As I mentioned yesterday, two nights ago a notable game-worn jersey dealer gave me a ring out of the blue. He was just checking to see how everything was going, but also wanted to touch on some very important issues in the hobby.

The topic of pro-cut jerseys made its way into the conversation, and pretty much consumed the rest of our one-hour chat. It turns out that my dealer friend sold a batch of pro-cut baseball jerseys, which he suspects were later sold as “game-worn” jerseys. We both agreed that this has been going on for years and that it is a major problem in the hobby.

Then our conversation changed to the question of whether an honest person should ever sell a pro-cut jersey. I am not going to call anyone dishonest for stating a jersey for sale is a pro-cut shirt and not game-worn, but I am willing to bet that the majority of jerseys sold as pro-cut will be sold as game-worn at some point.

So, what am I getting at? Well, I am not exactly sure. Maybe if you ever sell a pro-cut jersey it would be a good idea to mark it in some fashion to make sure you know that it was never game-used. Invisible ink is a procedure that comes to mind.

I don’t know how many times I have seen a pro-cut signed jersey, which sold in an  sale and it ended up on eBay or somewhere else with dirt and other artificial wear.

Someone please correct me if I am wrong, but how many pro-cut jerseys you have seen sold on eBay are later sold again as pro-cuts? Probably very few. I am sure some end up in collections, but my gut tells me that a bunch of them are sold fraudulently as game-used.
Many people are being fooled and it really is a shame.

Hello all. You will be happy to know that my Paypal account was restored to full power last night. After I made a phone call to its customer service line a representative asked me a few questions and restored the account.

I asked the lady why I was never sent my confirmation code through the mail. She said "sometimes it takes up to three weeks, sometimes it comes right away." Thanks... that's nice to know. If I wouldn't have called last night I could be waiting through the good part of May to receive the code.

Well, that's done at least.

I am sorry that this is going to be a short entry today. I was out of the office and am home now, but just wanted to touch base with everyone.

However, in closing, I will offer you this teaser for tomorrow's blog entry. After I received a call from a notable game-worn jersey dealer last night, I came up with a very disturbing angle on game-worn and game-cut jerseys.

Be sure to check out Gavel Chat tomorrow.

Good night.

If you haven’t already checked it out, there is a picture of Keith Olbermann on the sportscollectorsdigest.com home page linking you to an archive of stories written by the host of MSNBC’s Countdown, regular participant of the Dan Patrick Show and columnist of SCD.
Keith is an avid collector and quite the historian. I think you will find his stories entertaining and equally informative.

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I hate to keep bringing it up, but my Paypal account is still down. I really am getting tired of waiting for Paypal to send me a confirmation code via U.S. mail. Today I emailed them to find out what was taking so long. I have many items I have won recently off eBay and need to pay for them ASAP. You would think that Paypal would splurge for Express Mail on something this important, but I guess not.

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If anyone missed it, the NBA Playoffs have started and last night I forced myself to watch some of the games. Is it me or does nobody really care about the first round of these games? About ten years ago I would watch every single game of the playoffs that was televised. Now, I am more interested in the winner of The Apprentice than how many points Rip Hamilton scored last night.

I still would rather watch the NBA Playoffs than Deal of No Deal. What a stupid show! What is so exciting about watching a hyperactive contestant jump up and down, trying to win prizes with no talent or real strategy? I heard that it’s one of the highest-rated shows on television. If that’s true, we have truly sunk to the bottom of the barrel.

Right now I count at least 12 auctions that are live online. Kevin Savage, Premier, Mastro, AMI, Bricol, Robert Edward, EAC, Heritage, Grey Flannel and Lelands are all offering treasures that we’ve been saving our money for all winter and spring. With this many auctions going on right now, and so many fantastic items offered, how will these auction houses keep prices up? I mean, wouldn’t it make more sense if they would space them out more?

I guess I’m probably not correct in my assumption because this has been going on for a while. I remember when I would be working on auction night for American Memorabilia and our bidders would be calling until around 3am, and they used to tell us that Lelands, or whoever, was still open (Lelands usually closed on the same night).


Speaking of auctions. I will be traveling to Heritage Auction Galleries’ live sports auction in Dallas, along with Steve Bloedow next month. The auction, which is a live event on May 5, should be very interesting. I have never been to a live major auction, so I am very excited.
I plan on covering the auction in the pages of SCD and will also have some Internet content prepared, including video or audio.
Heritage’s auction features some killer football material and a great selection of baseball autographs and memorabilia, including pieces from the Cy Young museum.


Here is an awesome clipping I swiped from the Vintage Card Forum boys… In case you didn’t see it on their website here it is.


Judging from the amount of hits on my blog it appears that a lot of people are reading. I wish we could get more people emailing or posting comments. Tell me about some of your similar experiences. Praise or criticism relating to memorabilia, cards or auctions will be greatly appreciated. I love reading things from our readers because I know I can get very boring at times.:)


Well, off to Sin City. Have a good weekend everyone!
-chris

    Just an FYI for all my loyal readers, I will be headed to Las Vegas this Thursday to celebrate my birthday, so unfortunately I will probably not be posting any blog entries after Wednesday of this week. I will be hanging out with some employees from the Upper Deck card company and from American Memorabilia, so I may have some breaking news that I can chime in with, but I wouldn’t bet on it (even if I am in Vegas… Get it?)

    Leland’s preview is online right now and the auction will be going live tonight and it is gonna be a dandy.
The auction even had an item in it that prompted me to give my boy Al Rosen a call. I’m not sure how many of you remember this, but in 1989 Mr. Mint toured the country with an uncut strip of T206 cards that included a Honus Wagner and two other Hall of Famers (Cy Young and Mordecai Brown).
    Well, this same sheet is lot No. 1 in Leland’s May 18th sale.
Al told me that the sheet originally belonged to Barry Halper and that he was trying to sell it for Halper in the two or three million dollar range. That didn’t happen, but it did sell in Halper’s 1999     sale. Since then, it changed hands one more time.
    Despite the strip’s creased nature, I still think that this Honus example is probably second most famous, only less popular than the PSA8 that just sold for $2.35 million.
Will it hit $500,000? $1 million?? Not sure, but I will be watching this one like a hawk.

    If you’re not interested in the Wagner card, maybe you will want to buy his house! Yep, you read that right. Now, I am not going to lie. I don’t really consider cars and houses, which were once owned by an athlete, that much of a collectible. But if I had the chance to buy the home that Vince Lombardi once lived in, I would at least have to consider it.

    There will be a killer boxing offering in Leland’s sale as well, including the earliest known pair of Cassius Clay fight-worn boxing gloves and Sugar Ray Robinson’s first pro fight-worn robe.


    As an off-topic note, I rented the new Rocky Balboa DVD over the weekend and I was pleasantly surprised. I knew it would be a little cheesy, but it wasn’t too bad and I really enjoyed it. After I was through with that, I watched United 93 and I don’t know if I ever watched something that depressing. It was really well done and I couldn’t help but tear up.

At some point in my lifetime I would really hope that each major sports league would offer game-used jerseys the “right” way, in order to offset the problems that are currently taking place with modern game-worn jerseys. In my opinion there is only one way to do this, and it’s actually quite simple.

After a player is through using a particular jersey, it should then be inventoried and properly marked and then auctioned off on that league’s website.
I know the leagues already do this to an extent, but in the very near future I would like to see every single jersey that is worn in a professional game up for auction.
Obviously, nothing can be done for jerseys that were distributed in the past, but looking forward, this would be the answer.

Each jersey should be accompanied with a team letter and a matching hologram, in addition to a proprietary marking (invisible ink perhaps?).
This system would work perfectly and it would take any guesswork, used to determine whether a jersey is real or not, out of the equation.

Say you want the jersey that Terrell Owens wore in his first game as a Cowboy… As long as you are willing to win it at auction, this can happen.

Do you want a milestone jersey like Peyton Manning’s Super Bowl XLI shirt or Kobe’s 81-point shirt he wore in 2006? No problemo.

The auction format is a no-brainer. There is so much demand for game-worn jerseys without rock-solid provenance and a lot more demand for shirts with that sure-fire proof.
Far too many game-issued, game-cut and even store-model jerseys are offered to collectors and identified as authentic gamers, and this crap is really getting old.

The truth is there are very few ways you can tell if a jersey was actually used in a game. Unless you have a perfect photomatch, which is nearly impossible to find most of the time, you can’t be sure that a jersey was actually used in a game.

Many sellers won’t even write the word “game-used” in an auction title any more. “Dan Marino game jersey,” “Babe Ruth game model bat.” These sellers won’t even tell you that it is “game-used,” but the pieces are still getting “game-used” money.
Now I am not saying that every jersey sold as a “game model,” and not “game-used” is fake. All I’m saying is you better be very careful.

If a LaDanian Tomlinson gamer goes up for auction and is described as having “light use,” I can tell you one thing right now; it ain’t real, and never was in the same building as L.T. unless it was sold at Qualcomm Stadium’s souvenir stand.

A jersey that was used by a running back in the NFL will more than likely be battered, filled with rips and hit marks, especially from a guy who touches the ball as many times as L.T.
I know that my request is probably a little far-fetched, mainly because the leagues are many moons from being even close to this strategy, but all I know is at some point something has to be done.

If you are a memorabilia collector and haven’t been to mearsonline.com yet, you might wanna check out this site. Troy Kinunen and Dave Bushing are selling a lot of their own items and also are offering items from consignors.

Their idea is to bring some of the top game-used equipment and other memorabilia to collectors who want to purchase something “right now,” as opposed to trying to win something from an auction.
The Miss America panoramic photo and many other sports and non-sports items can be viewed at their site.

They charge no buyer’s premium, so the price you see is the price you will pay.
On that same note, I will be conducting an interview with Kinunen this week and will either write a Q&A or offer the interview on sportscollectorsdigest.com as an audio file.

If there is an interview that you would like to hear, write me at chris.nerat@fwpubs.com.