With about one month to go before the consignment deadline hits for the Heritage Sports 2012 Platinum Auction, the World’s Largest Collectibles Auctioneer already has some of its key lots in place for what promises to be the year’s best consignment opportunity.
While staying focused on collectibles with key characteristics, such as historical firsts, extreme rarity and unmatched significance, all serious collectors’ eyes will be fixed to the highly anticipated event, which will be held Thursday August 2, at Camden Yards in Baltimore, during the week of the National Sports Collectors Convention.
No Platinum Auction would be complete without an extremely important artifact from Mickey Mantle. HA are thrilled to offer the only known bat that Mantle was issued during his rookie season for use in the historic 1951 World Series. Graded an impressive GU 8 by John Taube of PSA/DNA. The signature model Hillerich & Bradsby T41 provides a block lettered World Series 1951, New York Yankees framing the facsimile signature on the barrel, and heavy use with repaired handle and barrel and scattered ball marks, stitch impressions and cleat marks. A percentage of this use is not Mantle’s — the lumber took on a second career in the sandlots of the Mick’s childhood home of Commerce, Oklahoma. It was a gift from Mantle to his high school baseball coach who passed the bat on to his young friend Gomer Evans, a youngster who, like most boys in this small town, idolized the Mick.
This bat must be considered one of the most important and desirable bats of the post-war era. The historic ash relic measures thirty-five inches in length and just under thirty-four ounces in weight. It is accompanied by a letter of provenance from the Evans family, who recounts that Gomer was informed at the time of receipt that this was the bat with which Mantle cracked his only hit of the 1951 Series. [Heritage Auctions]
