Babe Ruth's First Yankee Stadium Home Run Bat In Auction [View All]

[matcom]

<snip>

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The bat Babe Ruth used to belt the first home run ever hit in Yankee Stadium will be up for auction in December with a chance to join the exclusive million-dollar club for sports memorabilia.

The bat signed by Ruth after his homer helped sink his former team, the Boston Red Sox, at opening day of Yankee Stadium on April 18, 1923, is the highlight of a sale devoted to the history of baseball in New York at Sotheby's on Dec. 2.

Yankee Stadium, arguably the most famous U.S. stadium, was nicknamed "The House that Ruth Built," based on the enormous success the team achieved after he joined the club and the popularity of Ruth, the greatest slugger baseball had known.

The big-barreled Louisville Slugger bat, weighing a hefty 45 ounces (1.28 kg), is expected to fetch more than $1 million, according to Sotheby's, which would make it the only sports object besides Mark McGwire's 70th home run ball to break the million mark.

McGwire's ball sold for $3 million. The highest price ever paid for a bat was nearly $600,000 -- for Shoeless Joe Jackson's Black Betsy bat.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=573&ncid=573&e=3&u=/nm/20040723/od_nm/life_ruthbat_dc