Ever seen this on a Rawlings bat

[Mark07]

This Nick Markakis bat has all the correct bat lot numbering on the bat's knob. I don't doubt the bat's authenticity. (I have a photo of him using a Rawlings bat in his rookie year. And the bat comes from an impeccable source. It's got some nice ball marks on it, and good pine tar.) But, being new to the hobby, I wasn't sure what to make of the lettering on the bat. The name seems to be engraved for the most part on the bat, but the black used to fill it in looks different than what I'm used to seeing.


Has anyone seen anything like this on a rookie bat, or any other Rawlings bats?

Thanks a lot for your help.

Mark

[Birdbats]

Stampings tend to flake off Rawlings bats. I've seen a few where the players used markers to trace over their names (McGwire did this back in the '80s and '90s). Have also seen Louisville Sluggers where stampings were colored in -- with pencil on a natural bat and with silver paint pen on a black bat. I owned a Tino Martinez Rawlings bat that was missing the "I" in Martinez -- until Tino (or someone) wrote it in with a marker. These player alterations are not unusual, but not really desirable, either -- unless you're fairly certain the player himself did the writing... then it's kind of cool.

[Mark07]

That makes sense. Thanks a lot. It appears the Rawlings engraving machine was having a bad day that day... the numbers on the knob had to be stamped twice.

Mark