2014 Derek Jeter Home Run #258 Baseball with MLB Authentication....

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Sold on Feb 21, 2015 for:

$15,535.00 Bid Source: Live: Floor bidder

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One of the only officially verified Jeter home run balls known!

2014 Derek Jeter Home Run #258 Baseball with MLB Authentication. For most lovers of baseball history, the affection is rooted in the belief that there was a purity to the early game that has been since been corrupted. We view the sport's childhood much like our own--uncomplicated, magical in its innocence, free of the guile and the compromise that tends to accompany progress. There were problems in the old days--serious ones solved only by brave men like Judge Landis and Jackie Robinson in their very different times--but we didn't yearn so desperately to kill our idols, and those old idols never seemed quite so ready to break our hearts either.

For one thing, they were always there, from kindergarten through college graduation sometimes, through births and deaths, unbroken chains of years until they were as familiar as family. The weight of American principle that Curt Flood took to the fight for free agency left little doubt but that his cause was just, but then we fans had only ever seen the good in our team "belonging" to us. Just because Flood was right didn't stop it from hurting. The game was forever changed. And so our baseball families would gradually be replaced by strangers, who would soon vanish themselves if they got much better, or much worse. The days of Teddy Ballgame were over. No more Stan the Mans. No more Micks.

So when the stalwart Yankees shortstop legged out a high Fenway chopper in the top of the third inning on September 28th last year and immediately surrendered his position at first base to pinch runner Brian McCann, it signaled more than just the end of one of the greatest careers in baseball history. Jeter will likely go down in history as the last top ten finisher in any pedigree Major League statistic to wear a single uniform to record each digit in the tally. He may well have been the last franchise superstar.

Presented is a thrilling rarity from that historic career, one of a tiny handful struck by Jeter that has been certified as genuine by Major League Baseball. It came at the start of a remarkable Yankees rally at Toronto's Rogers Centre on June 24, 2014, a sixth inning solo shot off Mark Buehrle that would prove to be the first of six unanswered runs to pull even with the Blue Jays. Jeter would hit just two more home runs before his emotional exit from the sport.

The ball exhibits solid game wear and is autographed in 10/10 blue ballpoint ink on the sweet spot with Jeter's handwritten notation, "Home Run #258." MLB Authentic HZ294036. COA from Steiner Sports (autograph). Full LOA from PSA/DNA. Full LOA from James Spence Authentication.

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