Louisville Slugger retiring Derek Jeter’s bat
By Phil Watson
The accolades keep rolling in for retiring New York Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter, with Louisville Slugger announcing Wednesday they will retire the P72 model used by Jeter his entire career.
It is the first time in the 130-year history of the company has retired a bat model in honor of a player.
"“Derek has swung one bat model from one bat company his entire career,” said James Sass, director of professional baseball sales for the Louisville, Ky.-based company.“Derek has made over 12,500 plate appearances in his 20 seasons in MLB and every single one of them has been with a Louisville Slugger P72. With Derek’s Impending retirement, we thought it was fitting to retire the bat model in recognition of his brilliant career. We are grateful for his enduring an unwavering loyalty. We won’t be making the P72 anymore—in honor of Derek.”"
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Of course, there are other players who use the P72—Lyle Overbay of the Milwaukee Brewers and Kelly Johnson of the Baltimore Orioles—among them, but they won’t have to change lumber.
Instead, Louisville Slugger will provide bats to the specifications of the P72, only it will now be known as the DJ2
Interestingly, the company said it will make one exception to the retirement of the P72 and that will be for any descendant of the player for whom it was first designed.
And who is this immortal of the diamond?
Les Pinkham.
You know, Les Pinkham.
So who in the heck is Les Pinkham?
Pinkham was a catcher who played in the Detroit Tigers and St. Louis Cardinals organizations from 1950-53, never advancing beyond the Triple-A level.
Pinkham was a lifetime .259/.267/.417 hitter with 37 home runs in 444 minor-league games.
But he had a son, Bill Pinkham, who swung the P72 during his time in the Cincinnati Reds’ organization from 1970-72.
Les’ grandson, Zeke Pinkham, is playing travel ball and is expected to play Division I baseball, so the P72 might be brought out of retirement yet.
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