Former MLB player from Indianapolis has artwork on display at the famous Rickwood Game

Indianapolis, Indiana – A resident of Indianapolis will have artwork on display throughout Rickwood Field as Major League Baseball celebrates the Negro Leagues in a game in Birmingham, Alabama.

The artist Micah Johnson, a former Major League baseball player, is the creator of a series of beautifully illustrated Topps baseball cards that honor the Black League icons.

“I just went into work mode,” said Mic Johnson on a recent Black Baseball Mixtape podcast appearance. “There’s a few opportunities in this life where you got to capitalize on, and I saw this as one of those opportunities. And so, for the next three weeks, I worked around the clock.”

The set, which includes Negro League greats Willie Mays, Jackie Robinson, Josh Gibson, Larry Doby, Monte Irvin, and Satchel Paige, will be on full display at Rickwood Field in Birmingham during the San Francisco Giants vs. St. Louis Cardinals regular season game.

“In a lot of ways, it was the perfect project,” Johnson said in an interview with Ripped.TOPPS.com. “It taught me a lot. I did a lot of research going into it on each player because I really [wanted] to understand the magnitude of this project I was working on, and I went through a lot of iterations leading into this before I actually completed one. Just destroying canvases trying to get it right.”

Johnson finished the original artwork on canvas using charcoal.

“One of the first things we thought of as far as who should we connect with on this is Micah Johnson,” says Michael Linkens, director of product & creative at the Topps Company. “As a former MLB player turned artist, he’s been on my radar for a while. I’ve been looking at him as somebody who does really cool work that is affecting culture. So, this was just a slam dunk opportunity to connect with him and to collaborate.”

Additionally, enormous 24-foot-tall replicas of the cards will be visiting other towns and ballparks.