Category: Baseballs

Ron Reed… you might not have heard of him. I had not heard of him prior to looking at Hank Aaron’s 715th home run boxscore. Turns out Ron was the winning pitcher in the game The Hammer hit #715. I sent Mr Reed a baseball asking to write a story about the game Hank hit #715. What I received was something I never knew… Ron wrote that he was the winning pitcher the game Hank hit his 500th HR. He was also the winning pitcher the game Hank hit his 600th HR. That means Ron got the win in three big milestone games for Hank Aaron and they were teammates for only 6 years. Hank hit a lot of homers over those 6 years to have Ron be the winning pitcher in each game!

Today I received a baseball signed by Buzz Capra. Buzz was the person who earned the save in the game Hank Aaron hit his 715th homerun breaking Babe Ruth’s record. Buzz wrote how “it was a very electrifying night – tremendous crowd” and how we came in to the game and pitched the last three innings to earn the save. Pretty neat story ball on a great moment in baseball history!

Today I received a neat ball signed by John McDonald. John has the unique experience of being traded for himself. He signed the ball with “Traded For Myself” and wrote the details on each trade on each side of the ball including the date, team, and general manager for that team. On the bottom he wrote “Traded 8 times in my 16 year career”. On the top he wrote that cash transactions completed each trade. Pretty unique situation that I don’t think ever happened since.

Wow! I received a really cool package today! Even though it was Columbus Day, my mail carrier still delivered a priority mail package (yeah USPS!). My collection addition today is a baseball from Todd Greene. You might say “big deal!” The guy played for six teams and has a negative career WAR. Well, one of those teams was the New York Yankees and the year was 2001. That year he was back up to Jorge Posada getting into just 35 games but what makes this one of my favorite baseballs in my collection is something that will not show up in a box score. Prior to Game 3 of the 2001 World Series, President Bush threw out the first pitch becoming just the third sitting president to throw a first pitch in the World Series. Who did President Bush throw it to? Yep! You guessed it! Todd Greene! I asked him to write about the event on the baseball and he did a great job on it. He wrote that Jorge Posada was supposed to catch the first pitch but “‘Rocket’ took a while in the pen” so Todd grabbed his glove and caught it. What a neat footnote to the event. Next time you watch the clip of President Bush throwing out the first pitch, know it was Todd Greene who caught it!

Here is a video of the event!