The baseball from Freddie Freeman’s walk-off World Series grand slam sold at auction Saturday night for $1.56 million.
The $1.6 million bid made the ball the third most expensive baseball ever, according to SCP Auctions. Shohei Ohtani’s 50th home run ball from last season, when Ohtani became MLB’s first 50-50 player, was auctioned for $4.4 million. Mark McGwire’s 70th home run ball from 1998 cost $3.005 million.
Freeman lifted the Los Angeles Dodgers to a 6-3 victory over the New York Yankees in Game 1 of the 2024 World Series with his 10th-inning home run off Nestor Cortes. The dramatic blow clinched an eventual five-game victory for the Dodgers.
What made Freeman’s grand slam even more convincing was that the veteran first baseman was dealing with an ankle injury that made such a feat seem unlikely. Instead, the home run on baseball’s biggest stage drew quick comparisons to Kirk Gibson’s walk-off home run in Game 1 of the 1988 World Series.
The grand slam ball was initially grabbed by 10-year-old Zachary Ruderman. As the ball rolled toward him, he hit it to his father Nico, who secured the ball amid a ferocious crowd of fans in Dodger Stadium’s right field pavilion.
“As soon as everyone knew I had the ball, I stood up and handed it to him [Zac]Nico Ruderman said in a statement from SCP Auctions. “I picked him up and tears were streaming down his face.”
The buyer of the Grand Slam ball has not yet been announced.
Freeman’s home run ball is the second from the 2024 World Series to be sold at auction in the past week. On Thursday, the Yankees’ Aaron Judge dropped the ball in Game 5, sparking a Dodgers comeback from down 5-0, sold for $43,510.
Still available for fans who want a memento of the 2024 World Series is game-used dirt.
