Mike Remlinger has had the second half or barrel of the infamous Sammy Sosa corked bat in his possession since June, 2003. He recently consigned the corked barrel to Schulte Auctions. It is currently live now in our October on-line auction. The game-used bat was authenticated by PSA/DNA, the vintage game-used memorabilia authentication company, recognized by the HOBBY and will come with a letter of authenticity from Mike Remlinger as well.
Was it an innocent mistake or was it partly responsible for the home run era? We may never know for sure but we now know where the barrel or second half of Sammy Sosa’s X professional model XX bat is located. On June 3, 2003, in the first inning of a game against the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, Sammy Sosa hit a shot toward second base and shattered his bat into two pieces.
The umpire crew chief, Tim McClelland, picked up the bat handle and found cork in one half of the shattered bat. Sosa was immediately ejected and claimed he took his batting practice bat up to the plate by mistake.
Major League Baseball confiscated Sammy’s shattered bat handle, but the barrel’s whereabouts were unknown until today. During the commotion on the field that day, Cub’s relief pitcher Mike Remlinger came in from the bullpen to the clubhouse and found the barrel of Sammy’s bat on the floor of the clubhouse runway. The Cub’s bat boy must have collected the bat barrel and brought it into the clubhouse. Mike picked up Sammy’s shattered bat barrel and put it in is fishing carrying bag in his locker and took it home
Sammy Sosa gained national prominence in 1998 during his home run battle with Mark McGwire. Even though Sammy said he liked to put on a show for fans during batting practice, the question will always remain – Was he cheating when he hit any of those 505 home runs through June 3, 2003? MLB confiscated over 70 of Sammy’s bats and conducted an investigation without finding any evidence that Sammy had or used other corked game bats at that time.
