Help on this hefty metal printing plate? 1930s?

[vthobby]

My friend has this interesting player plate. Full metal, 3 7/8 by 6 1/4 inches. Weighs 6.5 ounces. S on players cap with the number 9 on his jersey.

Name on bottom says "Baroff". Reverse negative of course.

I found a Harry Baroff that used to photograph for the Scranton Miners that died in 1944.

Was hoping for any info on the player or the product that this printing plate was used for?

Thanks in advance!

Peace, Mike

IMG_9232.jpg

IMG_9233.jpg

[oldeboo]

Mike O'Neill?

Mike managed the Scranton Miners for only one year in 1929. It looks like an older fellow on the plate and he would have been around 51 years old during his year there. The ears look to be a match along with other facial features like his nose. Notice the face creases that run from nose to corner of mouth, the ones outside of those, and finally creases around his chin. You can also see a defined crease between bottom of nose and the upper lip as well. Looks to be a pretty good match to me. I'm guessing the "9" on the uniform is just an "S" that is hard to see the bottom of.

Wikipedia info:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_O'Neill_(baseball)

Stats from playing days:
https://www.baseball-reference.com/p...;neimi01.shtml

Pretty nice piece of a former major leaguer that has a pretty good claim to an interesting historical statistic. He was the first NL pitcher to hit a grand slam in the 20th century with an in the park home run in 1902, it was also the first pinch grand slam in major league history.

[vthobby]

Incredible Trey!

Thank you so much!

Peace, Mike

[swarmee]

Throws left handed would also make sense for O'Neill. Glove is on the right hand. Only 10% of people are left handed. And after reversing the image, easy to see that the number is likely an S, as mentioned.

As to what it was used for, maybe newspaper?