This is our second column in our series dedicated to Joey Votto's 2009 All-Star Rookie Cup Card.
Today we are going to try and Game Date the Photo. For those of you that weren't with us last week you can go here to see the original posting - for purposes of this column here is a reminder of the card:
Game Dated Card*
I am opening with minor asterisk here by noting I am not positive on this one. The evidence we find in baseball-ref while not conclusive does appear to point to a specific at-bat. That likely plate appearance was in the fourth inning of a Reds game at Shea Stadium on May 10th 2008.
How did we arrive here?
1) This appears to be Shea Stadium in it's closing season of 2008. Within Getty Images we were unable to find the picture on the card, However there was this series of photos of Votto that were all taken on May 10th
This doesn't confirm the date but it is similar enough to verify we are dealing with the Mets and Shea Stadium.
2) This is a big one - According to baseball_reference Joey Votto played only 2 games at Shea Stadium. Those two games were on the proposed May 10th date and the following day May 11.
Now that we are down to 2 games we can look at the details.
3) Now we switch over to retrosheet because their play by play is a tad more descriptive and we find this within the May 10th game:
Bonus Evidence
4) This is all just supplementary evidence that doesn't prove anything but does support the case we made in points 1-3 above
We return to Getty Images and find a photo from the other game (May 11th)
There is one other photo from May 10 which is from the first base angle and it also shows black bat.
Now this doesn't mean that Votto didn't have an AB with a black bat May 11 but so far every AB on May 10 is black bat and the only AB on May 11th is natural
Looking Back
In last weeks column we discussed that Joey Votto had 8700 PAs without a sacrifice, well he wasn't sacrificing here either. Votto was leading off the inning so this was not a sacrifice attempt. It was likely a good strategic move, Votto a Left Handed Hitter was leading off facing the tough Southpaw Johan Santana on the mound. Right Handed Slugger Edwin Encarnacion was on deck and in fact did hit a Home Run off Santana.
Sources and Links
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