MIGHTY DUCK NOTEBOOK / ROBYN NORWOOD : Ducks Find Secret to Good Merchandising

So, you’re going to a Mighty Duck game and you’d like a little souvenir. Maybe you can afford something a bit more expensive than the 10-buck duck call.

How about a $350 goalie stick autographed by each player on the Ducks’ opening-night roster? A $400 signed set of season-ticket replicas? A $600 team-autographed jersey? Or the $700 inaugural team autographed-puck set?

Seven hundred dollars for 27 pieces of vulcanized rubber signed by the castoffs of 24 other NHL teams?

These are the prices Disney Sports Enterprises is asking, and getting.

The line to get into the Mighty Ducks Team Store at Anaheim Arena is sometimes 40 deep during Duck games, though most of the purchases are of the T-shirt, baseball cap, keychain, coffee cup, baby-bib variety.

But the limited-edition autographed Mighty Duck inaugural team collectibles have sold, too, as the team tries to cash in on the clamor for first-year memorabilia.

Are the items worth it?

No, says Bill Adams, who appraises sports memorabilia for Leland’s, a New York dealer. He estimates the value of the $600 official jersey signed by the opening-night players and Coach Ron Wilson at $100-$200 less than the Ducks are asking.

“If it was not worn in a game, it’s probably worth $400 or $500, and in a few years it will drop to $200 or $300,” he said. “With any expansion team there’s a lot of excitement the first year. It starts at a premium and actually would slide in value the next few years. It wouldn’t be until well down the line that it would take off again--like 20 years, once the team has established itself, especially if the team had future success.”

But Chris Sanders, manager of the Field of Dreams sports memorabilia stores at MainPlace and South Coast Plaza, says the jerseys signed by Guy Hebert, Anatoli Semenov and teammates have a retail value of $700-$800, and the ones he has had in his stores have sold.

By comparison, a jersey signed by Wayne Gretzky might go for $400 if it wasn’t worn in a game. A jersey worn by Gretzky in a game might sell for $8,000-$15,000.

What will the Duck memorabilia be worth down the road?

“It depends on how many are on the market,” Sanders said. (The Ducks say their high-end items are limited editions of 250-1,000). “With all the hype, I see them going nowhere but up. They won’t be worth more in two or three years, but in 10 or 15 years, when the team’s been established a while, I can see them being a quality item.”

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What Disney is doing is relatively new in pro sports: The team is claiming the profits usually made by collectors and autograph seekers.

“We knew these things would be a hot item, and wanted to be involved financially,” said Andy Roundtree, vice president of finance and administration for Disney Sports Enterprises. “You go in the parking lot, and there are all these guys with sticks. Some want them for themselves, but we have a problem with somebody who takes a stick like that and sells it for 500 bucks, so you don’t get anything for it and they’re making money off you.”

So the Ducks decided to make the money themselves, enlisting players in an unusual arrangement under which they give players 50% of the profit added by their signatures.

That’s about the only way you’d get professional athletes to stop and sign their autograph a wrist-cramping 200 times on goalie sticks as they leave practice.

“Other teams should be doing this,” said Ted Saskin, NHL director of licensing. “It’s the appropriate thing to do; unfortunately, not all the other teams are as enlightened as the Mighty Ducks.”

The team says the players have been “unbelievably cooperative,” about the constant signing demands and team captain Troy Loney says the agreement is good for everyone.

The Ducks aren’t perennial All-Stars, and their autographs have never been so sought after. “It’s incredible,” defenseman Bobby Dollas said. “I never thought they’d get so much for them, but more power to them, if people want to buy it.”

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Those who bought programs at the inaugural game Oct. 8 against Detroit in hopes of selling them at a profit one day might as well put them in the recycling bin.

The Ducks have reprinted the programs and are still selling them in their stores and through their new catalogue. There are more than 50,000 in circulation.