood experience, it has to be authentic." 

"We spend our first ten years of life being a kid, we spend the next 10 years doing all we can to separate ourselves from being that kid, and then spend the rest of your life trying to get back to those first 10 years, its all about finding your youth." 

I was about to say Daniel is a wealth of positivity, feeding knowledge of his art experiences. It is more than that, when he speaks it can be related to so many aspects of life, furthering the understanding of the passion bucket he pours into is work. Daniel pours a little of his soul into each design and well, that resonates with us Daniel. 

Daniel is the bug spray for a creativity block bug. Daniel said, "I am a strong believer of thinking should not replace doing." 

The experience I had talking with Daniel left me a better person, why? Because he allowed me to see a different perspective. My views are never boxed in, yet others can still show you different avenues you just have not taken yet. Many feel I see so many things others do not, yet listening to Daniel talk just opened more avenues of creativity for me, so I am better off for his time.

"Do not be hung up on quality when you are reaching for better",  as Daniel explained to me, "Quantity can get you one step closer to the perfect piece, and quantity over time can become quality as it becomes part of a whole collection." (Again, great life advice.)

When I received my first order from Daniel, I was blown away by the packaging. Later that night I had tweeted that you know you have something special in hand when the packaging is better than most products you purchase. 

Daniel said, "I wanted the packaging to feel like you just came from the comic store in 1980, even bringing the experience down to the brown paper bag the comic comes in."

Personally I believe we all desire for accomplishments in life and not always know when we achieve one of our goals.

 Daniel said, "Its all about getting back to the height of the junk wax era." 

As someone who is constantly trying to get back there as well, coming from someone who never owned a comic book, that is where your art takes me, so on behalf of anyone who has the pleasure of owning your artwork, we thank you Daniel. You hit your target.

In closing, I left the best for last. As this journey continues to unfold for Pop Fly Pop Shop, and we will check back down the line as he has some new tricks up his sleeve for us all, I wanted to know what Daniel's proudest accomplishment had been to this point. 

That was the last question I had, but when we first started talking, that was the first item he spoke about, so it was clear to me that I did not even have to ask. 

"More than anything, more than Baseball, more than Comics, my heart is about my Family, that is my legacy." - Daniel Jacob Horine 

We are all grateful for your time Daniel. Thank You!

Dale Murphy gets to meet Daniel link.

https://www.beckett.com/news/reverse-negative-dale-murphy-autograph/

Thank you and please join us in the not to distant future, as we sit down with Stand Out artist.

Kevin Gust. Until then, Happy Baseball Art Collecting!