The Ted Williams Ball

Baseball will break your heart in ways you never saw coming. Sometimes it’s misplaying a routine fly ball to right, sometimes it’s the mark of a god.

A million years ago my grandfather was the foreman for the Premier Refinery on 28th street in Fort Worth. If you drove by today you wouldn’t see much, the cooling towers have long been dismantled and the ground is so polluted it’s basically Chernobyl. But back in the day working as a foreman was the type of gig that granted my grandfather access to all kinds of interesting people. Like Michael Franklin “Pinky” Higgins, who managed the Boston Red Sox from 1955-1962. Somehow my grandfather convinced Pinky – career 560-566 – to secure an autograph from the greatest hitter who ever lived.

And really, it’s not close.

Consider these Ted Williams fun facts, nineteen-time All-Star, two-time recipient of the AL MVP, six-time AL Batting Champion and a two-time Triple Crown winner. He finished his playing career with a .344 batting average, 521 home runs and a slugging percentage of .482, highest of all time. Did I mention he was the last player to hit over .400 for an entire season? Or that he racked up these numbers despite losing five seasons to the military? Or that he looked like this?

Teddy Ballgame indeed. To have his autograph was a big freaking deal. Then, now, forever. For years my father kept the ball in his desk at home, wrapped in tissue paper, safe in the dark. I used to sneak into his office and examine it under the light, dreaming of the day it would be mine.

The day arrived in 2011 when my father decided to pass it down. By then I had sons of my own and we all went to dinner to mark the milestone. My father made a speech and presented me the ball, still wrapped in the original paper. I showed it to my sons, who were properly impressed. They asked what I’d do with it. I intended to display it my house, a shrine to immortality. But also, I wanted to know the value. Not the intangible, emotional value but the actual number in the marketplace. Maybe just maybe it could help fund college one day.

James Spence Authentication is one of the most respected companies in the sports memorabilia business and as luck would have it, they were in Dallas the next weekend. I drove to the Anatole and handed my Ted Williams ball to a white-bearded JSA rep. While he examined it, I told him the story of my grandfather and Pinky Higgins and so on. “Isn’t that something,” I said, thinking it totally was. White beard squinted at the ball. I just kind of stood there, wondering how this worked. Then I found out. White beard called over another JSA rep – younger, wearing a suit – clearly in charge. This guy takes one look at the ball and goes, “yeah that’s a fake.”

“Excuse me?”

“Ted Willams didn’t sign the ball.”

“But my grandfather got the ball from Pinky Higgins, the manger of-“

“I know who Pinky Higgins is.”

“How do you know it’s fake?”

“It’s my job.”

“Right but…”

“The T’s not right.”

“How can a T not be right?”

“When it’s a fake.”

“Who signed it then?”

“Someone in the clubhouse. A traveling secretary most likely.”

“Are you sure?”

“Again, it’s my job.”

“What now?”

Three hundred bucks was the answer. That’s how much it cost to discover our treasured Ted Williams ball was a forgery. I still have it of course, hidden away in a shoebox in my closet where I suppose it belongs. My father thinks JSA got it wrong but I’m not so sure. We struck out once and there’s no reason to think another at bat would make any difference. That’s the way baseball go.