Throughout the 1950’s, the biggest argument in baseball was “who was better: Willie, Mickey or the Duke?” Sure, Willie Mays was the best 5-tool player in the game and Mickey Mantle was a heck of a slugger, but if you were from the far side of the East River, you pulled for The Duke. Throughout the 1950’s Duke Snider reigned supreme as the “Duke of Flatbush”, sending countless home run balls out of Ebbets Field and onto Bedford Avenue as the Dodgers won a half dozen pennants and one precious World Championship.

     This Duke Snider Hillerich & Bradsby C117L model bat shows good game use and has a repaired handle crack. The C117L was Snider’s preferred model during the 1950-1960 period, and by the amount of use visible on it, this particular one seems to have been one of his favorites. Setting it apart from the usual Louisville Slugger bats of the period, instead of the traditional black ink inside the stamping on the barrel, this C117L was finished with a distinctive white ink stamping. The barrel shows many ball marks with checking from repeated ball contact on the back barrel. There are many bat rack paint streaks and contact scuffs throughout along with several cleat imprints. Adhesive tape residue is visible on the handle, a trait of 1950’s Snider gamers as he often taped his bats with a spiral pattern.

     The bat looks every inch like the preferred club used by the Brooklyn Dodgers main slugger. The Duke has signed the barrel in black marker and added his statistics for the 1955 World Championship season. A great gamer from one third of New York’s famed centerfield trio. The bat comes with a full A9 LOA from MEARS (315158) for the game use and PSA/DNA STICKER ONLY (1A31067) for the signature.

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