My Personally Significant Adam Dunn Photo Match

[Juan Gris]

I was originally going to write about this in the "Post Your Photo-matched Game-used Items Here" thread (a great read when you have the time) but wanted to go more in-depth on the matches and the personal significance behind a 2nd photo match I was able to make just last night. On 7/24/14, I posted the 1st photo match of my Adam Dunn bat to a baseball card image (see that post here: http://www.gameuseduniverse.com/vb_f...postcount=1239). Thanks to my endless pursuit to photo match my Dunn bats, I was able to find something even better...

The bat presented here is a Louisville Slugger Y30 that was ordered in 2001 and used in 2002. Dunn ordered 6 Y30 bats on 8/8/01, 6 on 8/22/01, 6 on 9/28/01 and 5 on 11/10/01 (BMH, thanks again for providing Dunn's order records last month!). My earlier photo match to the baseball card was most likely taken during batting practice in a cold weather climate as Dunn is wearing a batting practice cap and a jacket. In the card image, the bat is nearly unused and has a long life to live before being slathered with pine tar and used in battle.

The photo I was able to match the bat to last night was reportedly taken, "against the San Francisco Giants during a game at AT&T Park in San Francisco, California in 2002." The Reds only played one series in San Francisco in 2002, a 3 game series from May 3-5. Aaron Boone (#17) can be seen in the on-deck circle in the background which is accurate as he batted after Dunn in all 3 games. You'll notice that Dunn is wearing long sleeves, which fits with the chilly San Francisco weather conditions for all 3 games:

5/3/02 Start Time Weather: 54° F, Wind 14mph out to Centerfield, Sunny.
5/4/02 Start Time Weather: 59° F, Wind 7mph out to Leftfield, Sunny.
5/5/02 Start Time Weather: 61° F, Wind 7mph in unknown direction, Sunny.

And now for the best part! The first time I saw Adam Dunn play in person was on 4/28/02 in Cincinnati against the Giants. I went to the game with a buddy in hopes that Barry Bonds might hit a home run (he was fresh off his 2001 campaign). Bonds went 1-for-3 with a single but Adam Dunn hit 2 home runs (his first multi-home run game) and made me a lifelong fan. I can't directly tie my bat to that game but knowing he used it 5-7 days later is pretty damn cool.

Here are the pictures: