Christian Lopez, the man who caught Derek Jeter’s 3,000 hit ball and gave it back to him without asking anything is return is now in minute 10 of his 15.
This comes after Topps announced that they would develop a baseball card featuring Christian Lopez that will be included in sets later this year.
“We thought what he did captures the essence of what baseball and the Topps company is about,” said Mark Sapir, Topps vice president for sports.
And as part of his 15 minutes, Lopez says he has been overwhelmed with requests which includes the sports card maker Topps…
“Yeah, I spoke with them a couple days ago,” Lopez said. “All I know, is they kind of want to make a baseball card out of me.”
Furthermore, according to SI.com, memorabilia dealer Brandon Steiner and sporting goods CEO Mitch Modell said they will make sure Lopez gets at least $50,000 toward his outstanding student loans of $150,000.
Wow, I can almost see the collectors lining up to get their hands on a baseball card or baseball featuring the John Hancock of Christian Lopez.
I still think I’d rather have a baseball card of Javy Lopez.
Darren Rovell of CNBC also reports that Miller High Life has offered to pay any potential tax hit, which could be more than $10,000 on the roughly $60,000-$75,000 in stuff Lopez has received so far.
But wait a second, lets do some of the math here…
Lopez has roughly $150,000 dollars in student loan debt that is probably still collecting interest. We’ll bump that down to $100,000 after Mr. Modell said they would make sure he get’s at least $50,0o0 to help pay for those loans. Now according to David Brown of Yahoo Sports, companies are lining up to help Lopez pay for the roughly $10,000 dollars worth of taxes that will be included on the $60,000 t0 $75,000 worth of memorabilia he received from the Yankees. So we’ll just say that he will still owe $100,000 dollars in student loans after those companies will probably help him pay for the taxes that accumulated in the gifts from the Yankees.
As for the ball itself…
You can bet that the Derek Jeter 3,000 hit ball will fetch at least $250,000 dollars in an auction setting. This is also something that will only increase in value considering only 28 MLB players in the history of the game have hit 3,000 or more hits in their career. Oh yeah, Derek Jeter is also the first Yankee in the organization’s history to EVER get more than 3,000 hits in a career.
But hey it’s ok though! Christian Lopez is a nice guy! Derek Jeter is a nice guy and the Yankees are certainly a stand up organization!
Yep, this is the same Derek Jeter didn’t perform well last year, hasn’t performed well this year, is well past his prime but still demanded top dollar from the Yankees. This is the same Derek Jeter that was there for fans like Christian Lopez at this year’s All-Star Game. Oh yeah I forgot, Jeter said he was too exhausted to show up after spending weeks on the disabled list. It doesn’t however look like he was too exhausted to party it up in Miami with girlfriend Minka Kelly.
Yes, Derek Jeter certainly DESERVED to have HIS 3,000 ball back.
Let’s not forget the Yankees! One of the classiest organizations in all of sports. Yep this is the same organization that practically makes you take out a second mortgage on your house in order to pay for tickets at the NEW Yankee Stadium.
The bottom line? Christian Lopez still loses and he is still an idiot. The Yankee organization is still the Evil Empire and Derek Jeter will still play up the nice guy image.
Source: Yahoo Sports, SI.com, CNBC
Alright Adam, my friend, we get it. We all know he could have got more money for it on the market. I’m not even saying I would have done the same thing as Lopez, but calling him an idiot is absurd. With this one gesture he has showed millions of baseball fans what true love of the game is really all about. He didn’t do it for the free swag the Yankees gave him (which was generous) and he didn’t do it for his “15 minutes”. He reminded me that there are more important things than money in this short life and if you or anyone else still doesn’t understand why he did it, you probably never will.
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