Draining Every Drop of Blood

Check this out from eSCD:

It's an idea that's likely to raise a few eyebrows in the hobby, but a new company has figured out a way to remove autographs from baseballs. Alan Berman, founder of Signed Baseball Magic, talks with SCD's Scott Kelnhofer about the new process that can take a multi-signed baseball with, say, Doc Ellis and Roberto Clemente, and quite thorougly remove the former, leaving behind only the latter and a very different -- and more valuable -- collectible.

I looked online for more information on this practice and could not find any.

Take yer pick... every hobby has its pitfalls and they get worse as the money gets bigger. Everyday, the circling sharks take another chunk from the flailing swimmer. When there is nothing left to feed on, where will the sharks go next?

Whether it's pressing, trimming, restoration, toning (coins), forgery or removing unwanted signatures to manufacture a more valuable single-signed ball, it's just another way for an opportunistic scavenger to artificially make a collectible "worth more," that is, drain a few more drops of blood from the flatlining corpus of a hobby.

It's a Real Mess Out There

I occasionally get emails like this and they always make me sad.

I am purchasing a Babe Ruth Baseball and it has a Donald Frangipani authenticity document. I saw on your alert on your web site. Is there a time period that is suspect? I have not seen any other negative press regarding his authentication. Should I or can I get the ball reviewed by someone else? If so, who would you suggest?

I suggested that he RUN away from the transaction and referred him to some others to back up my assertions. Any Ruth signature with a Frangipani COA is undoubtedly fake. It's never fun delivering bad news, but hopefully he'll heed my advice.

That said, there is a tendency in people to not want to believe that they just dropped thousands of dollars on a worthless fake.

From comics to autographs, all collectibles fields are a real mess now. Too much money is involved and it has brought out the big time scam artists and bloodsuckers seeking to drain gullible collectors of every last penny.

Biggest Comic Scandal EVER!!

It's deja vu all over again in the collectibles field.

As some predicted, it appears as if the graded comic book market is going the same way the graded coin market did a decade earlier. That is, it is going the way of cracking slabs, performing stealth micro-restoration to squeeze out a slightly better grade and reslabbing. Further, some in the hobby are coming to believe that CGC is offering preferential treatment to certain big shot dealers.

What brought this all to a head is that prominent dealer Jason Ewert was caught selling trimmed books in unrestored slabs. Thanks to before and after scans, it has become evident that the books were trimmed while in Ewert's possession. CGC has investigated internally, and subsequently banned Ewert from submitting. Moreso, CGC President Steve Borock has reported that he told Ewert to "leave the hobby or risk lawsuit from CGC." No one knows how many trimmed books Ewert slipped past CGC before he was caught... it could be hundreds.

Certainly there are many juicy details that us non-connected peons will only hear whispered in rumor.

If you have a few hours to spare, you can read how it all unfolded on the CGC Message Boards (where the trimmed books were first exposed.)

Trimmed FF 3 and FF 10 first exposed

Steve Borock's (CGC's) Response

A Summary Thread of the Whole Scandal

Buy My Stuff

For the first time in quite a while, I'm selling some stuff on eBay.

Trying to thin the herd a bit by getting rid of doubles, modern lots, miniseries and some sports bobbleheads.

Last week I sold about $100 worth of comicbooks and received an invitation to be a Bronze Powerseller. Gee, I knew the standards were low to be a Powerseller, but I never dreamt they were that low!

The Baseball Collector's Holy Grail

Record Sale for Babe Ruth Signed Baseball

Memory Lane Memorabilia of Tustin, CA has reported selling a Babe Ruth signed baseball for $150,000, establishing a record price for a Ruth signed ball. The details of the transaction were private. The ball was graded 9.5 out of 10 by PSA.

Due to the ball's unblemished white, almost new appearance and a strong, bold signature, most hobby experts regard this as the finest single-signature Ruth ball known.

The same baseball first set a record in November 2004 when it was purchased for $115,000.

Why Paypal ONLY?

I wanted to launch a bid on this Fantastic Four 14, but the seller stated Paypal ONLY accepted. I figured it wouldn't hurt to ask if other payment methods would be accepted from a longtime ebay member. (As regular readers know, I am no longer on Paypal after a very ugly chargeback incident where they tried to take back $1,100 from me because they approved a fraudulent credit card.)

So, I sent the seller, kaching$$$, an inquiry:

Will you accept BidPay or a money order? I have been on ebay since 1998... My feedback is over 500 with no negatives. PLMK. Thanks - Steve

kaching$$$'s response:

Only paypal accepted. Sorry.

I see more and more of this "Paypal only" nonsense everyday. What gives?

Are sellers so impatient and lazy that they would choose to have less people bid on their auctions rather than have to deposit a money order?

ebay is truly the land of sellers with no business sense... and it gets worse everyday as more brainless monkeys figure out how to use their computers.

And I will have no sympathy for them when they learn the hard way that Paypal will screw them sooner or later.

Charity Auction: A Smashing Success

My buddy Al Hallonquist and I are co-moderators of the Astronaut Yahoo Group with about 500 members. The prime focus of the group is collecting astronaut related memorabilia.

As I mentioned a few days ago, Al and I decided to run a Hurricane Katrina Charity Auction. Group members would donate items to the auction with 100% of the proceeds going to the Red Cross or Salvation Army. We ended up with over 80 lots donated to the auction. We opened the auction to group members and/or anyone else that found about it on the various space collecting sites. I created the webpage and updated it with the bids every night.

The auction closed last night with $5,170 in charitable bids!! A smashing success. When we started last week we were hoping for a few grand at best.

I'm still on Cloud 9. ;-)

Word Verification

Unfortunately, I had to add the word verification security feature for those that want to leave comments. Sorry for the extra step, but I was getting "comment spam"... much of it from these losers. This shady website was leaving spam links in all of my entries that mentioned PSA/DNA.

Fantastic Four 60 Newsstand Price Variant

Since I fell out of the running very quickly on this one, I don't mind drawing attention to the auction.

This is the first copy I've seen on eBay in over a year of looking. The results should be interesting.

What's odd is there is almost no interest in the other newsstand price variants. This issue was a 9 cent promotional issue in comic book stores, yet it is no more rare than the other newsstand variants. Whoever said collectors were logical?

Superb Astronaut Autopen Resource

Be sure to bookmark this highly recommended Space Directory Astronaut Autopen Guide.

In fact, the entire site is a treasure trove of great astronaut and space collecting information.

Kudos to the webmaster, Craig.

UACC Show Report

I attended the UACC National Show in Secaucus, NJ this past weekend. The show promised a good lineup of guests and I was looking forward to seeing many on my online buddies from around the country.

The show was held in the Exhibition Center of the Meadowlands Crowne Plaza. I've been in this room many times for other events, so I knew it would be hot. The room is always hot and the 100+ temperatures outside didn't help. Even industrial sized fans could barely help the weak air conditioning.

My plan was to get several signatures on my Saturn V wooden model and the SpaceShip One pilots to sign my new SpaceShip One wooden model. After that, I wanted a few signed photos from the guests and I would browse the dealer tables.

My first stop was with Kier Dullea and Gary Lockwood of 2001: A Space Odyssey. I wanted to add them to a photo previously signed by Arthur C. Clarke. This is a vintage still that I picked up in NYC years ago and was signed by Mr. Clarke in 1999. The Clarke signature and inscription is so nice that I was tempted to leave it as is, but temptation got the better of me and I had the 2 actors add their signatures. Both actors were very friendly.

My next stop was at the SpaceShip one table.

I asked Mike Melville and Brian Binnie sign a wooden desktop model. Both were real gentlemen and were a pleasure.

The rest of the people I wanted to get had fairly long lines, so I decided to browse the dealer tables a bit waiting for the lines to thin. I've been to enough of these shows to know that the lines always thin by noon, so there is no need to wait in long lines... be patient and you will get the signature you want. None of the guests are going to get up and suddenly disappear.


Next, I stopped by Rusty Schweickhart's table (Apollo 9) and had him add his signature to my Saturn V wooden model. It now has a dozen signatures on it, so signing space is getting limited.

After Rusty, Ed Gibson (Skylab), was my next stop. Always a pleasure, Mr. Gibson signed my Saturn V model as well. If I want any additional signatures on this, I may have to start using the base.

I returned to my car to unload the models -- they are a pain to carry around -- and returned to the show to have Valentina Tereshkova (the first woman in space) sign a photo for me. She looks unbelievably young for a 68 year old woman. She looks at least 10 years younger than she is. My regret is that I didn't think to take a photo with her.

That was it for the in-person signatures. I went upstairs to meet with the UACC Board in a wonderfully air conditioned meeting room. As we had sandwiches for lunch (Thanks to Al Hallonquist for the invite!) , Al Wittnebert tossed out a folder full of bargain signed photos... a special for the UACC Officers at the meeting.

I wasted no time picking out this one for $10. An in-person signature from early in A-ROD's career. This could be my bargain on the year.

After the meeting, I wanted to hit the dealer tables. I did a lot of browsing, but (thankfully) no big items caught my interest. I was thrilled to pick up this beauty from my favorite TV show for $10...

Most importantly, I did get to say hello to lots of listpeople we all know: Al Hallonquist, Bob Russo, Steve Gruber, Kevin Taylor, Bill Owenby, Bob Glass, Sam Stein, Steve Hankow, Tracey Kornfeld, Mint Montague, Carrie in the blue flightsuit, Doug Henry, Rob Pearlman, Andy McCully & Lauren, Linn LeBlanc, Eddie Bizbub, and I know I am forgetting at least 3 or 4 more. (Sorry) I did enjoy meeting everyone I spoke with.

Overall, kudos to the UACC, Steve Hankow and Nolan Sims for putting on a great event.

The Bronx Bleeder Pleads Guilty

From the August 11 eSCD Newsletter:

FORGERY CASE LEADS TO WEPNER PLEA

The FBI has released details regarding the guilty plea entered by former boxer Chuck Wepner, who lost to Muhammad Ali in a heavyweight championship fight in 1975 and was using the prestige of that event and his career to sell forged Ali autographs. The files were sealed until recently, but a press release now reveals that Wepner entered a guilty plea in May for conspiring to commit mail fraud. He admitted to selling memorabilia forged by John Olson, who pled guilty in 2003 and received three years probation, those sales taking place from June 1996 through March 2002.

Among the items that were sold were Champions Forever boxing posters (gold ink versions are forged). The Champions Forever forgeries were exposed in 1996 by Sports Collectors Digest, which quoted Wepner as claiming the forgeries were purchased from another party. "John (Olson) is a good kid," Wepner said in that 1996 story. "He buys things in good faith and sometimes he gets stuck." Wepner is scheduled to enter his plea and receive his sentencing on Oct. 24 in San Diego. Wepner and Olson say most of their forgeries were sold through Brian Ginsberg, who was indicted recently in San Diego on 13 counts related to the sale of forged sports and celebrity memorabilia. Ginsberg entered a not guilty plea and has a hearing set for Sept. 12. Olson was quoted in an FBI press release as saying Ginsberg paid him and Wepner about $117,000 for forged memorabilia.

In a related case, Michael De Sola of Madison Sports pled guilty in March 2004 to mail fraud, again related to forged autographs, often Ali, and again in a case sealed until recently. De Sola was sentenced to three years probation and a $1,000 fine.