I re-read the beginning of the thread and admit I thought the two documents were sold together as a lot. I was mistaken. Only the "incentive" contract was sold recently by cleansweep auctions.
That said, I stand fully by the legal reasons set forth above (along with basic common sense) that the incentive (handwritten) contract sold by cleansweep is a forgery. Actually, since the "formal" boilerplate contract has been public knowledge for so long, it now makes even more sense that the handwritten one is a forgery, since a date (Jan 11) would have been known to the forger.
The Sox were also very busy the day before (Jan. 10)- check this out:
http://www.1918redsox.com/season.htm
It would've made more sense to date the forgery Jan 10, since that day was obviously one where "deals" were being made. But the forger must have known of the other contract from the old Guernsey auction and used the Jan. 11 date for consistency.
Another thing is that spring training was even shortened that year due to WWI, and all the owners feared lower gate receipts due to wartime hardships, male fans in military service, etc. Doesn't make sense that that would be a year Frazee would be offering "cookies" like this to Ruth, who was not yet a superstar at this time- in fact, he was well behind Mays and Bush in the mound's pecking order. That Ruth at this stage of his career had the "juice" to get a deal like this (which is admittedly unheard of in this time period) simply transcends believability. The forger simply didn't do enough research to make his document stand up to A.) the historical facts, B. the state of 1918 contract law, or C. basic common sense.
Some poor sap is 70 K poorer though