T206 'sets'
 

Our of curiosity, anyone have any thought/guesses as to how many 520-card T206 'sets' exist out there? Obviously we're talking only a few 524-card sets around. We have 27 registered here at 520 in the Monster Number thread with several very close. Even with that, while my guess would be that almost all are still together, I guess we can't be sure.

As somewhat of a point of reference, there are about 250 each of the Demmitt and O'Hara St. Louis cards combined in the PSA and SGC registries. I think that's probably the best place to start.

I did find this thread searching for it, but it was from 4-5 years ago. Wondering if anyone has had any recent thoughts on it.

I will guess 60-80 520+ T206 "sets," ballpark.

I have been curious, I wonder how many people that are fortunate enough to own the Wagner have also completed the set? Or was the Wagner and/or Plank simply an investment?

In the spirit of the hobby I hope many of them have also completed the set!

I have heard the number 300 Oharas and Demmits out there ... which that would be the limiting factor for the set of 520. I have both, one graded, one not, both horrible condition.

I'll be half of the known Wagners are not in sets.

My immediate inclination was around 75-100 and that's nothing more than a wild guess. I would say there are around 400-500 Demmitt/O'Haras (I think there are more than 300 just because about 250 or so of each are in the pop reports). And while I think a good bit more are at 500 or so, I'm not sure how many are at 520. For example, the Monster Number post has 27 at 520, but more than double that at 500 or more.

I do think there are a good number of sets unaccounted for from older collectors that put them together and have basically sat on them ever since. But I also think there are several that have probably been broken up and sold.

To the point about the Wagner owners, I see that as more of a specialty collector. I think many that own them couldn't care less about the set and are really just in it for that one card. There are exceptions, but I wouldn't be surprised if many of them only had the Wagner or the Wagner and other Big 4 cards.

Good question Mike

For a fortunate collector though, owning/purchasing a Wagner & a Plank is easy, the Joe Doyle Nat'l is the tough one.

Off the top of my head I can think of two 524 sets that have been broken up, two that are intact, and one that is technically at 533.

Edited: The two broken sets might not have been 523 not 524. Anywho...

Hey Jantz, you reminded me of something I've always wondered about: who owns the Doyles? There are eight known:
Brian Powell owns one,
Richard Masson,
David Hall (I think),
Larry Fritsh owned two. I never heard of them coming to market, so perhaps they passed to his son (?),
That's five. I'm not sure if Keith Olbermman ever got one.

Does anyone else know who owns the rest?

Steven what cards take the set from 524 to 533?
Larry

KO has all 9 of the known otherwise unreleased proofs. One Collins and 8 southern leaguers. Truly you wouldn't need them to complete a set, but if you own them why not add them to the count. He has a Wagner (2 if I'm not mistaken) and a Plank. I'd assume he has a Doyle, as massive as his collection is, although I can't be positive on that fact.

Unreleased proofs?????? Is there any photos of any of these. I've never heard of them. I'm sure others have but how many of those are known to exist? Who are the SL players also?

Link about the T206 proofs.

http://t206resource.com/Olbermann%20Proofs.html

Matt

As Josh linked, the nine KO owns are the only known "unreleased" proofs. In my opinion the Collins is massively underrated as an important rarity in the hobby being a singular T206 HOF example - proof be damned. Honestly, if it were a Cobb, Matty, Lajoie, or god-forbid another Wagner pose it would probably be one of the 10 most important items in the hobby.

Thanks Matt & Steve!!

I didn't know those existed. Those are awesome.

+1 If I could have any card added to my collection, it would be the Collins proof, or maybe the Doyle. I know this sounds idiotic, but everyone has seen pictures of a Wagner. How many people know about these? :)

Personally :rolleyes: I think 75-100 "520" is low. Wouldn't be surprised it could actually be closer to 150. On the Monster Number thread, "we" have 57 at 500+. net54 is a great place, but "we" aren't the "end all" of collecting. How many collectors do not even know of net54, yet along do not wish to indulge their numbers ??!!

BTW, proof-wise, give me a Jax. player any day :)

Well Sean if you owned a Wagner then you could buy the Collins :rolleyes:

Likely not. KO isn't the type to sell or flip so you are waiting on him to kick and I have a feeling his collection will go in a museum. If not, however, it will be one he'll of an auction.

Yeah certainly agree that our MN thread is a fraction of what's out there. I'm surprised at even the number of pre-war sellers on eBay I've spoken with that either don't know of Net54 or don't come here. More often than not, actually, when I message any, they usually are not over here.

That's not even to account for all of the older collectors that aren't online at all. There are certainly some 520 sets that are stored away. I'll say this - whatever the number of 520-card sets there are out there, I think the amount of collectors with 500+ cards is significantly higher. Probably double, as is the case in the MN thread. My guess is that a lot of people get stuck at 518 or 500 or so minus high-dollar cards like the Cobbs, etc.

Steve it was a joke based off the price for each of them. If he had a Wagner he could sell it and then (theoretically) buy the Collins.

I am fairly sure more collectors don't know about net54 than do.......now if we only count pre-war baseball card collectors who are on the internet it might be close.

The article says that hundreds of T206 proofs were found in the collection and Lifson picked out the one he wanted, Eddie Collins. Now we are saying that "the Eddie Collins (w/ Bat) proof remains the only unissued major-league subject known from the T206 set." What about the rest of them? Out of hundreds, was the Collins the only unissued one?

From my understanding, yes.

i believe collins was the only unissued "major leaguer"...the others were SL'ers.

Collins was the only unissued Major Leaguer. There were 8 unissued Minor Leaguers, all of which KO now owns. The rest were all proofs of players issued in the T206 set.

Considering that our "monster number" thread only accounts for about 50,000 cards out of the 2 million or so surviving, net54 is a small sampling.

Listed here are the past or current owners (in chronological order) of the Joe Doyle error cards......


Richard Russell (1910)....his Doyle (with his T-card collection) is on display at Univ. of Georgia.

Larry Fritsch (circa 1980)

Bill Huggins (circa 1985)

Charlie Conlin (circa late 1980's)

Joe Peleaz (circa early 1990's)

Levi Bleam (1991)

KO (1990's)

2010 find (current owner unknown)


TED Z
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Net54 vs. collectors that are "not online"
 

I can tell you that for the stuff I collect, it's the same people outbidding me over and over...When I lose an auction on ebay or at an auction house, the card almost always shows up on a 'pick-up' thread on here by someone with a name I recognize or know. In the 1990's when ebay showed the id's of the winner and underbidders, it was the usual net54 suspects as well. I imagine there are many nice collections by people that I don't know that no longer buy at auction.(inactive collectors). I am speaking of the more obscure stuff..T210-T216...n172 etc...

I seem to always go up against Net54baseball members when bidding. Then afterwards we compare notes and we find we are all bidding against each other!! Small world and some collecting niches are very, very small.....maybe less than 5 collectors but the prices can still soar. It only takes two to tango!!

My father put together the complete set in the early 70's including the "big three" but sold everything in 1984. He was only missing the Doyle variation but he likely never knew about it until afterwards. Not sure where the set ended up though I do know what happened to the Wagner.

I also personally know another old time collector who isn't on the forum who has a near-complete set but missing "the big four" and every card is raw.

And does he have and Edwards/Cobb Wagner….no set is complete without it.