Leaf Al Hostak - Red
 

This was on eBay and sold for $130. I was the underbidder on a whim. Leaf misprints and problem cards are everywhere and this has to be one of the crappiest quality sets of all time, but even by Leaf standards I thought this one was interesting. Usually problems are color passes, missing elements, cutting and centering, etc. I cannot recall seeing a Hostak with a red background before instead of the blank white. The offset red over his body seems to be just an offset, not the red ink from another card layered over him.

Anyone seen another Hostak like this?

Also missing the outline in black for the border.

Just when you thought their QC had bottomed out, you find another mess.

Leaf not only didn't have a QC department, they didn't even seem to try to print them right.

This one is so weird to me because it doesn't look like a QC problem to me. The red is offset a bit, but it seems to have been designed to fit around Hostak's picture. It's not the red background and layer of another card laid over a Hostak card. A proper Hostak doesn't have a printed background of any color; the white backdrop isn't printed it's just blank stock. So it also isn't the wrong ink color in the printer, because there wouldn't be anything there and it wouldn't be designed to fit around Hostak.

I don't think I've seen any other Leaf like this.

Me neither. I wonder if it came off an early sheet that was not meant to go out?

Here's an interesting thought: maybe Hostak was the replacement for Graziano and the design was preliminary with red?

The Graziano's I am aware of are also white stocks, so it's definitely possible it was a change made at the same time for some reason. That it must be an intentional creation would indicate Hostak had some change made during white production or late stage testing (if there was any for Leaf). They must have pulled the Graziano almost right away and I cannot find a second Hostak like this.

How many Graziano's are we up to confirmed? I have images of only 5.

PSA shows 2 A's and a 5 I don't have pics of. SGC has 2 A's I don't have a pick of. I suspect there are some resubs and duplication here. Presumably some collector(s) somewhere has/have a raw one.

Like the similar SP'd T220 Silver Corbett, the Graziano rarity seems to mostly exist in pretty strong mid grade.

The only one I knew of 'in the wild' was found in an estate of a Chicago sportswriter. He had several cards tucked away in his office and his daughter was the one who found and marketed it. I think that SGC 50 might be it. She contacted me about it but I couldn't fly to Chicago with enough cash so I lost out. As I recall, it went for $17K to a dealer in Chicago who had it slabbed and then flipped it. I want to say into Chad Dreier's collection, though I cannot recall if there was an intermediary involved or if it was a direct flip.

As far as how many are out there, I don't know of any raw ones, but there could be. Given its great value, though, I doubt that any knowledgeable collector would have it raw in an album, but you never know.

The 6.5 surfaced from a random northeast collection in 2011. Golden late sold it for $85,200 at some point. I don't think the others have publicly given histories.

The Memory Lane sale of the 4 ending in 755 reports that Graziano was replaced by Godoy on the sheet, which has been long stated elsewhere. The uncut sheet has odd placement of Godoy and Mickey Walker. Godoy is the likeliest spot based on the numbering sequences in the columns, as if Rocky replaced Walker it would still be out of order. This shouldn't be stated as a fact as it usually is.

I would think it likelier than not there are some raw, there are usually more out there undiscovered of things as we always find with every cool discovery (we have 0 silver Donovan's known in 2005, 5+8 of them now); whether one or two exist raw in collections depends more on the collector than anything; some of us are still awfully resistant to slabbing things we aren't selling regardless of value. I have never seen a raw one, have heard of a couple but I've heard of a lot of claimed cards that nobody can produce a photo of. 'Pics or it didn't happen'.

Jones lists the Graziano in Seconds Out, but makes no mention of its great rarity. I don't know when this card was 'discovered' by the hobby. Was Rocky known in, say, the 70's?

Your book lists a sale in Legendary of an SGC A, but I cannot find a picture of that card online for my photo archive. The POP says there are 2 A's, neither of which I can find a picture of.

I would appreciate it if anyone has an image of a Graziano I didn't show they could contribute. I for one am just happy Leaf short prints are worth way more than similar short prints in other sets, as I can live content without ever finishing my Leaf set. This is probably $50K+ in any grade now.