Fresh to the Hobby from a Chicago estate comes this historic baseball. Of the few game used baseballs to emerge from the infamous 1919 World Series, featuring Shoeless Joe Jackson and the 8 Men Out, this is the only one that has the signature of a White Sox player on it.  Of those that have surfaced are from the hands of fans who caught a foul ball or of unknown origin with Series information notated on them.   

This blue and red stitched ball bear the stampings of a 1918-1924 Official Ban Johnson American League baseball. Though some of the stampings are smeared from game usage enough remain that are confirmed in Brandon Grunbaum’s History of the Baseball Ball Guide to OAL Ball that would have been used in the Chicago ballpark for that Series. In Collin’s hand, confirmed by JSA, is “1919 Worlds Series”.   While Collins did not notate a game number this ball must have been special for some reason for to him to save, or he just wanted a momento from playing in the World Series of 1919.  

A little-known fact about Collins, he was the first batter and led off Game 1 with a single to center field at Redland Field in Cincinnati to start what would become the most talked about World Series of all time. Collins was the only member of the White Sox in the starting lineup that day that was NOT a member of the infamous Black Sox or that ended up in the Hall of Fame. Collins spent most of the 1920 season at first base in place of Black Sox ringleader Chic Gandil, who abruptly retired from baseball before the season began. Collins would go on to be the manager of the Boston Red Sox for a couple years in the 1930’s. On September 10, 1955, Collins died suddenly at his home in Newton, Massachusetts, at the age of 69. A historic baseball from the hands of 1919 Chicago White Sox John “Shano” Collins to yours. Also included in this lot is a display case that has printed “1919 World Series – Game Used Baseball Signed by John “Shano” Collins (OF-1B) Shoeless Joe Jackson & the Black Sox Fixed Series” and this comes with a LOA from MEARS (317630) for the game use and a LOA from JSA (BB76414) for the signature.

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