Ted Williams Game-Worn Baseball Cleats: His Sizes Through the Years.
Ted Williams Game-Worn Cleats
Early in his career, Ted Williams wore size 9 and 9.5 cleats like the ones that are featured in this article. In fact, these Ted Williams worn cleats featured in this article could be one of the earliest cleats known to exist from Ted Williams’ career. If you have any other information about Ted Williams Cleats let us know as we are searching for his earliest cleats to exist. So far, this has been the only ones we can find.
Pictured, we see Williams wearing RIDDELLS. This Riddell model cleat was made early on in Ted Williams career, in 1942. Upon close examination, the tongues on each cleat can safely be identified as the RIDDELLS style that Williams used.
Ted Williams Game-Worn Cleats
Seen in the tongue’s of the shoe, underneath the word RIDDELL you will find the letters HB 9 – D
The other cleat will have the same markings except it will be marked HB 9 with a small 2 in the corner. What does that mean? The number “2” is a half size designator. Hence, the one shoe is a half size bigger than the other one. Ted Williams was known to wear two different size shoes. Williams’ daughter stated that “my father would buy two pairs of different size shoes the same shoe but in two different sizes. I don’t know what he would do with the other shoes he would have to buy in a pair.”
Ted Williams #9 Worn Cleat
These cleats have vintage clay on the bottom of them. The number 9’s on the tongue and the Ted Williams printed on the bottom of the shoes, when examined with a digital microscope appears vintage. The shoes also appear very vintage and shoe obvious wear.
Ted Williams #9 Worn Cleat
Now research and photo style matching can aid in our examination of these cleats, however, what really seals the deal is the provenance. In the particular case of these Riddell size 9 and 9.5 cleats, they were obtained by a prominent Knicks basketball equipment manager, who was one of Ted Williams greatest fans.
Our research supports that Ted Williams, changed shoe sizes throughout his career. He wore 2 different sizes, and we don’t know what he did with the extra shoes. Check out our current auctions or check out other items that have been authenticated by 100% Authentic.
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