A bat Finds its way home

[shoremen44]

So another thread just popped up about a player getting a jersey back, and I thought I would share my story.

I bought some old bats back at the begining of the summer... all were old international players that played in Baltimore before there was a major league team... like my 1936 Woodley Abernathy (international league HR champ).

Well... one of the bats I bought was of Lee Riley... who among many other teams played briefly in Baltimore in 1939.

I was going through my collection and decided to sell some bats and decided that I wasnt that attached to the Riley bat and was going to see if I could get the $100 I payed out of this sidewritten old bat.

In preparing to sell the bat I found out that the only Lee Riley at the time ended up being the father of Coach Pat Riley. I sent a note to the only email address I could find for the Miami heat and wanted to know if Coach Riley would like his father's bat. I got a nice response from their marketing guys and he told me that Coach Riley was very excited to get it.

I sent it off... and a week or two later I got a copy of Pat Riley's Hall of Fame book... autographed to me... and a long hand written letter from the Coach thanking me for my gift. He was very excited to have a bat that his dad "had his own hands around".

The letter is over the top nice... I am not an NBA fan... but Pat Riley is a stand up guy... and I kind of cheer for the Heat now.


Bert

[larry bourget]

Great Story, Thanks for sharing it Bert.

LB

[MichaelofSF]

great story

[spartakid]

Very cool, great story Bert

[JCC1968]

Hi

I have a good story about Al Leiter. I went to his last game he pitched in spring training and caught a foul ball. Little did anyone know (or did they know?) that Al was pitching for the last time in the Major leagues and the last batter he faced was Eduardo Perez. I got Eduardo to sign the baseball and sent it to Al to sign instead he sent me another baseball from that game and wrote some great comments on the baseball about what he was feeling pitching for the last time and signed the baseball and cut me a check for $100 for getting Eduardo Perez signature on the baseball and my troubles. It is the nices and kindest thing that any player I have contacted ever did. To follow your story, Al was excited to get the baseball with Perez signature and my account of his last game written on the baseball. so when you mentioned Pat Riley's excitment it reminded how excited Al was to get that baseball from a fan who cared.

Jason

[ironmanfan]

very cool story Bert!

[tigerdale]

great stories!!

[STLHAMMER32]

Very cool stories! Thanks for sharing

[bigtruck260]

Good Stuff Bert!

Thanks for sharing.

[mariner_gamers]

That is a great story!