Hample collects baseballs, 12,000+ baseballs and counting, from every major league stadium, including Mike Trout’s first career HR and Alex Rodrigues’s 3,000 career hit. But rather than just being celebrated for his work and accomplishments, Hample is criticized for how he goes about his craft.
Hample, who was raised in New York City, loves the game of baseball. After playing high school baseball, he played Division III ball at Guilford College in North Carolina. As a youth, he dreamed of playing in the Bigs, but what became reality was collecting baseballs during Major League games.
It started in 1990 when Hample caught a ball during a Mets’ game at Shea Stadium. The quest took off from there, reaching 6,000 balls and then doubling that number. He even developed a device for retrieving balls from tight spots, making it out of a baseball glove, rubber band, and pen.
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Along the way, Hample founded a concierge service. He escorts fans to games, catches balls for them, and charges $1500 for the experience (plus travel expenses). Hample became so famous (perhaps infamous) that Topps, the company that manufactures baseball cards, created the Zack Hample baseball card and included it in its 2017 collection.
But there is another side to Hample’s story: he has been widely criticized for the aggressive way he collects baseballs, including bumping young fans out of the way to get balls for himself. Consider this. A Colorado Rockies usher witnessed an incident where a coach threw a ball to a young fan, who then dropped it. Hample saw the incident, stepped in to grab the ball for himself, and then walked away.
Behavior like that prompted The New York Post to call him “baseball’s most hated fan,” and it also put MLB players on the alert. For example, Dodgers star Clayton Kershaw once refused to give Hample a ball because he already had so many.
Is there anything Hample wouldn’t do to collect a ball? What we know for sure is that Zack Hample is incredibly serious about collecting baseballs.
