Trophy Balls

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Posted By: Donald Johnson

I was recently looking at the Leland's Dec. Auction and saw a few late 1800 balls. Are trophy balls very collectible? I know where I can get a 1909 Penn vs Lafayette ball but don't know what a reasonable price would be since it's a college ball. Any help would be appreciated.

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Posted By: Hankron

Trophy balls are collectable and scarce. 1900s balls will be a lot less expensive than 1800 balls, and college balls will be less expensive than professional. There are also old trophy footballs-- these are almost all college balls (for a long time college football was bigger than pro football) ... Provenance and documentation of provenance is important with these types of things, and will only serve to increase value.

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Posted By: Jimmy Leiderman

David is correct, but college game trophy balls always attract non-baseball college memorabilia collectors driving the prices up.
A similar situation occurs with early college baseball photographs and scorecards.

Trophy balls from the 1900's are rarely seen, but that doesn't mean a higher price tag.

Expect a little over $1K for a "common" trophy ball, and well over 5K for a well known team ball.

Another thing that can change the price tag is the trophy ball design. (Paint color, a silver tag, visible stats or names, etc.)

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Posted By: Jimmy Leiderman

Prices above were for 19th Century trophy balls.

Another thing I forgot to mention was that lemon peel trophy balls from the 1860's are usually more desirable than the "modern" style balls from the 70's and 80's.

I recommend that you pick a bunch of old Robert Edward Auctions catalogs to check price figures.
In my opinion, Rob Lifson has handled almost every rare trophy baseball in the market.

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Posted By: Donald Johnson

Thanks for the good info! The ball I was looking at was on sale for about $400 and is painted half white/half brown? and has the date 1909, Penn vs Lafayette 4-2! Seems like a very low score compared to most of the scores in the 1800's! I thought the 1909 date was interesting because it coincided with the date on most T206's.

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Posted By: Jeff M.

I am sorry for this post but because I am a deranged, corrupted, individual and cant help my self I had to add my 2 dirty cents.

(Trophy Balls every mans dream)