Thread: Yankees Fan’s Generosity Is Returned! (was originally "Jeter homers for hit # 3,000")

Glad he got it at home, and it's good to see him hitting again as of late. Now the Yankees need to get back to winning games. Tying run on 3rd in the 8th.

Jeter just got his fifth hit of the day, to drive in the (hopefully) winning run in the 8th. Talk about having a great day and getting the record in style. Great stuff!

Bring on the Redsox!

good for jeter.

Homers for his 3,000th. Goes 5 for 5. Amazing.

I'm in awe more than ever.

Lucky fan grabs Jeter's 3,000 ball, gives it back

NEW YORK (AP) — Christian Lopez was at the bottom of several piles during his days playing football at small St. Lawrence University.

So, finding himself buried under a hoard of Yankee Stadium fans Saturday wasn't exactly a new experience. What was different, however, was that instead of cradling a fumbled pigskin in his arms, the 6-foot-5 former lineman happened to be clutching Derek Jeter's 3,000th career hit after the New York star homered in the third inning off Tampa Bay's David Price.

The specially marked ball landed in the first row of Section 236 in the left-field bleachers, avidly pursued by a dozen other fans. Lucky to land the prize, Lopez was happy to give it back to Jeter for season tickets and several other goodies.

"I was taking a picture, hoping he would hit it, and the next thing I know, it's in the air and I see my dad diving across a crowd of people," Lopez said after a whirlwind series of in-game interviews with the media and a postgame meeting with Jeter and several other Yankees.

"My dad missed it, because he has awful hands. The next thing I know, I just saw the ball roll in front of me and I jumped on it. It was instinct."

The 23-year-old Lopez, from Highland Mills, N.Y., a town just outside West Point, got his $65 tickets a few days ago through StubHub as a birthday present from his girlfriend, Tara Johnson, 22, also from Highland Mills.

Johnson, his father, Raul, and two family friends all were in the first row of raised bleachers, hoping to see history. According to Johnson, Lopez actually thought he might be part of it.

"My boyfriend said, 'If the ball comes over here, I'm going to get it,'" Johnson said. "So when it was hit, I said, 'Christian, I think it's really coming here.'" When the ball reached the stands, Lopez bent down to retrieve it and engulfed as though he was recovering a fumble.

His father, wearing a No. 5 Joe DiMaggio jersey, draped himself across his son's back while others in the section tried to pry away the prized possession.

"I was worried about getting out of there alive," Christian Lopez said during an in-game interview that the Yankees showed on the big video board in center field.

The crowd cheered when Lopez said he would give the ball back to Jeter. "When I saw the ball went to him, I covered him," Raul Lopez said. "I knew it would be crazy, because I saw the Barry Bonds thing.

You know it's going to be crazy because it's history." Once he emerged, Christian Lopez told a different tale.

"I think he's telling the story that he was trying to protect me," Christian Lopez said. "But I think he was the one who punched me in the ribs. I was glad I got to share with him. This is a good time."

Moments after Lopez grabbed the ball, Yankees officials hustled him to the Steinbrenner family luxury box. "Security was right there in a second," Lopez said.

"They were dragging me up the stairs, and I'm a large man to drag up stairs. They were saying, 'Come with us.' The whole reason for me to come to the game was for history. And to actually be part of it now, it's crazy. It was surreal."

It became even more exciting when he met Jeter and presented him with the ball. Lopez also met several other Yankees stars, including Hall of Famer Reggie Jackson.

"I had an opportunity to meet him a little while ago," Jeter said after getting the ball from Lopez. "He got his tickets from his girlfriend, so he owes her quite a bit. He's going to be paying her back for quite some time."

Lopez can pay her back, in part, with some of the bounty he received from the Yankees. He was rewarded with four front-row Legends seats for the remainder of the 2011 season, including the postseason, along with three bats and three balls signed by Jeter, plus two jerseys autographed by Jeter.

Lopez was asked if he ever thought of demanding $1 million or more for the ball, as some fans have after catching milestone home runs.

"It didn't cross my mind until they asked me what I wanted," he said. "The only thing I could think of was a few signed balls would be nice, and to meet him. It wasn't about the money. It was about a milestone and I wasn't going to take that away from him.

Money's cool and all, but I'm only 23 years old. I have a lot of time to make that." "Mr. Jeter deserved it," Lopez said. "It's all his."

Lopez, who sells cell phones for a living, already was receiving calls from friends and co-workers. "My boss actually talked to me today," he said. "She said, 'You're going to keep the ball from me? You're fired.'"

While 48,102 other fans were fortunate enough to see Jeter's 5-for-5 performance and milestone hit in a 5-4 Yankees win, thousands more who held tickets to Friday night's rainout waited dejectedly in long lines at ticket windows before the game, hoping to exchange their rain checks for seats on Saturday. No such luck. Electronic signs ringing the stadium indicated the game was sold out, and that those in line most likely were waiting in vain.

But the majority of fans, many of whom were from out of town and who had been on line for as long as 2 hours, still hoped for a mini-miracle.

"My 10-year-old is a really big Yankees fan who's never been to a major league baseball game. This will be a first if we make it," said David Demmon of Albuquerque, N.M. "We bought these tickets a month in advance. We thought this was great and we were really looking forward to it, but it doesn't look as if we're going to get in today."

John Verbeek made train trips down from Connecticut on two straight days, hoping to see Jeter hit the mark. Instead, he was headed back to the station without seeing a single pitch or at-bat. "I got the tickets on StubHub for a premium," Verbeek said, referring to Friday's game. "My daughter is a real Jeter fan and she raced all the way in from Boston to get here on time last night. I'm really disappointed, because I've seen them play in a lot worse weather than last night. We were here for a Boston game one night (June 9) when they waited 3 hours and then played the game. And it wasn't that bad weather. They've played in a lot worse. And now we can't get in today. We're very, very disappointed."

Mark Brill, who drove in from Woodstock, bought his tickets for Friday's game on TicketsNow.com. "Sometimes you get bit," he said. "I know they're sold out for today's game, but I heard they might have standing room, or maybe we'll get tickets for tomorrow's game."

For the chance to see Jeter's 3,000th hit, that's too late.

From USAToday.com

Class act all the way. Good to see there are still some real fans out there, and it is refreshing that someone isn't willing to sell out for a cheap money-making opportunity. Very cool.

Update: Returning Jeter’s Big Hit: No Good Deed Goes Untaxed (Perhaps)


Christian Lopez, left, caught Jeter's 3,000th career hit on Friday and gave the ball back to the Yankees for four seats to every game for the rest of this season.

By John Leland
July 11, 2011

Here is the fan’s fantasy: You go to the ballpark and under a picture-perfect sky not only do the Yankees win, but in recognition of your exemplary behavior, the team also showers you with free season tickets, signed merchandise and a personal audience with the Yankee-est of Yankees, Derek Jeter. The team president hands you his card, with his e-mail address.

And here is the reality: The taxman may own a piece of your windfall. And not in tickets, either. He takes only cash.

For Christian Lopez, the 23-year-old fan who came up with Jeter’s 3,000th hit at Yankee Stadium on Saturday, the ramifications of his gift from above are as American as baseball, hot dogs and taxes.

As in Las Vegas, the house always wins.

“There’s different ways the I.R.S. could try to characterize a ball caught by a fan in the stands,” said Andrew D. Appleby, a tax associate at the Sutherland Asbill & Brennan law firm in New York who has written about the tax implications of souvenir baseballs. “But when the Yankees give him all those things, it’s much more clear-cut that he owes taxes on what they give him.”

Mr. Lopez, of Highland Mills, N.Y., was seated with his father, Raul, in the left field stands when Jeter drove a 3-2 curveball over the wall. The ball bounced off Raul Lopez’s hands and rolled to the floor, where his son, a former defensive tackle in college, pounced on it. The blast made Jeter only the 28th player to have 3,000 hits, and the first to do so as a Yankee.

Stadium security guards, who had been prepared for the event, whisked Mr. Lopez and his father to the office of the team president, Randy Levine, where officials asked his intentions, according to a team spokeswoman.

“He goes, ‘What do you want?’ ” Mr. Lopez said Monday at a Verizon store in Middletown, N.Y., where he works in customer service. “I was like, ‘How about a couple signed balls, some jerseys and bats.’ He said, ‘O.K., I can definitely do that.’ ”

Fans have not always been as generous with their windfalls. In 2006, a San Francisco man named Andrew Morbitzer, who recovered Barry Bonds’s record-breaking 715th home run ball, sold the ball on eBay for $220,100. The ball Mark McGwire hit for his record-breaking 70th home run in 1998 sold for around $3 million.

Mr. Lopez, who told reporters later that he owed more than $100,000 in student loans, said he felt the ball rightfully belonged to Jeter.

“To have someone come up to you and say, ‘Hey, my kid is looking up to you now’ or ‘You’re a really stand-up guy, I wish there were more people like you in the world,’ it’s very meaningful stuff,” he said at the store, where he had already been interviewed nine times before work. “You can’t put a price on something like that.”

In lieu of such price-setting, the Yankees gave Mr. Lopez four Champions Suite tickets for their remaining home games and any postseason games, along with three bats, three balls and two jerseys, all signed by Jeter. For Sunday’s game the team gave him four front-row Legends seats, which sell for up to $1,358.90 each.

In such gratitude begins tax liability, said Paul Caron, a tax professor at the University of Cincinnati law school and author of Tax Prof Blog.

He recalled a 2004 incident in which Oprah Winfrey gave 276 cars to the audience of her show, who were surprised to discover they incurred tax obligations of around $7,000.

“Pretty clearly he’s going to have to report as income the value of all the stuff he got for the ball,” Professor Caron said.

So break out your pencils.

On SportsMemorabilia.com, an auction site, baseballs signed by Jeter were being sold for up to $600, jerseys for close to $1,000 and bats for $900.

The tickets to the 32 remaining home games (after Sunday) have a combined face value of $44,800 to $73,600, according to the team’s Web site. The tickets could be worth a lot more if the Yankees play deep into October. Steven Bandini, a tax partner at the accounting firm Zapken & Loeb, said that if the items were valued modestly at $50,000, they would probably carry a tax burden of about $14,000.

Michael J. Graetz, a law professor at Columbia University who advised the I.R.S. on how to treat the McGwire ball, questioned whether the booty was not a gift, and therefore not taxable.

“The legal question of whether it is a gift or prize is whether the transferor is giving the property out of detached and disinterested generosity,” Professor Graetz said. “It’s hard for me, not being a Yankee fan, to think of the Yankees as being in the business of exercising generosity to others, but there’s a reasonable case to be made that these were given out of generosity.”

An I.R.S. spokesman, Grant Williams, said the agency would not speculate on Mr. Lopez’s tax liabilities.

Alice McGillion, a spokeswoman for the Yankees, declined to say whether the team would give Mr. Lopez money to meet any tax liability, saying only, “Yankee partners and partnership always comply with the tax laws.”

Mr. Lopez said if he had to pay taxes, he hoped he could borrow from his parents rather than sell his memorabilia.

He did, however, plan to give a bat and a jersey to his girlfriend, he said. “She’s the one who bought the tickets,” he said.

Tim Stelloh contributed reporting from Middletown, N.Y.

A version of this article appeared in print on July 12, 2011, on page A15 of the New York edition with the headline: Returning Jeter’s Big Hit: No Good Deed Goes Untaxed (Perhaps).

From http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/12/ny...-hit.html?_r=1

When I read this I was initially bothered by it, but I do think that whatever happens with the IRS, the guy who gave Jeter the ball will not pay a nickel of it. Gotta love his attitude about the whole thing.

Damn the IRS.

Christian Lopez is seen with his girlfriend, Tara Johnson, at a Yankees game in this June 2010 file photo. (Tara Johnson)

Modells and other sporting good stores are taking good care of him, paying off all the taxes as well as for his college, and apparently making him into a baseball card....

The real question is why the hell wouldn't Jeter shell for the guys bills considering the amount of money he has and not to mention the guy graciously offered the ball up to him for free!!!

That's a good question, I would have thought Jeter would do something.
Maybe he did but under the table kind of deal.

It depends on whether the exchange was considered income. What occurred could be considered a gift from the Yankees, depending on who you ask.

Originally Posted by kt0473

Modells and other sporting good stores are taking good care of him, paying off all the taxes as well as for his college, and apparently making him into a baseball card....

Yankees Fan’s Generosity Is Returned, With $50,000 to Ease His Debt

By Tim Stelloh
July 13, 2011

A week ago, Christian Lopez was living an unremarkable life. He had a job, a girlfriend, a significant student loan debt. Then fate (he retrieved Derek Jeter’s 3,000th hit) and choice (he simply returned the ball to the Yankees shortstop) changed all that.

Executives in sporting goods and memorabilia are donating $25,000 each to Christian Lopez.

Mr. Lopez, 23, was lauded for his honor and ridiculed for his refusal to consider selling the ball. He met Jeter on Saturday, was the Yankees’ guest on Sunday and was back at work in a Verizon store in Middletown, N.Y., on Monday.

On Wednesday afternoon, the story took a new turn at a crowded Times Square sports store, where two of Mr. Lopez’s admirers pledged him at least $50,000 in financial support — donations that came amid revelations of Mr. Lopez’s financial challenges.

Mr. Lopez said he owed more than $100,000 in student loan debt; he could also face a significant tax burden after receiving season tickets and autographed memorabilia from the Yankees in exchange for the ball, which may have been worth $100,000 or more.

Surrounded by Yankees T-shirts, hats and other merchandise, Mitchell Modell, chief executive of Modell’s Sporting Goods, and Brandon Steiner, chief of the memorabilia company Steiner Sports, pledged Mr. Lopez $25,000 each at a Modell’s shop off Times Square. Mr. Modell will also donate 5 percent of the earnings from Yankees merchandise sold at his shops over the next week to Mr. Lopez.

At the news conference, Mr. Lopez appeared stunned. “I don’t know if there’s a cloud name for where I am right now,” he said.

Moments before, Mr. Modell had given Mr. Lopez two other gifts: a lifetime discount card to his stores and his personal 2009 Yankees World Series ring, which Mr. Modell said he had because his company was a major sponsor. Mr. Steiner estimated the ring to be worth more than $40,000.
Mr. Modell said he had been on vacation in Turkey during Saturday’s game. Upon returning to New York, he read news accounts of Mr. Lopez and of his financial woes and wanted to help.

“When you hear about what Christian did, it wasn’t about Christian,” he said. “It was about his love for the Yankees, his love for Derek Jeter, his love for the history of the Yankees franchise.”

Since Saturday, Mr. Lopez’s story has played out across the local and national news media and transformed him into a kind of baseball-fan superstar. He is asked for autographs; he has received hundreds of Facebook friend requests.

At the news conference, Mr. Lopez said his finances were the last thing on his mind. “Right now I’m living in the moment,” he said. “I’m not going to let taxes ruin my experience.”

A version of this article appeared in print on July 14, 2011, on page A20 of the New York edition with the headline: Yankees Fan’s Generosity Is Returned, With $50,000 to Ease His Debt.

From http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/14/ny...ans-debts.html

Yes that is true, Jeter very well could have kept it under the table, but if he did in fact do that why would Christian Lopez be accepting the full amount paid from the Sporting Goods companies and whoever else. I am a die hard Jeter fan, but I don't believe he did anything to contribute, which to me is out of character. The yankees barely gave the guy anything, four tickets or something for the rest of the season I think in legend seats? and a few other things adding up to about 14 grand. The guy could have easily sold that ball for a quarter mill.