Note: This article was originally written and published by BigLeagueBaseballs.com on May 21, 2010. It has since been acquired and reposted by OfficialGameBalls.com, with permission. It has been edited slightly for clarity and its been updated with new links.
Interview with Andy Strasberg: We have uncovered the turning point in the evolution of the Mid-Summer Classic’s game ball. We offer you the exclusive story about how today’s colorful baseballs came to be, and how one long-time fan and MLB team marketing exec, along with a Baseball Hall of Famer, propelled the reincarnation of multi-color laced Official Major League Baseballs.
The official regular season game balls used in Major League Baseball today may seem cold, corporate and lacking in aesthetic appeal and imagination to most autograph and memorabilia collectors. The Rawlings Official RO-MLB game ball has remained unchanged since 2000, aside from a new commissioner’s signature. It features blue ink, the iconic MLB batter logo on the lower panel (an upgrade compared to the lower panels of previous AL and NL balls), and the official stamping with commissioner Allan “Bud” Selig’s Robert Manfred Jr’s facsimile signature.
The Majors switched to a universal game ball after dissolving the American and National League presidents’ offices, and ended a near 100-year run of individual league balls for both leagues. But regular season balls haven’t always been so bland.
Multi-colored stitching was a tradition for MLB and many other official and amateur league baseballs that began around the turn of the 20th Century. The practice ended in the 1933-34 seasons in the Bigs, when all-red laces became standard.
One of the great cosmetic highlights of vintage Reach and Spalding baseballs of yesteryear were multi-colored laces, blue and red for the American League and black and red for the National League. Though it was only a short time before the leagues switch to all red laces on their respective baseballs, those vintage balls represent an era of America’s pastime and vintage memorabilia that is prized by serious collectors.
The Majors went nearly 60 years without deviating from those red laces (with perhaps the exception of this new find from our last post). That was until one man, with a passion for baseball nostalgia and an astute marketing mind, got a chance to leave his stamp on the Major League’s Official Game ball.
Andy Strasberg, owner of ACME Sports Marketing in San Diego, developed his baseball roots as a young New York Yankees fan living in Bronx, NY in the 1950’s. He is known by his peers as Roger Maris’s number one fan, and it’s hard to argue that considering Maris himself acknowledged it when Strasberg had the honor of meeting him in 1960s.
Strasberg and Maris developed an uncommon friendship between fan and legendary sports star, one that perhaps helped pave the way for him to turn his love of the game into a successful career in the biz of baseball. The story of Strasberg and Maris is well documented and stands alone; what makes Andy an icon to OfficialGameBalls.com is his own contribution to the game and to the evolution of the Official Game Ball.
The Padres had last hosted MLB’s Midsummer Classic in 1978. That would be the last season in which standard NL/AL league balls were used in the exhibition. The next season, the first Rawlings All-Star Game ball was introduced. It would take another 20-plus seasons before the stitching colors changed.
In 1978, when Andy Strasberg was working as Padres Director of Promotions under VP of Marketing Elten Schiller, the organization was awarded the right to host the Mid-Summer Classic. With Schiller in charge of organizing the Padres end of the game, Mr. Strasberg was given limited responsibilities as a relative newcomer to the front office. But from that point forward he began developing ideas for when his time would come to lead the team’s marketing initiative for such an celebrated event.
MLB Official Game Balls were destined for a revolutionary change when Strasberg and the San Diego Padres ball club learned in 1989 that they’d been awarded the right to host the 1992 All-Star Game. Strasberg was put in charge of organizing and facilitating the festivities on behalf of the Padres and he coordinated efforts in MLB front offices in New York.
Andy was prepared, he referred to his list of ideas he had been developing since the ’78 game. And the one idea that makes Strasberg a legend at Big League Baseballs? It was simply to have the laces replicate the colors of team. “I took the old red and blue stitch baseball and translated it to a new All-Star Game ball,” remembers Strasberg.
Brilliant. Simple, yes, but brilliant!
Andy proposed a dozen new ideas to top-level folks at Major League Baseball, and, “to my shock and astonishment, they said ‘yes’ to all.” Andy notes that the toughest idea for MLB to accept was the radical change to the game ball.
“People in MLB thought the ball might be a distraction and a problem. I thought that was ludicrous. We tried three or four different types of baseballs. The first one had black stitching. I said ‘it’s not right.’ The next had blue stitching, then orange. We went through a number of prototypes. They finally made a protoype I liked, and made 6 dozen that had Padres colors.”
–Andy strasberg
Strasberg continues: “The agreement was if Tony Gwynn took batting practice and didn’t have a problem seeing and hitting the ball, they’d allow it. He took BP, and I asked him if he had any problem seeing them. He said ‘no, no problem whatsoever.’ That’s how those baseballs became a reality. It started in San Diego in ’92 and it has carried on ever since.”
Strasberg received little recognition for the idea to bring back multi-colored stitching to the game’s Official Baseball. Several of the other innovations that he played a part in were coveted by those fortunate enough to attend the game. One of those included a bit of a “prank” – sneaking a girl into the outfield, with hair tucked under a ball cap, to shag fly balls with the guys during the Home Run Derby. “She eventually took off her hat, letting her pony tail fall out, and the crowd went crazy,” said Strasberg. “She was a softball player, and was out there catching line drives.”
Some more collectibles made possible by Strasberg: The Official Game Programs: “I wanted the program to play take me out to the ball game; open it up, it does.” And when the program is opened to a specific page, a “popup” presents fans with a foldout baseball card.
Strasberg’s contributions to baseball memorabilia also include perhaps the most unique Rawlings Official Commemorative Game Baseball ever made (and a personal favorite), the 1996 La Primera Serie National League game ball:
Yes, it features multi-colored laces, all thanks to Strasberg’s breakthrough concept in 1992, which opened the door for such colorful creativity to be brought back into the game. The red and green laces were a no-brainer for Andy, who wanted to replicate the host nation, Mexico’s official colors and baseballs. The red stamping was also a first on a regular season game ball.
This is the first second NL commemorative logo gamer ever used; it commemorated the first MLB regular season games abroad, and the first outside of the United States and Canada. Strasberg noted that at that time, these weren’t made for “merchandising” as much as they were used to truly make the games that much more special.
Strasberg continues to contribute to the game. As the founder of Fantography, he enables fans to share their personal photographs of America’s favorite pastime with other fans. Strasberg encourages all fans to contribute their pictures from their trips ballpark, and he notes that “some of the world’s best baseball photos are in shoeboxes all over the word.”
Strasberg’s connection to the game, and specifically to Roger Maris, also landed him a technical advisory role on the set of the Billy Crystal directed HBO special 61*. His responsibilities for the production were to assure the film’s great attention to detail as it retold Maris’s historic home run record breaking season. He appeared in the film in a small role, and also helped commission Fotoball, (which along with Rawlings was a subsidiary of K2 Inc.) to make 10 dozen official-style American League Joe Cronin-stamped baseballs. They were real baseballs complete with leather covers, replicated Reach logos and Cronin facsimile signatures. And they were used as the official baseballs in the film. And, thanks again to Andy, one of these official movie props is pictured:
Awesome! Check out the trailer for 61*, at about the 18 second mark, you can see one of these reproduction baseballs in action:
Finally, one last note, as if Mr. Strasberg hasn’t provided us with enough amazing experiences at baseball’s highest level, we’ve found a book that he co-authored: Baseball’s Greatest Hit: The Story of “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.“
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Now just think where commemorative MLB game baseballs would be today without Mr. Strasberg’s contribution? All of the All-Star balls since his creation, from 1993-2024, feature multi-color laces (save for the 2021 fiasco in Colorado). Since Strasberg brought his Padres orange and bright blue laces into the game, baseballs have been stitched with black, yellow, purple, teal, navy blue, dark blue, baby blue, silver/gray, sandstone/off-white, army green, brown, and pink. And, we can count at least nine a dozen commemorative MLB game balls with either multi-colored laces or balls that feature lace colors other than the traditional red:
- 1995 Cal Ripken consecutive games record “8” ball
- 1996 La Primera Serie, Monterrey, Mexico ball
- 1996 Mickey Mantle Day ball
- 1998 Joe DiMaggio Day ball
- 1998 All-Star Home Run Derby Game Ball
- 1999 All-Star Home Run Derby Game Ball
- 2002 MLB Opening Day ball
- 2002 Memorial Day ball
- 2002 4th of July ball
- 2002 9/11 ball
- 2013 Mother’s Day Selig & Manfred
- 2017 Memorial Day
- 2017 Father’s Day
- 2017 July 4th Independence Day
BigLeagueBaseballs.com would like to thank Mr. Strasberg for all the time he took to share his amazing stories with the site, and all the pictures he contributed. And on behalf of baseball memorabilia collectors all over the world, a collective admiration and a big thank you for his incredible contributions of the evolution of Major League Baseball’s Official Game Ball! Where would commemorative baseballs be without his reintroduction of multi-colored laces?
