Rawlings Baseballs - White Sox Versions

Rawlings Baseballs - Chicago White Sox Related Logos

Featured here are the Chicago White Sox "related" baseballs made by Rawlings. As we know, Rawlings has numerous baseballs from various teams and years...however, the White Sox only have a few of those as available option. The picture displays seven (7) Rawlings baseballs and each is unsigned, near mint, and remain in hard plastic display cases.

I do collect Rawlings baseballs as well but as part of the White Sox collection doubled up on these particular options.

New Comiskey Park Inaugural Season

 The first commemorative baseball developed by Rawlings was the 1991 NEW Comiskey Park logo ball. The logo is a soft blue color, which matched the new blue seats in the stadium at the time. Of course, right now we see those much better looking hunter green seats. "Comiskey Park - Inaugural Year - Chicago White Sox" is fresh on the baseball. It was the first year outside of Old Comiskey and featured a really bad opening day beat down at the hand of the Detroit Tigers. Great stadium...especially with the current upgrades, which enhance the fan experience in a significant way.

1983 50th Anniversary All Star Game

 1983 featured the actual first ball designed for a White Sox related event. Prior to commemorative baseballs, Rawlings produced All Star and World Series baseballs. The All Star baseballs started in 1979 - Seattle and continue today. To fall in line with production, 1983 featured a great 50th Anniversary baseball for the White Sox celebrating 50 years of the MLB All Star Game. The first All Star Game was played in Chicago in 1933 and there really was no better place to host the 50th game. It has a red logo on it. The All Star balls flipped from blue to red each year. Great item.

2003 Rawlings - Futures Game

In 2003, the White Sox hosted another All Star Classic in the city of Chicago. The southside served as the second venue for the new MLB slogan - "This time it counts." Essentially, the winner of this All Star Game would serve as the home team for the World Series. It was an interesting concept, which you will recall resulted in a tie in year one, which did not go over so well with fans.

2003 Rawlings - Home Run Derby

The White Sox hosted numerous events during All Star weekend including but not limited to...the Futures Game, which featured the World v.s. USA. The game resulted in a 3-2 win for Team USA with MVP trophy going to Grady Sizemore who went 2-3 in the game. Remember him? Current White Sox slugger Alex Rios played for the World team.

The baseball - it is likely the hardest one to come by in this trio of Rawlings baseballs. It features the Radio Shack logo (remember Radio Shack?). The ball displays the 3 pin wheels on the left side and no doubt one of the better designs by Rawlings.

2003 Rawlings - All Star Game

The White Sox also hosted the Home Run Derby from 2003. The game featured some of the best sluggers in baseball but to be honest...fell short of at least extending an invitation to a White Sox slugger and there were plenty of them in 2003. Participants included: Garrett Anderson (winner), Albert Pujols, Jason Giambi, Jim Edmonds, Gary Sheffield, Carlos Delgado, Richie Sexton, and Bret Boone. Anderson edged Pujols 9-8 in the final round.

The baseball features two bats crossing each other and was hosted by Century 21 real estate. Remember them? Time sure does change things. Neat baseball...again in the blue color of the seats of NEW Comiskey but of course at this point...it was called U.S. Cellular Field. Not a fan.

Lastly, the 2003 All Star Baseballs by Rawlings features a traditional White Sox black and silver look. The threads/laces are black and silver with a fresh black stamped logo on the ball. The logo features the exploding fireworks known from the scoreboard. Great design that truly captured the history of Comiskey Park. Well done.

Of course, what can a collection be without the 2005 World Series baseball. It comes in a nice clean crisp gold logo look. Of course, one of the greatest...if not THE greatest years in White Sox history. Great ball and will likely be featured throughout this blog...so I will save you the hassle. At some point I will feature my signed baseballs from each player on that 2005 roster...but that is another posting for another day.

After the White Sox won the World Series in 2005, Rawlings developed "celebration" baseballs as commemorative balls. Here is the 2005 version celebrating the White Sox victory over the Astros in Minute Maid Park. Again, a great baseball completed in the gold stamping format which was relatively standard for World Series baseballs during the decade.