About the Ball: Rawlings offered these leather Signature Series baseballs* for autograph collectors as a more economical alternative to the Official Game Ball. Big League Baseballs does not condone unofficial baseballs for autographs under any citcumstances, but at least these are leather and supposedly do not bleed when signed.

*This addition to the Museum of Baseballs is an exception, only for educational purposes.

About the Ball: Extremely rare - the 2012 Gold Glove Awards Official Baseball. The most perfect leather you'd see on any ball is wrapped around these 2012 keepsakes, as well as the almost identical 2011 versions of Gold Glove Awards Ceremony baseballs. They saved the best of the best for these very special baseballs, and the stamping is perfect in placement and crispness.

This ball is extremely rare, to obtain one, you had to be there, and even then, you probably had to be pretty important. Not many of these made it to collectors, if any. In fact, it's the only one I've seen unsigned, and one of the only ones that made it out to the public (huge tip of the cap to Rawlings for making this available!)

About the Ball: We're very lucky to have added this ball to the Museum of Baseballs (and to my personal collection). This is the second version of 2011 Gold Glove Awards baseballs we've seen. The other more common version, with all red laces, is pictured in this gallery.

This version features the common gold laces and new -- for 2011 -- gold stamping. I believe these were used for signings with award winners, or perhaps given to Rawlings and MLB execs and other dignitaries. Just speculating.

The other version was provided to attendees and found in gift bags at the 2011 Gold Glove Awards Dinner. It contains a list of AL and NL Gold Glove winners on each side panel, where as this version is blank.

Additional differences - this version is clearly MLB Baseball grade leather, whereas the more common red laced version is a bit lower grade (still excellent) and has a "China" stamp on the reverse, meaning it was made in China.

I believe the new 2012 Gold Glove Awards Dinner Official Baseballs is almost exactly like this one, with only the year being chance. And it could be even scarcer. It was apparently only used for Award Winner autographs and I suppose given to some attendees (one of these 2012 balls, signed by Matt Wieters, was given away to a very lucky Rawlings Facebook Page Fan - a good reason for all collectors to follow!)

The 2012 Attendees actually received a "non official" souvenir ball this year instead of any form of official leather version. (It's probably not worthy of a place in the revered Museum of Baseballs).

One final note, in my opinion, this 2011 special version is one of the finest baseballs I've owned in regards to ink boldness, stamp placement, stitching and perfection of leather - not a single blemish. It is as close to a perfect baseball as I've seen.