The man who caught the ball that tied Willie Mays on the all-time home run list sounds like he might be consigning it to an auction company.
Michael Shuster snared the homer hit by Alex Rodriguez at Fenway Park Friday night. The 25-year-old financial planner drove in from Rhode Island and had just rushed back to his seat after a trip to the restroom when the ball came sailing his way.
He was offered a signed bat or some David Ortiz memorabilia (something Ortiz wasn’t happy about), but Shuster is a collector who understands the ball is worth a lot more than what teams are usually willing to offer.
Had Rodriguez never been linked to PEDs, the ball would have been worth a lot more, of course, but that doesn’t mean someone wouldn’t be willing to shell out a decent sum of cash. SCP Auctions’ Dan Imler told CNN Monday that the ball would sell–just not for anything close to his last major milestone home run ball.
While he didn’t make any immediate commitment one way or another, Shuster left the ballpark with the authenticated sphere and told the New York Daily News he wasn’t planning on handing it back to the very wealthy Rodriguez.
MLB.com has an interview with him below (if you can’t see it, click here).
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