1923 was a pivotal year in New York sports. For two decades, John McGraw’s Giants were the best team in town, with the Dodgers and Yankees playing a distant second and third. The Yankees didn’t even own their own ballpark, having to rent the Giants’ Polo Grounds, an arrangement that became awkward after Babe Ruth joined the Yanks in 1920.

Much to McGraw’s disgust, fans were abandoning the Giants to watch the excitement generated by the new home run slugger. The two teams had met in the 1921 and 1922 World Series, both resulting in Giants victories – but 1923 would be different. That season Ruth hit an incredible .393 with 41 home runs and 130 RBI to win the only MVP Award of his career. He was joined by .300 hitters Bob Meusel, Wally Pipp and Whitey Witt who combined to drive in 255 Yankees runs that summer. The Yanks also featured a solid pitching staff of Carl Mays, Waite Hoyt, Bob Shawkey, Herb Pennock and Bullet Joe Bush who would hold opposing teams to just 3 and half runs a game – a deficit easily overcome by Ruth and company. With this aggregation of hitting and pitching the Yankees won the pennant by 16 games, then defeated the Giants 4 games to 2 for the first of the team’s 27 World Championship titles.

24 members of this first Yankees Championship team have signed this Reach Official American League Johnson ball including Hall of Famers Babe Ruth, Waite Hoyt, Herb Pennock, and Miller Huggins plus George Pipgras, Elmer Smith, Joe Bush, Benny Bengough, Harvey Hendrick, Carl Mays, Whitey Witt, Everett Scott, Ernie Johnson, Aaron Ward, Bob Shawkey, Wally Pipp, and Bob Meusel. The signatures are in black fountain pen and display nicely against the toned ball. The ball has been given a coat of shellac which has darkened with age and flaked off in some spots, but none of this takes away from the signatures of this important Yankees team. This ball comes with a LOA from JSA (BB34338) for the signatures.

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