Gary Sheffield - Possible photo match ??

[schubert1970]

I was browsing through John Taube's web site last week and noticed this 2005 Sheff bat. Nice bat a GU 10 rating, but I wasn't really interested. I thought the white ball marks might make it a easy to make a photo match.

A few days later I was looking through Getty images and noticed this photo from 10/1/05. I was surprised to see a similar pattern of marks on the bat. The photo is when Sheff hit a two run homer in the first inning. I found another photo that shows the ball mark just above the gray ring.

My next step was to find some video of this game on MLB.com. Found a link to the video of this game, but wouldn't play due to an error.

Sheff didn't use this model bat all year and the fact he wrote his year end stats on this bat makes me think this bat may have used toward the end of the year.

Anyway, it's a real rush when you find a game used item from a player you collect. Although this isn't conclusive, playing detective for a photo match...what a rush...it's addicting!

[Manram]

Looks like a match to me

[suave1477]

By the photos you provided I would say definitely not a match.

[schubert1970]

By the photos you provided I would say definitely not a match.

Why?

[mbrieve]

It looks good to me...

[Nnunnari]

possibly the same bat but doesn't qualify as a match.

[ballhawknet]

First time trying to photomatch a bat and here is what I come up with ....
the autographed bat looks like the ball marks line up horizontally , the
game photo it appears they do not . Also the ball mark near the end of the bat in the game photo looks like its lined up more with the beginning of Gary Sheffield stamp and not in the middle of the name as it appears in the autographed bat.

Very interesting though , and very close. I think with only two marks to
go by , no pine tar no cleat marks ..etc ...it makes it very possible that even if they did line up better , there would be a possibility that there are two bats that have similar ball marks in the same areas of a bat. Obviously the more marks to match the better . Cool bat ....thanks for posting it.

[schubert1970]

First time trying to photomatch a bat and here is what I come up with ....
the autographed bat looks like the ball marks line up horizontally , the
game photo it appears they do not . Also the ball mark near the end of the bat in the game photo looks like its lined up more with the beginning of Gary Sheffield stamp and not in the middle of the name as it appears in the autographed bat.

Very interesting though , and very close. I think with only two marks to
go by , no pine tar no cleat marks ..etc ...it makes it very possible that even if they did line up better , there would be a possibility that there are two bats that have similar ball marks in the same areas of a bat. Obviously the more marks to match the better . Cool bat ....thanks for posting it.

Ballhawk - Thanks for doing that. The way you lined up the pics gives a better explination. This is why I love this forum.

[spartakid]

I don't think you can call it a match from those pics. I may be wrong, but it looks like the two marks on the Taube bat are in a straight line from one another, and the one in the game pic doesn't as you can see more of one pic than another.

[suave1477]

First time trying to photomatch a bat and here is what I come up with ....
the autographed bat looks like the ball marks line up horizontally , the
game photo it appears they do not . Also the ball mark near the end of the bat in the game photo looks like its lined up more with the beginning of Gary Sheffield stamp and not in the middle of the name as it appears in the autographed bat.

Very interesting though , and very close. I think with only two marks to
go by , no pine tar no cleat marks ..etc ...it makes it very possible that even if they did line up better , there would be a possibility that there are two bats that have similar ball marks in the same areas of a bat. Obviously the more marks to match the better . Cool bat ....thanks for posting it.

I am sorry I didn't go into an explaination why. I was in a rush when I wrote my comment.

But as Ballhawk pointed out which was my exact conclusion also that the ball marks are not lined up in the exact positions from your bat to the photos.