Brooks Robinson and the Baltimore Orioles

[roarfrom34]

At the conclusion of every season the Orioles would have a Fan Appreciation weekend and one of the things they would do is choose children randomly as they entered the ballpark to be given game used jerseys of the players (as part of a pre-game ceremony). The players placed the jerseys on the children as a photo opportunity & then took them back to play that evening's game....Once the game was over, the jersey's/Thanks Fans Undershirts were washed, signed then sent to the recipient.

In 2000, a child from the Bowie area was the lucky winner of the Cal Ripken Jr. jersey. About 5-6 years ago that child (then in his early 20's) read about my collection somewhere and reached out to me to see if I would be interested in purchasing it from him. Fortunately, we were able to work it out and I drove down to Bowie one afternoon to pick it up and spent a nice day with him and his family hearing all the stories about that evening (they kept one photograph and fortunately included the rest of the photos and the Orioles paperwork with the jersey).

When I acquired it it was signed just "Cal Ripken Jr." but the next time I saw Cal I showed him the photos/paperwork, etc. and he added "2000 Game Used" underneath his original autograph....Did I mention that Cal homered that night too?...lol..Easily, one of my favorite pieces in my collection