A Babe Ruth game-used bat, dating to the 1918 Boston Red Sox World Championship-winning season, realized $537,750 at Heritage Auction Galleries’ October 1′ Signature sports memorabilia auction. In an auction that totaled more than $4.2 million, including buyer’s premium, the price is the second highest ever realized for a Babe Ruth bat, and the most ever for an unsigned one.
“We saw very solid results across the board,” said Chris Ivy, director of sports at Heritage Auction Galleries, “and the Ruth bat was the icing on the cake.”
Another record-setting lot was a game-used basketball from “Pistol Pete” Maravich. Used when Maravich scored his 68th point in the February 25, 1977, game, Ivy said, “The auction result of $131,450 sets a world’s record as the highest price ever paid at auction for a game-used basketball.”
The Babe Ruth bat, used by the slugger during the 1918 season and later returned to the Louisville Slugger factory in Kentucky to be used as a template for future Ruth bats, became just the second to summit the half-million-dollar mark at auction, and is topped only by the model used to hit the first home run in Yankee Stadium history on April 18, 1923, which sold for $1.2 million in 2004.
A complete review of the auction will appear in a future issue. ⁁K
