Hall of Fame Signed Baseball - Larry Doby

I spent this past weekend visiting the inlaws in Charlotte for Easter, so while I was in town on Saturday, I made the short drive to one of my favorite card shops, AAA Collectibles, in Matthews, NC to visit for the first time in about 5 years or so.  The proprietors, Bob and Linda, are some awesome folks and I was happy to reconnect.  I'm sure they were happy, too, because I spent a good bit of money on some 1959 and 1969 set needs, a Chris Davis card, a nice vintage RC that will be shown later on and a Tim Lincecum card for Chris.

Something else that caught my eye was that they had a great price for signed Larry Doby, JSA authenticated baseballs.  So, I exceeded my budget and grabbed one, since this was substantially less than what I had been seeing online.  I was happy to add it to my collection at Hall of Fame baseball #102.

Larry Doby (b. 1923 - d. 2003) played in the majors from 1947 to 1959 for the Indians, White Sox and Tigers).  He was the first black player to play in the American League.  He and Satchel Paige were the first black players to win a World Series when their Indians team won in 1948.

Doby, in his Major League career, had 1,515 hits, 253 home runs and an average of .283 over 13 seasons.  He led the league in home runs twice with 32 in 1952 and 1954.  He finished as high as second in the AL MVP voting (1954) and was an All Star in 7 seasons.

He was elected to the Hall of Fame by the Veterans Committee in 1998.