Since the turn of the century, some of the game’s greatest hitters have worn the Boston Red Sox uniform: Tris Speaker, Jimmie Foxx, Ted Williams - yet it wasn’t until Carl Yastrzemski came along that a Sox player combined 3,000 career hits and 400 career home runs. Yaz accomplished this rarefied milestone during the September 12, 1979 game against the Yankees at Fenway Park. The hit came in the bottom of the 8th when he singled to center-field off Jim Beattie. A closer look at photos from this historic at-bat shows that Yastrzemski was actually wearing two different brands of cleats: Spot-Bilt on the left and Nike on the right. The reason is unknown, but afterwards Yaz gave his agent, Bob Woolf, the left Spot-bilt cleat along with its matching partner (most likely because they’d display nicer than two mis-matching brands.
The Spot-Bilt cleats show great game use. The black leather body shows the amount of turf marks and abrasions you’d expect from the man who reached the 3,000 hit mark. The fold-over tongue flaps have a back and white patch affixed with Yaz’s number “8” hand written in black marker. Both cleats have mis-matched and replaced white laces and there is some touch-up done to the whites of the Spot-Bilt leather logos on the side. Both cleats still have some ballpark turf clinging to the spikes on the soles. The left cleat, which Yastrzemski wore that historic game, has been signed in black marker and inscribed with “#3000 Hit 9-12-79 YAZ”.
The cleats are accompanied by Yaz’s right-hand batting glove. The batting glove, actually a golf glove, is Velcro adjustable with a snap tightener, and displays outstanding game use. The leather shows pine tar, turf and perspiration staining throughout. Yaz has signed the glove in black marker adding “3000 HIT 9-12-79”. A number “24” has been hand written in blue marker. A great grouping from the very at-bat in which Carl Yastrzemski joined the 3,000 Hit Club.
Includes LOA from the Woolf family. Autographs pre-certified by PSA/DNA.