Inside a Baseball

[Runscott]

In case you were curious, but afraid to try it yourself - Inside a 1956 New York Yankees team-signed Offical AL Reach ball.

The dog started it and I finished the job.

[Bpm0014]

Ouch.

[khkco4bls]

ouch is right how nice was the ball

[Runscott]

It was horrid, but the 'Mantle/Berra' panel was good.

A dog got hold of the ball (way before I bought it), and ripped one of the panels to pieces. It was bad enough that I just got stink-faces when I brought it to shows. I purchased it with the intention of replacing the worst parts, but it didn't take me long to figure out that not just me, but NO ONE had the skills to do such a thing. Fortunately, I paid '1956 Mantle autograph' price for it, so the goal at this point is to salvage all I can from the ball, and create a nice display.

I literally felt nauseous as I cut up the ball this morning. And after testing one of the panel pieces - lightly spraying with distilled water prior to pressing - I got nauseous again when it began yellowing in random spots and wrinkling when I tried to flatten it.

So far, kind of a horror, but anyone who knows me knows that I'll work on this until I have success.

Here are the separated pieces:

[Runscott]

Here's the mock-up of the desired final piece:

[baseballart]

The baseball deconstruction inspired the artist at one point. (Harder to sell than the ubiquitous Mickey Mantle paintings)

[Runscott]

The flattening of the baseball panels is not going well - it looks like there will be, at best, permanent tiny wrinkles, and at worst, yellow splotching.

My inclination is to flatten only slightly, to reduce wrinkling to almost nothing - it also protects the Mantle-Berra panel. The result would force me to separate all the panels as shown in the left-hand mock-up, and the panels would remain somewhat rounded, like on a real baseball, as opposed to flat as shown in the right-hand mock-up.

Thoughts are appreciated as I'm about to commit.

[perezfan]

I like the look of the one on the left a bit better. It draws more attention to the Mantle/Berra sweetspot portion, which looks good in the dead-center. Just my personal preference... If it helps with the "flattening", that might be an added plus.

The Ball is already altered, so 2 more cuts shouldn't really make a difference...

[almostdone]

I agree. The one on the left frames better and layers out the signatures better. Please continue to update. I think it's a great idea for a tough situation.
Drew

[Runscott]

Another suggestion I received was to frame the Mantle/Berra piece with a nice 1956 photo of the two of them together.

I'm leaning toward that, but I have nothing to lose by creating the one on the left first, and seeing how it looks.

[Runscott]

other options. All photos are 1956 except the one where Mantle is in the extreme foreground - that one had Maris off to the side, so was 1960s.

[Cfern023]

Why not try to resew the leather onto a cheap ball- and try to tone the "new pieces" just enough to make it less noticeable.

They are sewn together by hand any way. All it'll require is time.

[Runscott]

That was my original plan, but it's not as easy as you might think. Even if I could have done it, it would have involved sewing a blank piece of leather where a partial piece had been left by the dog, and there weren't stitch holes remaining - it would have involved glueing pieces on that included stitching on one side. In any event, it's too late for that now - I'm committed to one of the mock-ups shown above, or something similar.

[djson1]

This is why you shouldn't keep your treasures near the pets!

[jbhofmann]

I'd create a custom 1956 Topps themed cut card of the SweetSpot.

It would marry the year to a card and is clean and compact.

[Runscott]

Originally Posted by djson1

This is why you shouldn't keep your treasures near the pets!

That's certainly true;however, I bought this ball already massacred. The mauling might have taken place in 1957 for all I know. But I do know that the ball looked horrible chewed up - I could barely stand to look at it.

[Runscott]

Mark, that's a great idea. I'm just going to sit on it for a while. The main thing was to get it in displayable condition without damaging the panel. I'll leave it to a professional to do the final work, but in the meantime it will still look good on my wall, right next to my Babe Ruth piece.