Fan Christian Lopez was the luckiest man in Yankee Stadium Saturday. The Highland Mills resident recovered Derek Jeter’s 3,000th hit ball, a home run to left field off David Price in the third inning. Lopez says his girlfriend bought the tickets for him as a birthday present. He received an even more valuable gift in return.
Lopez decided to return the home run ball to Jeter without asking for anything in exchange even though it could have easily sold for a six-figure sum.
“[Jeter] deserved this,” Lopez said in an interview on the YES Network. “He worked so hard for this. He’s been in the league for so long. I’m not really the kind to take something away from him.”
The Yankees rewarded Lopez’s honorable deed by offering him some sweet gifts in return. He’ll receive signed bats and balls, and he was promised a meeting with Jeter after the game. The best gift from the Yankees is four suite tickets to every game for the rest of the season, including all Yankees playoff games.
There’s already a fan movement on Facebook to try and raise $300,000 for Lopez to reward him for the outstanding gesture.
The honorable thing to do is return the ball to the batter, but it’s awfully hard to turn down hundreds of thousands of dollars. Let’s commend Christian Lopez for the tremendous deed, which is the second great story we covered this week.
