T206Collector.com

The Grading Pyramid

2011-12-14T14:51:00.001-08:00

Grading is a pyramid. At the top, you have the 10s. 10 means perfection and thus all 10s will be identical. As you go down the pyramid, grades are set for a variety of reasons -- 9s almost all look the same, but 3s, 2s and 1s have a huge number of potential flaws, including paper loss on reverse, creasing, corner wear, etc. What makes a card an SGC 30 could be a variety of factors that tell you nothing about the eye appeal of the card without looking at it.

Professional grading is not designed to reflect eye appeal. It is designed to point out flaws, often hard to see or hidden, in a piece of card board. When you see a clean-looking SGC 30, you actually know there are a lot of hard to see flaws. When you see a badgered up SGC 30, what you see is what you get. But not all SGC 30s will look alike -- in fact, at that level of the "pyramid" you will have a lot of different looking cards.

This becomes problematic when sellers try to sell a PSA 2 for what a previous PSA 2 sold for. Without comparing both cards, going by the number alone gets you nowhere because what you don't know about the previous card is whether the damage was similar or whether the eye-appeal was comparable. Sometimes you can get a pretty good deal on a nice looking 2 when a seller is willing to use a previous ugly 2 as a comparable. This is why they say, "Buy the card, not the holder."

2011-10-21T12:46:00.000-07:00

Picked up another Marquard a coupla weeks ago. Here's my current collection of signed T206 Marquards. Sometimes people will ask me how rare these really are, and I say, "Well, if I've got 8 of them, how rare can they really be? How many more must be out there?" Heck, I've owned maybe a half dozen other signed T206 Marquards that aren't even among this 8!

Anyway, here they are....

Share Your Collection!!

2011-06-26T20:24:00.000-07:00

If you're going to keep special cards under lock and key for a generation, you owe it to the collecting public to at least let them breathe online. Collectors of pre-war cards are only holding our cards in a sort of collective public trust. Sharing cards not only increases personal enjoyment, but it inspires collections. People complain that kids today don't collect baseball cards. Today's collectors share responsibility for passing on the enjoyment to the next generation. Not only does this make sense economically when you go to sell, but it makes at least me feel better when I realize I can't take these with me. Moreover, sharing cards on my website has brought so many collectors to my attention, including like-minded folk with similar collecting interestes.

In short, share your images!

"The Unauthenticatables"

2011-04-01T19:59:00.000-07:00

My endless pursuit of autographed T206 cards often forces me to buy cards that have not been authenticated. Frequently, a signature is convincing, even though I am unable to find any examples of the signature against which to compare it. And the seller isn't making forgeries, he's just selling a card that has definitely been signed by someone -- perhaps even the player himself. The problem is, not only can't I find an exemplar -- neither can PSA/DNA or JSA. In fact, the sad truth is, some signatures are so obscure that even if they were genuine, the experts can't confirm it or deny it. They can only tell you the factors that suggest it could be real, and the reasons they think it might be fake.

The three examples below fall into this category. I absolutely love the Frank Smith, which has been artfully signed in white by someone with a smooth hand. James Spence took a picture for his files, but had nothing against which to compare it. Maybe one day, an identifying exemplar of Smith's will turn up and uncover whether this is the genuine article or not.

The McElveen is an ugly card with an interesting signature. It doesn't have the traditional hallmarks of a fake, as it is small and unassuming. However, given that McElveen died in 1951, this gave McElveen precious few years to sign T206 cards in ballpoint - as this one was - since ballpoint pens only came into vogue shortly after World War II. PSA/DNA found the signature to have questionable authenticity, and JSA couldn't authenticate it either. The reason? Again, nothing against which to compare it.

Finally, good old Gus Dorner. This one is pretty clearly just an identifying mark of a collector, who wanted for some reason to put the player's full name on the back of his card in pencil. However, if it were real, we wouldn't be able to authenticate it -- this is a Minor League card of a player who played sporadically in the Majors only through 1909. Again, no exemplars available.

So what do you do when you come across signed cards that can't be authenticated by anyone? If a player signed few autographs during his lifetime, that makes them rare -- and valuable, but only if the signature can be confirmed as real. Ironically, the rarer the signature, the less valuable it can become. If there's only one -- and there were no witnesses -- then how do you know it is real at all?

The Ultimate Signed Pre-War Card

2011-01-01T17:47:00.001-08:00

For the past decade or so, my mother always gets me the Cooperstown Calendar (among other things) as a Christmas present. Imagine my shock and awe when I looked at March and saw an autographed 1933 Goudey Lajoie in the display. This has got to be the ultimate autographed pre-war auto -- beatable only by a signed T206 Wagner or T206 Plank. Obviously, it is hidden away from all collectors -- totally unobtainable -- and I would bet there is not another. How many collections are incomplete without this one? Autographed pre-war card collections? Signed HOF card collections? Lajoie collections? Simply an amazing card.

Morey, Ritter & the Glory of Their Times

2010-11-24T11:26:00.000-08:00

I just received a scan of a terrific letter from Larry Ritter to autograph legend Jeff Morey, essentially crediting Morey for helping him locate some players. I always had a theory that Ritter's book should be credited for getting the names of pre-war players into the minds of autograph seekers in the 1960s and 1970s. It is amazing to see that the autograph seekers themselves had a hand in Ritter's work.

Here's one of my favorite signed T206 cards from the Morey collection (Crawford -- who was also in Ritter's book), as well as a scan of the letter from Ritter to Morey.

2010-10-27T08:13:00.001-07:00

If anyone wants to go in for the T205 set in Heritage Auctions, I would be a more than happy bidding partner -- and all I'd want would be the signed Marquard and Wheat that found their way into this collection.

Email me at SignedT206@gmail.com if you'd like some serious help bidding!

Auction Here:
http://sports.ha.com/common/view_ite...8&Lot_No=80374

Signed Marquard & Wheat here:

Loads of Changes

2010-10-15T08:04:00.000-07:00

Well, my strategy to sell off my T206s again to make another big auction run -- this time a Signed T206 Cobb -- fell just short of my goal. So, I have very few unsigned cards left -- just my "core" few -- and am left a little shell-shocked as to how I should proceed collecting now. But I am happy to report the acquisition of this beautiful T205 Walsh auto, which came as a nice consolation prize for losing out on the Cobbie:

Enjoying Pre-War Cards Digitally

2010-08-24T07:18:00.001-07:00

I just upgraded my Blackberry to the new hybrid touchscreen Torch, and I am very happy with it. By far the coolest thing I have done with it is uploaded my entire T206 collection -- card by card, with front and back scans on each file...

...onto the MiniSD card. Now, when I open the photo album, I can literally flip through my entire collection with my finger, at a faster speed than if I had a stack of T206 cards in my hand. And I do not even need to flip the cards over to see the backs, because the backs are side-by-side with the fronts. Also, the resolution is so good that I can "pinch" the screen in order to magnify the images and see the subtle flaws as well as beauty of each individual card.

I have to say, this technology has really improved my enjoyment of my collection. If nothing else, I was able to bring my BlackBerry to the East Coast National card show this past weekend so that I could see whether I needed certain T206 cards and whether the cards available would be upgrades for me.

I am now fully immersed in the...

2010-08-23T10:24:00.000-07:00

...run up the mountain that is the Monster. (Borrowing from the name of the Metallica documentary, I refer to my latest collection as Some Kind Of Monster.) The first time around, I was condition conscious and went after some really nice examples of Hall of Famers.

But this time, I am pushing for quantity over quality. And I could really care less about condition.

But even so, I often accidentally fall into really nice VG-EX cards that are being lumped in with the beaters, and for hardly any additional cash whatsoever.

What has always been daunting to me is the sheer quantity of cards required for completion. But when you eschew quality of cardboard and player, the quantity part takes care of itself pretty quickly. In a few months of trolling the B/S/T threads on Net54baseball.com and an occasional hit on ebay, I have managed to accrue about 300 new T206 cards, virtually all for under $20 -- and many for less than $15 or even $10. Indeed, I am now less than 200 cards from completion. While I need almost all the HOFers and Southern Leaguers, I only need just about 70 commons now. When I get those knocked off, then the Monster will become a much more manageable beast.

While it is certainly fun to collect HOFers, they are a slower collection. Given that patience has never been one of my strong suits, I think going the commons route has really helped me this time around, because I can see quicker progress.

Also, one of the things that makes collecting T206 so hard is the constant temptation to sell. If you've got a few mid-grade HOFers, they are easy to sell for $100+ as singles. But low-grade commons take a lot more effort to part with and the return is obviously much, much lower. My low-grade T206 commons collection actually makes it harder to just cut bait. It creates its own disincentive to sell.

The Monster may want me to quit, to be sure, but it hardly cares for my approach here either. In this way, I sort of feel like I am sneaking up on the Monster. In a few acquisitions, I'm sure he'll turn around -- "What?! You again, eh?!" -- but for the time being, he sits silently, unconcerned that I am anywhere nearing completion. I have him right where I want him!!

The National

2010-08-05T06:49:00.000-07:00

And I still say :
"Where is our boy ? Ah, we've lost our boy"
But I should know
Why you've gone
Because again and again you've explained
You've gone to the ...

National, ah ...
To the National ..

--Morrissey

Unfortunately, I will not be going to the National. But if anyone there sees any pre-WW I autographed cards, please be sure to let me know about it!!

"T205'ers" Not In T206

2010-06-15T14:12:00.000-07:00

We often discuss why certain players did not have a cards -- or why certain cards were not produced in certain quantities based on theories about caramel and tobacco licensing and products. Well, have you ever compared the 1911 T205 checklist to the 1909-11 T206 checklist? I did this afternoon, and I have to tell you, I was quite surprised at the number of players that appear in T205 but not T206. (While we're at it, why did Burdick get to T205 before T206 if T205 came second?)

In any event, I count at least 32 T205ers not in T206.

1 Archer
2 Austin
3 Bailey
4 Cady
5 Corridon
6 Daubert
7 Dickson
8 Fischer
9 Flynn
10 Foxen
11 Frick
12 Gardner
13 Grant
14 Hanford
15 Harmon
16 Hauser
17 Lang(e)
18 Lee
19 Leever
20 Lush
21 McAllister
22 McConnell
23 Nee
24 Richie
25 Rowan
26 Scanlan
27 Shean
28 Simmons
29 Suggs
30 Vaughn
31 Kirb White
32 Wolter

Seems to me that many of these players were already established by or in the period of the T206 run (1909-11), e.g., Leever and Wolter. And clearly each was either willing or did not successfully object to his appearance on a tobacco card. So how'd they get their mugs on T205 but not T206 -- especially if T206s were issued in 1911 along with their T205 counterpart? Obviously, the number of players in T205 was significantly limited in comparison to the T206 set. So why would approximately 1/6 of the T205 set contain entirely new players? The obvious explanations would be a combination of (a) expired/new player licenses; with (b) declining/emerging talent.

Collecting Update

2010-05-19T12:40:00.000-07:00

Not a lot has gone on in my collection since my last post. However, I am in the process of completing a trade for yet another new autographed T206 cards for my collection. If successful, it would bring my total of different signed T206 cards to a whopping 36 -- an even 3 dozen! Hard to imagine when I started six years ago by purchasing 4 signed T206 cards of Rube Marquard on ebay that I would have nearly 10 times as many within 6 years.

Naturally, it feels as though the well is drying up. But I keep my eyes open for new opportunities all the time. If you've got any leads, please let me know. My "modest" goal is to obtain 50 different signed T206 cards within my lifetime. Much of this is dependent on cards stashed away in private collections making their way into auctions or other public markets. And, of course, a lot of patience.

Stay tuned......

Signed Leifield Now On Ebay

2010-04-20T13:46:00.001-07:00

Signed T206 Leifield For Sale/Trade

2010-04-14T09:18:00.001-07:00

Please email me at SignedT206@gmail.com if you're interested in buying or trading for this card, which is one of my signed T206 dupes:

A few more raw lot dupes on ebay

2010-03-25T10:10:00.000-07:00

Thanks for indulging my recent ebay auction posts:

Dupe Sale

2010-03-10T12:32:00.000-08:00

Broke up my larger group of 63, sold off a few singles on Net54 and put the rest back on ebay in three smaller lots. Hopefully this will be a little more collector-friendly. Check them out here:

Raw Lots Bring Lots of Dupes for Sale

2010-03-05T06:20:00.001-08:00

Check it out here:

Nothing Like A Raw Stack Of T206 Cards

2010-03-02T06:27:00.000-08:00

Don't get me wrong, all my best cards are slabbed. And I think as a general rule that if you crack a card out of a slab in order to return it to its raw state that you are literally giving money away (sell the slabbed card, buy the raw one and keep the difference in your pocket).

But I am putting together an all (mostly) raw, condition insensitive, T206 set and last night I got a huge boost -- a lot of over 175 raw T206 cards to add to my previous stack of 100+ raw T206 cards. (Thanks to Chris from Net54!) And I have to tell you, there really is nothing like sorting through a stack of raw T206 cards -- just as they were collected by kids 100 years ago. And when they're already condition-challenged, there are no worries about nicks and bends and such. So you can really have fun with them!

Anyway, half the reason I bought this large group is because of how much fun I knew it would be to sort them.

From Misc. Pre-War

Burdick's T206 Wagner and T206 Plank

2010-02-20T15:39:00.000-08:00

Visited the Metropolitan Museum of Art today with my family and tracked down the relocated Burdick Collection. It is now on the mezzanine level of the American Wing (behind the Egyptian temple in the big room) and tucked away in the corner behind some paintings and kettles and misc junk. But I was pleasantly surprised to see Burdick's Wagner and Plank being displayed. It was pretty cool to see them together on the same wall.

May not be worth the price of admission, which now reaches $20, but at least you get to see some pretty cool baseball cards for the price.

Happy New Year!

2010-01-04T11:55:00.000-08:00

I'd make a New Year's Resolution to blog more, but really my blogging is driven by my collecting experiences and they have lately been quite far apart with little to mention in between. Last year was a great year for adding signed T206 to my collection, having started 2009 with 31 and now beginning 2010 with 35. The 4 I added were Johnson (Pitching), Rucker (Throwing), Clarke (Batting) and Crawford (Batting). It seems rather unlikely that I'll pick up another 4 in 2010, but there are 1 or 2 others out there that may be attainable. And you never know what REA will have....

The Raw Card Collection

2009-12-08T11:54:00.000-08:00

I received another 7 raw T206 cards in the mail yesterday, bringing my total of unique raw T206 cards up to 100 even. I'm not sure where I'm going with this, but having amassed nearly a full quarter of the Monster in beautiful raw and mostly beater form, I have to say I am curious about how far I can go here. The though of sticking them in sleeves in a binder has crossed my mind. Heck, I almost feel like going really old school and pasting them into a scrapbook. Talk about cool!

I really like having a stack of T206 cards around to sift through. It's a ton of fun and really is a different experience from sorting through a pile of slabbed cards. Don't get me wrong, I do still have a couple dozen slabbed goodies that I'll never crack out of their cases. But it's just another way of collecting. Perhaps I'll make some scans and start discussing this raw set in more detail...

The Trading Continues

2009-11-24T14:47:00.000-08:00

I added a significant piece to my signed T206 collection today in what for all intents and purposes was probably the biggest blockbuster trade I've ever been a part of. I traded a huge collection of signed pre-war cards in order to acquire Jeff Morey's autographed T206 Sam Crawford (Batting) card. The good news is that they were all duplicates. But it was a significant chunk of my collection nonetheless. Still I am extremely excited about the opportunity to continue to add to my signed T206 collection and, as important, put back together some of the highlights of Morey's old collection. Nothing will compare to Morey's Cobb collection, but putting Clarke and Crawford back next to each other is a significant feat. And the process will continue!

From Autographed T206

More T201s - Doyle and Wheat

2009-11-17T14:10:00.000-08:00

These have eluded me for a little while. The seller had them on ebay for what seems like a few months, but with BINs that were, frankly, a little too high for me. Obviously, the prices were a little too high for the other collectors, too. Fortunately, the seller decided to relist them last week, and just let the market set the price -- and I won them both. I can't wait to get them!

From Autographed T201

2009-10-29T11:12:00.000-07:00

Very happy about adding all these in one lot at the last White Plains show. At some point I'll update my website to include all this stuff, but for the time being wanted to share here. I believe John Wagner was one of the pioneers of by-mail autograph seeking, along with, e.g., Jeff Morey. Nice little lot and, of course, the reason I nabbed it was it came with a signed T206 of Sno. At some point I'll probably pick up a signed 3x5 so I can complete the list of items referenced in the letter.

From Misc. Pre-War

From Autographed T206

Back of photo:

From Misc. Pre-War

Fred Snodgrass Collection

2009-10-13T08:32:00.000-07:00

I am putting together a nice collection of Snodgrass material. I recently acquired a signed letter, personal envelope, signed T206 card and signed b&w photo all from the same collection -- and the best part is the letter references the T206 card that he signed. Pretty neat stuff.

I'll post a scan and some other minutiae when I get the chance.

T206 Biography Book in the Works

2009-09-14T11:49:00.000-07:00

Received an exciting email today about a project to publish the personal histories of the players featured in the T206 set. The book, entitled The T206 Collection: The Players and Their Stories, is scheduled for release in April 2010. From the email:

"Along with beautiful pictorials and card images, the reader will have information on the personal and professional stats on each player, as well as a little narrative on the players' contribution to our National Pastime. Players like Lena Blackburne and Freddy Parent made huge contributions to the game of baseball, and now their story is being told."

The book was created by Tom Zappala of ATS Communications along with Joe Orlando, President of PSA and Peter Randall Publishing.

Look for it soon!

Nap Rucker Finally Comes Home To Roost

2009-09-08T13:36:00.000-07:00

I've had a few different chances at this card -- when it sold on ebay for under $100, I passed on it because I didn't see the signature very well. When it turned out to be authentic, I passed on it again from a different collector, who opted to list it in Huggins and Scott. When it sold there, it sold to a higher bidder than me, when it's price tag seemed, well, unreasonable to me. But I finally came up with the right trade bait and NOW IT IS MINE! Hoorah!

From Autographed T206

Signed T206 Clarke

2009-08-28T18:38:00.000-07:00

Originally from the Jeff Morey collection, by way of a trade with a very generous collector.

From Autographed T206

Jeff Morey's "Lost" Cards -- Help Me Find Them!

2009-08-20T08:10:00.001-07:00

I received a wonderful package in the mail from Jeff Morey. It was a four page photo copy of a large portion of his signed pre-war card collection, representing many of the cards he consigned to Mastro Auctions circa 2001. I have cut and pasted the cards into the various appropriate sections on my website, and invite you to view the entire package on the Morey Interview page, towards the bottom.

Spectacular cards -- even in black and white. If you know of the whereabouts of any of these, you simply must let me know.

Big Trade In The Works

2009-08-19T14:58:00.001-07:00

After months and months of negotiating and false starts, I am on the precipice of a really big trade for a signed T206 card that I do not already have. It has proven to be quite the challenge. Even just finding the owner of the card that I knew was out there somewhere is somewhat of a miracle. But to finally compile a collection of cards that was worthy of a trade took a lot of time and effort. And it will not be without its victims. If the trade goes through as planned, I will have to give up my signed T202 of Zach Wheat. I really do not want to do this, but when I had an opportunity to pick up another signed T206 card, I had to take that leap. For while I really loved my signed T202, I am not a T202 collector. I am a T206 collector. And one cannot lose collecting focus.

When the card is safely in hand, I will share more details and, of course, a scan of this beautiful card. Stay tuned.....

White Plains Show

2009-08-17T14:54:00.000-07:00

Headed over the East Coast National at the Westchester County Center over the weekend and picked up 29 T206 cards for a reasonable price. Now I'm back over the century mark in my renewed pursuit of the Monster.

I have found that I really enjoy collecting the set in raw, low grade, but presentable, form. Sifting through a 100 deep stack of T206 cards is really a pleasure, regardless of condition. And I'd rather have 100 T206 cards in any condition than 10 SGC 60 commons. So, for the time being, I'll keep accruing them that way.

I also made a couple of leads on signed pre-war cards. Stay tuned....

Need To Sell The Unsigned To Pay For The Signed

2009-08-12T08:47:00.000-07:00

I need to fund some recent signed T206 purchases and so am selling this beauty on ebay.

X is for Ty Xobb?

2009-08-07T07:43:00.001-07:00

I've often thought it too bad that T206 does not have a single player whose last name begins with the letter X. Oh, there are a million and one Bs and Ms in the T206 set -- but nary an X. But here's a quick T206 trivia question -- how many T206 Players do not share a last name beginning with the same letter as another T206'er? The answer is 4. The next question is -- can you name them without checking?

I'll give you a few more lines of text so as to give you a chance to think about it without seeing the answer -- at least not so obviously. Here, I'll give you a hint -- they begin with the letter I, U, V and Z. There you have it -- which 4 players of the T206 set have last names beginning with I, U, V and Z? If you're reading this blog, I'm sure you have figured it out by now. If not -- well, then here are the answers: Isbell, Unglaub, Violat and Zimmerman.

Like I've said before, I enjoy playing alphabet games with T206. And if and when you do, just remember those 4 guys. And if you really want to stump them, then you should know that the only player in T206 with an X anywhere in his name is Jeff Pfeffer, whose real name was Francis Xavier Pfeffer.

Went to Maine for My Annual Family Vacation

2009-08-06T15:06:00.000-07:00

...and during a rainy day headed over to Don's Sports Cards in Portland. As luck would have it, he had 3 T206 cards -- all beaters -- and I bought two of them for $25.00 total. Pretty cool. Wasn't expecting to add to my raw T206 set during my vacation, but I'll take 'em -- a Doc White throwing and an Ed Hahn.

Also managed to score a new signed T206 of Rube Marquard (portrait). Yes, I already have that one, but when there are no new ones hitting the market, I still get a substantial charge out of acquiring doubles. So if you've got any I have and want to part with, please let me know about it. And thanks to everyone that keeps me up to speed on the existence of signed pre-WWI cards in auctions and on B/S/T threads on Net54.

Authentic & Pretty vs Beater & Unaltered

2009-07-22T08:53:00.000-07:00

Would you prefer to have an authentic, but trimmed T206 card with sharp corners and no creases; or the same card with multiple creases but no alterations? I will always side with the creased card. For me, the card should reflect its natural state of progression from the factory. It should not have been prettied up by someone.

Don't get me wrong, I will permit some cleaning -- e.g., removing glue or gunk from the back of a card, or erasing a pencil mark -- but I draw the line at someone intentionally trying to pretty up a card. Light cleaning with water or an art eraser, on the other hand, is undoing, to some degree, the ugly alterations of gluing a card into a scrap book or writing in pencil on a card. It is not altering the factory issued card in any way, and it is not trying to improve the natural age of the card. The intent is not to remove creases or restore factory condition. The intent is to remove the subsequently added junk.

What about restored cards? In that case I'll also take the beater every time. Otherwise, all you have is a semi-reprint; a recycled paper card. Though it is interesting to note that restoration is common and accepted practice in the art world. How did we wind up with this dichotomy? Why are the Rembrandt collectors less "puritanical" than the Wagner collectors? Perhaps the answer lies in the condition factor of a multi-issued set. While each Rembrandt is an original single-print 1-of-1, there are usually many multiples of the same baseball card -- condition provides the scale by which to value the multi-prints.

If you've got any beater T206s to sell, feel free to drop me an email -- SignedT206@gmail.com. I'm making a low-condition / collector-grade run at the Monster.

Signed Cracker Jacks

2009-07-20T08:29:00.001-07:00

I recently had the pleasure of adding a couple more signed Cracker Jacks to my website. While I do not own any of them, it is still rather exciting for me to unearth these treasures for the better enjoyment of the collecting public. Once upon a time, I only knew of Amos Strunk. But now I've got dupes of Marquard, a Rousch and a Hooper. Only time will tell how many more of these are out there. And in the meantime, I will continue to try to pry one example away from one of these lucky owners to add to my collection.

A is for Abbaticchio

2009-07-15T12:19:00.000-07:00

Sometimes, when I am lying in bed at night and I can't sleep, I do the T206 version of counting sheep -- I go alphabetically through the set, one player per letter. With A, I always start with Abbaticchio. Without pondering too long you might think he comes first in all of Baseball with an AB beginning -- but let's not forget Hank Aaron. And, to be fair, current player David Aardsma deserves to be credited with the first name in the baseball alphabet -- beating Aaron by a "D" to an "O" in letter 4 of the name.

Anyway, back to Mr. Abbaticchio. No -- he does not share a nickname with a Swedish Rock Group (ABBA). His nickname was Batty. And not because he was a particularly good hitter (lifetime .254). He was probably just a bit loony. But Abbaticchio deserves some historical mention for the following reasons:

- He was the first Major League Baseball player and first professional football player of Italian ancestry.
- He played for Pittsburgh Pirates on their 1909 World Series team (though he struck out in his only at-bat).
- In 1895 he was a member of the first professional football team in the United States -- the Latrobe Athletic Association football team -- where he starred as a fullback and kicker. In this regard, he is often credited with developing the first spiral punt.

So everytime you organize your T206 cards with Mr. Abbaticchio on top, you'll have a little historic ammunition to enhance your appreciation.

The Thrill of the Hunt

2009-07-14T11:19:00.001-07:00

I have noticed an interesting collecting phenomenon that I will refer to as the "Thrill of the Hunt." Basically, this applies to the feeling you get when you see -- maybe in an on-line auction or at a show or wherever -- a card you have been searching for. It refers to the moment in time between discovering the card is available and the actual moment of potential purchase. I have found that I enjoy card collecting quite a bit more than an average day during that period.

Since I began searching for signed T206 cards, the availability of ones I don't have has gotten to basically nil. So in the rare instance I see one come available, I really enjoy the process of putting together an offer or trade proposal and seeing if the card can be mine. But it is also a time of struggle, because I usually have to give up more money or cards than I really feel comfortable with. Still, the thrill is there and it is really one of the main reasons I collect.

Yard Sale

2009-07-13T07:47:00.000-07:00

I had a yard sale over the weekend. I put out a table filled with boxes and boxes of new (1980-present) shiny baseball cards. I even had some 70's stuff and, for fun, a beat up 1940 Play Ball common. While my yard sale did rather well, I sold more beat up old comic books than baseball cards. But I did manage to sell a 1987 Donruss PSA 9 McGwire for $5.00; a 1996 Score Yankees Team Set for $5.00; and a 1994 Emotion Rookies ARod for $2.00. That was it -- $12.00 in baseball card sales. Even though I had a box of 3,000 commons priced for $15.00 -- nobody even made an offer on that. Anybody got any bright ideas of where to unload commons by the penny or even nano-penny?

I had a couple of T206 reprints on my table (Cobb Red Back and Young Throwing), which drew some eyes. One guy said he loved old tobacco cards, and so I showed him my autographed T201 Nap Rucker and T202 Davy Jones cards, which I had inside and easy to access (most of my "good stuff" resides in a safety deposit box). He was really impressed by those, but I ain't parting with them anytime soon -- let alone at a Yard Sale!

I know sometimes people talk about great Yard Sale finds. Anyone ever have any luck (or fun) selling pre-war cards at a Yard Sale? I'm not talking about setting up at the local flea market or church attic sale. I'm talking about a solo table in front of your house.

Raw Cards and Signed Cards

2009-07-07T13:49:00.000-07:00

I am steadily adding to my raw T206 collection, with about 25 or so new examples over the past few months. It is refreshing to hold a pile of T206 cards, free to thumb through them over and over again -- as opposed to a clunky, heavy slab. Don't get be entirely wrong, I still love my slabbed cards -- hey, that's why I have held on to them. But the joy of quickly sifting or shuffling through a deck of T206 cards with one hand is hard to match with slabs.

I am also considering parting with some of my non-T206 signed cards in order to acquire a signed T206 signed card I own. This will be a hard decision, but my ultimate view may be that no stone should be left unturned when it comes to adding to a signed T206 card collection -- even if it means parting with a T201 or T202 of a favorite player. But I really don't know. I'm still mulling that one over. Stay tuned.....

The "Raw" Appeal of T206 Cards

2009-06-25T07:23:00.001-07:00

I have started to amass a somewhat substantial lot of raw T206 cards in varying degrees of low-grade-ness. And I have to say, I really enjoy flipping through them as a stack. Having been relegated in my prior T206 set to thumbing through columns of SGC slabs -- some of which I still, happily, own -- I had started to miss the feel of quickly flipping through a stack of 30 or 40 T206 cards, piled on top of each other in thin sleeved holders.

Every couple of weeks, I pick up a few more and and to the pile. It's been really enjoyable and especially affordable. I don't like thinking how long it would take to reconstitute an entire run of 520 of them, but if I could average 10 or so a month for 5 years, well, then I'd be there, I suppose. But a lot can happen in that time!

Monogamously T206

2009-06-24T06:45:00.000-07:00

I am basically a monogamous T206 collectors. Sure, sometimes I will read general pre-war card discussion because it broadens my perspective on T206. And, I have occasionally moved outside of T206, but it is always a brief sojourn. I keep getting pulled back, so to speak. Though, full disclaimer, I do have a few non-T206 autographed pre-war cards. I guess that means I have two different collecting interests -- T206 and signed pre-WWI cards.

I have often thought of why I am so faithfully devoted to just T206. To be honest I am not sure I can put it into words. Though I have noticed that one of the reasons I collect that way is because the Monster is so huge that any attempts to collect other cards are really only distracting from the ultimate goal -- which is completeness (however possible) of the set.

Still, I do love my signed T201s. I can't ever really imagine parting with them unless a trade for another signed T206 card I don't have was on the table.

T206 Injustice -- Fiene Gets Two; Mack Gets None?

2009-06-23T12:44:00.001-07:00

Born on December 22, 1862 in East Brookfield, MA, Cornelius Alexander McGillicuddy, a.k.a. Connie Mack, would have been 145 years old if he were alive today. One of the greatest managers of all time, it is hard to understand why so many of Mack's contemporary managers were featured on T206 -- e.g., John McGraw (3 cards), Hughie Jennings (3 cards) and Hugh Duffy (1 card), to name a few -- but Mack got no T206 card. Some have suggested that the reason for this is similar to the reason that Plank has such a short lifespan in T206, i.e., that there was a Philadelphia Athletics licensing issue of some sort. For whatever reason, Mack fans need to look beyond T206 (to E96 or Cracker Jack, for example) to find a baseball card rendition of the "The Tall Tactician."

On this same date in 1964, Lou Fiene passed away. Known as “Big Finn,” Fiene had a very short career as a pitcher for the Chicago White Sox, from 1906-1909. Having recorded just 26 games and 138.0 innings pitched over his brief Major League career, Fiene was out of Major League Baseball before his 25th birthday. He played his final game on August 15, 1909. Given the brevity of his career, it is surprising that the manufacturers of T206 cards decided to include two poses of Fiene.

That Lou Fiene gets two T206 cards and Connie Mack gets none may be one of the greatest injustices done by the manufacturers of T206 cards. (Obviously, if the T206 publishers were facing lawsuits from Philadelphia then the injustice is certainly justified.) Coincidentally, Fiene died on Mack's birthday -- December 22 -- just three days prior to Christmas.

Okay, I have now linked...

2009-06-23T12:40:00.001-07:00

....my website to www.blogger.com to hopefully create a more comfortable blogging atmosphere. Stay tuned....

2009-06-23T12:30:00.000-07:00

I am going to try to bring my blog into the 21st Century, with the ability to "comment" on my blogs. Hopefully this will create a nice dialogue about all things T206, and prompt me to post to my T206 blog a little bit more frequently. Let me know what you think!