Fan Who Caught Jeter's 3,000th Hit May Owe IRS Thousands

[Soul Crusher]

Fan Who Caught Jeter's 3,000th Hit May Owe IRS Thousands
NBC New York ^ | 7/12/11

Posted on Tuesday, July 12, 2011 10:07:09 AM by markomalley

The tax man may be on the hunt for the super fan who caught Derek Jeter's 3,000th hit.

Christian Lopez, 23, recovered the prized ball his father fumbled after The Captain hammered it into their section of the stands in the third inning of the Yankees' win over Tampa Bay on Saturday.

The Verizon salesman from Highland Mills, N.Y., gave the ball back to Jeter, whom he called an "icon," and the Yankees lavished a slew of prizes, including luxury box seats for every remaining home game this season and post-season and some signed memorabilia.

Now the IRS wants a piece. The prizes Lopez received are estimated to be worth more than $32,000 -- and, like game show contestants, Lopez may have to pay taxes on the gifts and prizes because the IRS considers them income.

[Grape Ape]

Yeah, I mentioned this might be a possibility in the MLB thread.  Another reason why the fan should have sold the thing to the highest bidder.

[funk51]

the yankees gave according to my local paper about 75k worth of stuff incliding the tickets, signed bats and balls and jerseys to this guy. steiner sports said he could have gotten a minimum of 250 k without much effort. the players for the most part are greedy why shouldn't the fans be.

[Grape Ape]

the players for the most part are greedy why shouldn't the fans be.

Spot on.  Plus, the guy had a lot of outstanding student loans.

[Grape Ape]

Good deed gets rewarded:

When Christian Lopez decided to give Derek Jeter the ball from the Yanks’ short stop’s 3000th hit in exchange for Yankee schwag,, Lopez, as we discussed yesterday, may have inadvertently incurred a decent amount of tax liability on top the $100,000 in outstanding student loans he owes. Today, we learn that this story has a happy ending. As ESPN New York reported, Modell’s and Miller High Life have both offered to help out. The beer company said they would cover Lopez’s tax liability while Modell’s said a portion of sales of Yankee merchandise would help offset Lopez’s loans as well. Furthermore, as NBC’s Bruce Beck noted, Brandon Steiner and Mitchell Modell both guaranteed $25,000 for Lopez’s loan repayments as well. Good deeds sometimes do get rewarded

[tonymctones]

Good deed gets rewarded:

cool stuff