Derek Jeter '2' photoshopped image goes viral

The stars appeared to align Thursday night at Yankee Stadium for Derek Jeter's final home game in pinstripes.

The cosmos seemed so in tune with Jeter's Big Apple farewell, that at one point during the second inning, a curious stat line appeared in the score box: top of the 2nd inning, score tied 2-2, 2 outs, 2 runners on base, and a 2-2 count on the batter. Add in Orioles' starter Kevin Gausman's 22-pitch pitch count and #2 himself standing next to it, and the shot seemed almost too perfect. And it was.

Turns out, the screenshot was the creation of Samuel Lam, who combined different screenshots from throughout the game to make the perfect #2 box score. But that didn't stop folks on Twitter from spreading the image as if it were real:

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Once Lam realized his image had gone viral, he issued an apology on Twitter, in addition to a lengthy explanation behind the image on his website:

"The constant talking about (Jeter's) number and the hashtag#RE2PECT gave me an idea. So I awaited the top of the second inning and looked at the pitch count. Then I awaited for the actual possibility of the influx of 2s to appear. It never happened. But I wanted it to happen. With all this talk of 2s and how everyone is praising Jeter for all the wrong reasons, I opened up my Photoshop, grabbed some screenshots from the game, then just made it myself.

"I didn’t think much of it. It was a joke. I was so sure that people watching the game would notice that it was fake since the Orioles didn’t get two runners on base in the top of the second inning. But of course, in this day and age of the Internet, people will jump to anything. And look at all those retweets and favorites. That’s a lot! Sorry if I deceived you.”