Many of you may already know, I'm a big ticket collector. I think tickets are the most undervalued niche in the hobby and there's no better way to bring the fan closer to the game than by collecting tickets.

That said, I just wanted to bring to the attention of my Gavel Chat readers the special that PSA is offering right now for all their members.
PSA is having a $10 special for any ticket valued under $500 (no minimum). This can be a pretty big savings if you have a stack of tickets waiting to be sent in for grading.

I received this email this week from Mastro:

MEARS Authentication took what in the auction industry is an unprecedented stand. In order to do business directly with auction companies they are requiring access to private consignor and confidential bidding records. We are uncomfortable providing this type of access to any organization let alone one that as part of their business model conducts private purchases and sales. It is on this basis we made the decision not to renew our contract with MEARS. What has transpired since this decision is a process that we believe will make us a better firm and enable us to offer game used jerseys that have gone through an unprecedented third party review process.

Effective in 2008 Mastro Auctions will stand behind all of our game used jerseys by issuing our own LOAs. Behind these LOAs will be the most targeted and comprehensive authentication process in the business.  For each auction we will assemble a team of experts that will work together to examine all of our game used jerseys. No individual names will be associated with this work based on the fact that we will only offer items where the team unanimously deems the item to be authentic. We have engaged John Taube of PSA/DNA to oversee this process to ensure the necessary steps are being taken to ensure this authentication is being conducted in the most professional and comprehensive manner possible.

With the proliferation of fraud and alterations in our industry it is critical to have access to exemplar files to aid in the authentication process. We will arm our authentication team with the best exemplar database in the industry. First, we have gone through our historical database over the last 10 years of items sold and populated our new exemplar archive with images of tagging, styles, lettering, patches, etc. In order to augment this we have embarked upon an extensive retrieval process to collect detailed images from our customers who have the best private collections in the world. Although this process will be time consuming and expensive what will result will be the best authentication tool to ever be made available to the industry

I want to assure you that consistent with all the moves we make, a tremendous amount of thought and planning has gone into this change. We are confident that what will result is a better product for the industry and our valued customers.

Doug Allen
President  COO
Mastro Auctions Inc.
7900 S. Madison Street
Burr Ridge, IL 60527
p: 630-472-1200
m: 630-336-6650

Mastro Auctions

It looks to me like bat authenticator John Taube will be helping them with its process of authenticating jerseys… I found this rather interesting because I thought John was just a bat guy and not a jersey guy. Maybe I am reading this wrong. Other collectors have asked me about this very topic and as of right now, I'm not sure the exact details of what Mastro has in mind. We will soon find out.
The NFL football playoffs start this weekend and I will give you my picks just for fun.

I see the Steelers defeating the Jags, even though they are underdogs and banged up. I also see SD winning, but not covering the spread over Tennessee. The Seahawks should roll over the Redskins, but I think 's almost a toss up between the Giants and Bucs. I guess I will go with the home team due to the inconsistency of Eli and the Giants.