1969 Boston Red Sox, No. 50 Mike Timlin
Uniform and Team History
This throwback uniform features the 100th anniversary Major League Baseball patch, which was worn by all big-league teams.
Oldtime Game History
Right-hander Mike Timlin pitched six seasons for the Red Sox and was a key member of World Series-winning teams in 2004 and 2007. In 2014, six years after he retired from the big leagues, Timlin performed a major service to the Oldtime Baseball Game when he flew from Colorado to Cambridge to pitch a couple of innings and help raise money for the ALS Therapy Development Institute. Timlin did so to honor his late mother, who battled ALS. The No. 50 represents the uniform number he wore during his years with the Red Sox.
The problem was that no uniform in our collection was big enough to fit him. But up to the plate stepped our longtime friend Peter Capolino of Philadelphia, the former owner of Mitchell & Ness who in 1998 worked with us when Technical Personnel Services of Lowell, Mass., provided funding for our original set of throwback uniforms. Capolino graciously donated a complete 1969 Red Sox throwback uniform to our collection, and Timlin was happy to wear it.
Timlin is not the only former Red Sox pitcher to wear this uniform. Jonathan Papelbon, who recorded the final out of the 2007 World Series by striking out the Colorado Rockies’ Seth Smith, wore this uniform when he pitched in the 2024 Oldtime Baseball Game. Papelbon pitched a shutout inning.
And there’s Milton, Mass., native Rich Hill, who had four different stints with the Red Sox during his illustrious 21 seasons in the majors. Hill stepped up in a major way for the 2025 Oldtime Baseball Game, this after the game had to be moved back a day because of rain. Former Red Sox all-purpose star Brock Holt was to have played in 2025, but was unable to do so because of the rainout, which is when Hill saved the day. It was longtime Red Sox executive Gus Quattlebaum who invited his longtime friend to appear in the game, and Hill showed up, climbed into our Mike Timlin uniform and pitched two innings and played a couple of innings at first base. What makes this all the more special is that it was just one month earlier, on July 28, 2025, that Hill, pitching for the Kansas Royals, made his final big-league appearance. He thus became the first player to appear in the major leagues and the Oldtime Baseball Game in the same year. Quattlebaum, who had been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 2021, was participating in the pregame program after being invited by The Boston Home.
Gordie Gronkowski, brother of New England Patriots tight end Rob Gronkowski, wore this uniform from 2016 to 2018. Gordie, who played three seasons of minor-league baseball, hit a home run in the 2016 Oldtime Baseball Game.