Collecting Game-used: Absolute first MLB home jersey? Maybe

It's always about the details -- and this time they spoke to me.

My newest item in this Collecting Game-used series is admittedly not game-used as in game action but it's pretty definitely used in its documented details and is unique ... as in I think it's perhaps the only one of its kind and a first.

It's an MLB Authenticated Alex Avila Detroit Tigers home jersey -- one that's tagged from back in 2009 but didn't get itself an MLBA sticker until after the 2022 season. How did that happen? Well, that's a mystery of its own -- and I can't solve that one -- but what struck me as interesting beyond that year, his first of 13 in MLB, was that uniform number for starters.

Keep reading to see the details this time ... and oddly enough it was documented in a different way for the first time tomorrow back in 2009.

THE BASICS ...
Team-issued jersey (MLB Authenticated): Alex Avila 2009 Detroit Tigers spring training home jersey
Watch it in action: No video this time ... but you can see it in action above and in the gallery below. This is definitely his photo shoot jersey based on its details and the team did wear these for spring games with them opening the 2009 spring at home in these unis.

Avila's reaction to The Buzz on Twitter.

What's Buzz-worthy: This jersey was among a number of Tigers gamers available recently on eBay from a major-volume dealer who bought a serious bulk lot direct from the team. (My price? Less than your 2024 Topps Series 1 jumbo box.) I found it during a search of familiar names with school ties in my collection (#RollTide) and the first thing that jumped out at me was the number -- that's a spring training special of sorts, but one that Avila didn't have attached to his profile as an MLB player here. The tag on the jersey does make it obvious -- it's a size 48 for No. 73 and for spring training (ST) but that style of tag is really more common for pants so I wasn't 100-percent sure just yet. Avila wore No. 13 as a Tiger for his first seven seasons, so I turned to the publicly available Getty Images photo database where preview images for media can be found and the earliest Avila search results confirmed the key detail as you can see above. He wore No. 73 in spring training that year, which was his first with the team ... but he didn't make his MLB debut until Aug. 6. So, a pre-rookie spring gamer? The Tigers reported for Grapefruit League action on Feb. 13 and photo day was eight days later at Joker Marchant Stadium in Lakeland, Fla. with their first game on Feb. 25 at home. Based on the selection of images and a closer look at the mesh vs. the Tigers' D patch on the front of this one, this is the same jersey seen in those portraits. The mesh holes in relation to the patch appear to match and that's really an impossibility to replicate (and I doubt anybody would want to). So, then I turned to Avila's game log ... just six games played that spring with all of them on the road ... so no official in-game action for this one, though it does have some very minor dirt stains near the collar and then down low on the back where a chest protector strap might have once landed but nothing like what you'd expect to see if used for a full game behind the plate. The Tigers did wear these style unis for spring games -- and their first game that spring -- so this is what he wore for photo day as well as his first game on the bench. So ... is it his first-ever Detroit Tigers home jersey? Well, he was a fifth-round pick in 2008, so he wasn't on the team the previous spring ... I'll let you decide.

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