BRIDGEPORT — When the 2005 World Series champs returned to U.S. Cellular Field this weekend, I caught up with Scott Podsednik, whose rain-drenched, walk-off homer clinched Game 2.
The laser-shot into the right-field seats bounced off a chiropractor’s ball glove, hit a finance guy in the chest and landed safely under the seat of Sox fan Jose Gamiz, who gave the ultimate World Series souvenir back to Podsednik in exchange for an autographed bat and signed game balls for his pals who nearly caught the ball.
“Thank you for catching the game winning home run ball in the 2005 World Series,” Pods wrote on the barrel along with his sweeping signature.
Ten years later, Podsednik told me a little-known truth about that World Series artifact — Major League Baseball doesn’t recognize it as “authentic.”
“About three days after that game, my agent tried to get the ball authenticated and they said, 'No way.' [MLB] only does that the day of,” Podsednik said. “So as a legitimate piece of baseball history … it is but it isn’t.”
Podsednik says he keeps the ball in his home office next to the only thing he has that’s close to proof it’s the real deal — a laminated letter from the White Sox employee who helped convinced Gamiz to get the ball to Podsednik.
“At the end of the season he wrote me a letter that said, ‘What an unbelievable year from everything from bargaining to get the home run ball,’ … So I kept that letter laminated,” Podsednik said. “It’s the only proof that I have the ball.”
On Monday, Gamiz, a machinist who keeps his World Series keepsake "in a safe place at home,' said there's one giant reason that's totally unfair — "Because it's real."
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