This guy.  I’m going to blame my fascination with Daniel Hernandez on COVID-19. 

Remember we couldn’t leave the house, so we were bingeing on things like “Tiger King”.  This is testament to the fact that we’d be watching almost anything.  As a lover of documentaries, I was all-up-in-it for every show about the killer football player Aaron Hernandez.  Which means my TV then recommended another Hernandez documentary “69: The Saga of Danny Hernandez”.  Algorithms. 

Now, obsessing over a handsome football player and real-life murder mystery with subsequent gay overtones and jail-mate interviews was quite different than watching my fellow Puerto Rican (I’m one-quarter …LOL) rapper known as 6ix9ine. 

Transfixed watching his saga, I just could not believe this guy.  His chutzpah, his canniness, the manipulations, the transformation, his drive, the puppeteering, the money he made, the feuds and controversies … and what moral compass? All wrapped up in “I give zero fucks”.   

Me, always a sucker for any pop-culture rabbit-hole, especially during the pandemic, I was sitting in the dark downloading his music, checking on his chart positions (and entering them in my iTunes interface because I’m OCD that way).  All the time, thinking, “He has hypnotized the world.  7 Billboard Top 40 hits, 11 R&B Top 40 Hits, 17 International Top 40 Hits.  My younger friends were surprised that I played his songs during game night and that I had an autographed photo on display.  “You’re the only person I know who likes him" HA! 

When I found that he had such an interesting graffiti-like autograph, was prone to signing in colored ink pens and usually signed very interesting illustrations or ultra-colorful photographs, I had to get one. 

The first one I got (with the purple background) came with a COA and was only $18! Yeah. No. “If it sounds too good to be true” … you know how the saying goes.  The COA was a piece of paper included with the photo that didn’t even have his name on it until I wrote it in for record-keeping purposes. 

The second one I bought (with the black background) came with a Beckett COA for $85. Authentic.  I’ve learned now that Daniel has three easy tells on authentic autographs.  The bottom of the T goes diagonally upward to start the top of the E, the 9 loops under and backwards, the height of all letters and numbers is consistent – almost always in a straight line – and although he may lift the pen once or twice, the whole signature looks contiguous. 

Oh … and those CDs of his #1 song “TROLLZ”, always on ebay, which are supposedly autographed by both him and Nicki Minaj.  Does anybody believe those are authentic?