Fire destroys California girl’s baseball card collection. Fellow fan pitches in to help

Life hasn’t been easy for San Francisco Giants fans after their team hit a wall since its World Series run in 2014, but one fan in particular has been hit hard.

Reese Osterberg, a 9-year-old Giants fan, lost her entire baseball card collection in the Creek wildfire that is burning in Fresno and Madera counties in California, The Fresno Bee reported. But, thanks to the kindness of a California man, Reese is now sitting on a collection of 25,000 baseball cards.

Kevin Ashford of San Jose had planned to sell his baseball card collection for a hefty amount of money, but in an act of pure generosity, he gifted his entire collection this week to Reese.

“I would give anything to see the smile on her face when she receives them,” Ashford said to NBC Bay Area.

Thanks to a Facebook post from the CalFire/Fresno County Fire asking for donations to Reese to help replace her 200-card collection, the word reached Ashford.

“I got to thinking about what I had in the garage,” Kevin said to NBC. “I thought, you know, what if instead of selling them on eBay, I’m going to donate them. I’m gonna donate them all and put a smile on a little girl’s face.”

Before Ashford stepped up to the plate for baseball-loving Reese, the young girl wrote a letter to Giants star catcher Buster Posey informing him of her loss, Fresno reported.

“She loves learning about the players,” Amy Osterberg, Reese’s mother said to The Mercury News. “She loves talking about the players.”

According to The Mercury News, while Reese is planning on keeping some of the gifted cards, she wants to share with other people who have been tragically affected by the fire.

“It would be fun for them to do after everything that’s happened,” Amy Osterberg said. “I know for Reese, she’s super excited about sharing all of them.”