are they real- Jennings, Cooper, Nichols
 

Most of us have a few items we question in our collection. I'd like your opinion on these.
Collins- not mine but looks decent to me but rejected by PSA
Nichols- had for awhile, skeptical but hope you folks like it rejected JSA
Bancroft- had for awhile, skeptical but hope you folks like it rejected PSA
Jennings- bough 15 years ago from long time collector Ernie Stautmeyer- skeptical- if you guys do not like it will probably just sell as a T206 w/o signature
Cooper- this was purchased from Negro League expert WAyne Stivers many years ago and to me matches the one in Keatings book. Rejected recently by PSA
Hanlon is from Jim Stinson who got it from Bill Zekus collection before Hanlon made HOF. Jim swears by it and claims it is a variant Hanlon sometimes used. I just spoke to him about it when he was ij the states for a few days
Open to selling the Cooper and Hanlon (have Stivers COA for Cooper and catalogue page of Stinson for Hanlon along with an email from Jim)
Thanks in advance for responding. see 2nd post for rest of pix
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this is the one in Keatings book to compare
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No

Tom C

Actually the Hanlon maybe. Not a fan of anything else though.

Tom C

The easy way out is to agree with PSA, but I think they're right on all of them. I'm sure Jim is more of an expert than most people involved in autographs, but I would have a hard time convincing myself that Hanlon was good either. The pen pressure looks just too heavy for something signed late in life. I have no opinion on different styles of his signature.

I wouldn't buy them.

Sorry to say that I agree with PSA on these . Each of these signatures have very evident signature characteristics that are not consistent with authentic signatures of these players. I have had multiple examples of these players in my collection on different media , except for the Cooper , which I turned down many years ago from Wayne.

Eddie Collins def no good.

I am totally on board with everyone on the Jennings, Collins, Nichols, and Bancroft. What would you do with these cards? The Bancroft is going in the trash. Jennings has value as a T206 so may sell as an unsigned. Nichols probably in trash.
I still have a hard time with the Cooper since it is such a match to the one in keatings book. What do you folks think is bad.
Jim is positive on the Hanlon as I have spoken to him many times about it. Should I sell it as a hanlon cut explaining it failed PSA but Stinson approves it???
I am just a collector but getting rid of a few items that do not fit my collecting parameters anymore. The $ is not that big a deal just if they are real I'd hate for them to be in the trash and I'd rather not give them away (Cooper and hanlon)
Thanks for all the input!

Doesn't Jim offer a Lifetime guarantee? I know others have returned autographs to him that have failed TPA.

As for Cooper, I am not nearly as knowledgeable as others, but I just find it odd how close of a match it is to Kevin's example, coupled with the fact of the medium, looks like unlined index card/sheet with just him on it. I doubt anyone was writing to him at home asking for an autograph given that he died young in 1941 or bringing index cards to games, especially in the Negro Leagues/Barnstorming, which was rare at that time. In fact, I don't even recall ever seeing a signal signed index card of a Rare Negro League player from their playing days. Perhaps it was taken from an autograph book?

Again, just my 2 Cents. Good Luck.

Isn't Keating at PSA? If so, he or his team failed the signature.

Keating
 

The Cooper is on a cardboard like paper cut to a 3x5. Keating looked at it at the national and said it was no good but didn't say why. But again they are rejecting most vintage ones these days - even ones everyone else says are real. Was also rejected at PSA but when you submit to them you have no idea who looked at it. The earlier negro league guys often signed slowly. There was a cooper sold recently at Clean Sweep that looked nothing like this- cert by JSA- looked almost printed. Wondered how he certified that. Haven't seen any exemplars other than the Keating one I posted
Not trying to convince and I appreciate the input and conversation

If you compare it to Keating and Keating turned it down that seems like a solid opinion.

A couple of related items:
I previously owned the Pop Lloyd that Ron K. used as his exemplar in his book. I showed it to Kevin (and later PSA) at the 2015 National and they both said it was no good. I had a standing offer on the signature for a fixed amount by another buyer who knew it was real. I accepted less $$ than I would have had PSA passed it, but knew that it would tough to move now that PSA failed it.

As for the Cooper, I believe this once originated from Kevin Keating, as he was selling the same signature at the 2015 National. I asked him how could he be SURE it was real based on the printed signature, he said he knew where it came from and it had to be real. It was later sold by Christies and then consigned again to JSA. Here is a picture for others:

http://www.christies.com/lotfinder/L...8-details.aspx

So weird about the Cooper. When I talked to Stivers he said the same about my Cooper- he knew the provinence and then it matched kevins in the book. I bought mine just after the book came out. Now PSA doesn't want to know provenance- which in some cases like the Hanlon is important.

Yes, I submitted a George Wright that was 100 percent good also in 2015 that failed PSA. No explanation was offered. I sat down with Steve Grad this year and showed him the autograph and all the history behind it. After carefully reviewing everything, and not just the autograph, it passed, as it should have. Perhaps u can reach out to Steve and maybe have beckett look at instead if you really feel it is good.

you can't keep saying that blanket statement like it's 100% forgone conclusion. maybe they're rejecting most of YOUR vintage items, but that may not be the case with everybody else. they wouldn't still be in business if this was true. i may get some pushback on here as i think a couple other people share that opinion, but that doesn't make it so.

you keep playing the game and TPA shop these sigs until maybe one of them agree with your opinion...but don't come on here and complain after the fact about it. it's the game you chose play! kinda ironic keating kind of rejected his own stuff tho.

I do not send things to TPA's except if they re going to auction. I am a collector and only sell dupes. When they reject Bobby Doerr, harry Eisenstat and others who I got through the mail and who eveyone agrees are real something is going on. Most of my graphs came from Stinson, etc. I had them reject items I bought from their authenticators before they were working for PSA. I know at least 4 other big collectors who are experiencing 80%+ rejection rate on vintage signed cards while before they were running (as I was) a 90% acceptance rate. It is this policy change that mystifies us. I have showed my collection to some of the biggesr names in the busines plus it is posted on flickr for you to peruse. Small auction companies are finding the same thing and if it wasn't for the population report PSA would lose alot more customers to Beckett etc who appear to be judging more fairly. Let's not though have this conversation. The point of this post was to show a few items I was suspicious of in my collection and get confirmation that they were probably bad (except for the hanlon and cooper) as I trust the long time collectors on this forum more than some of the TPA's.

Collins and Bancroft are bad.

Nothing I am reading here convinces me that the Cooper is bad - Wayne Stivers is a better authority on Negro League autographs than Kevin Keating and the photo you provided is not clear enough to judge it. Doesn't mean it's good, but also doesn't mean it's bad. When an 'expert' won't say why they have an opinion, their opinion doesn't mean much, and I have plenty of books in my bookshelf that are full of errors.

They've been rejecting mine as well, even people players who are actively signing ttm, after "the head authenticator " reviewed them. Agreed it could just be mine as well, but we are talking easier names from the 1950s

With no disrespect to Jim Stinson, Kevin Keating, or the handful or two of top notch dealers of vintage autographs over the years, but I have always assumed their money back guarantees were valid as long as they were actively in the business of buying/selling autographs. Essentially, only as long as the life time of that business. Once they retired or moved onto another occupation, the guarantee ceased. Just my opinion.

not a matter of the $. I trust Jim and Wayne more than the people that rejected them and am in contact with both. probably will list them explaining who vouches for them and who rejected them or just keep them

and there you go...if you trust stinson and wayne, then why spend extra money getting opinions from people you trust less? because people buy the alphabets! and now that pandora's box is open, it's this whole thing where i bought from abc and it's good but i sent it to xyz and they said it's bad but i trust abc way more than xyz. don't say you don't trust the tpa or bash them for ruining the hobby while selectively use them to your benefit.

Huge +1

The biggest problem I have with the vintage sports hobby is that once a name gets established as being an 'expert', moreso if they publish a book, that name is unquestionable, even when others come along that are 10x better at whatever skill is involved. You guys really need to understand that and buy into it, or you are going to get screwed repeatedly from today until the day you quit collecting. Think about how much fun that will be.

None of this would ever come up for me but I was thinking about narrowing my collection alittle and getting rid of a few rare HOFers that weren't on cards and that most folks never heard of. Knowing where I got them I thought getting them slabbed was a done deal and I needed them slabbed to put them at auction with a major AH

Here is my question with TPA. What are their qualifications for saying a signature is authentic? What makes you qualified? There is a lot of money involved here and that makes everything these authenticators do suspicious. Many take their word as gospel and spend lots of money are signatures that are deemed authentic. I just always wonder how many of these vintage signatures are actually real. I would figure most are not regardless of what these so called experts say. There is just way too much money involved for all this to be above board

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The answer is complicated in some ways but let me say that their only qualification that is required is having some background in the hobby , having a fairly clean reputation AND Mainly having the buyers and sellers faith . Unlike a doctor , dentist , lawyer , CPA , broker or any profession that requires licensing and a board to have oversight over the profession the TPAs rely on a trust created by the illusion of expertise . Any person can call themselves an autograph authenticator or expert but there is no standard by which that statement can be validated in our hobby . It is an illusion of trust created by the TPA. Money rules our hobby to a great degree and much rides on these opinions from TPAs and they know it and they wield their power , influence and the knowledge that deals happen or not depending on them with a knowledge that there is little or no recourse to them. Also their responsibilities lie in an opinion but that opinion has no validity if at times the authenticator moves to a different company .
As always the best advice is to try to educate yourself, find people you trust to help you, but remember you are ultimately responsible for your purchases; buy legal documents when possible , get items signed in person when possible BUT mainly don't buy an item if you can't afford to lose the money you spent to buy an item if you find out later that the item isn't authentic regardless if it comes from a TPA because getting money back from them can be an exercise on futility.

I agree with the illusion part. Another problem I have is most of these " experts" are also collectors of the same stuff they certify. This I find highly unethical. I have the same opinion about the card graders who are also probably collectors of cards. It just seems like its a big can of worms and difficult for the average collector to navigate.

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Why would that be unethical? Personally I'd prefer someone with hobby experience. Some scientist isn't going to know hobby history and isn't going to know who to scrutinize because they're heavily forged. Also I see no direct conflict of interest between a person certing an autograph that isn't for sale.

I just find it that way because they can certify their own pieces plus those of their friends. They stand to make lots of money. You know once an auto goes under that plastic it becomes authentic for life regardless if it is. Worthless pieces of paper can be turned into a treasure if just 1 person is doing bad stuff and in this hobby thats highly likely. Of course this is just my opinion of what could be a problem regarding this.

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I don't know how the authenticating process works but I would be surprised if an authenticator knows the name of the person who submitted items for authentication. That would certainly be a conflict of interest but I would assume the hobby has figured that out and uses a blind submission process. I could be wrong though, but I hope I'm not.