NY Times covers the scandal
 

Online today, hard copy tomorrow I am told.

You would think they could have found a better source for that comment about originality.:eek:

Gary denied everything, it seems. He was only looking for bumps.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/14/y...ype=collection

LOL, Moser would look for undergraded cards to bump without altering them. Has this moron seen his before and afters. That’s a flimsy defense.

Pretty good piece for its brevity. Glad they contacted Ken Kendrick about the issue. Surprised they didnt show any images from the before and after. Neither Brent nor Joe Orlando wanted to talk, very unlike them, and still didnt say which law enforcement agency they're working with.
And Moser throws PSA under the bus; that's rich.

Peter- did The Times contact you directly, or is that just a quote from one of your posts?

I spoke with the reporter at some length, and also directed him to some background materials.

The last paragraph says a lot. The bellwether card of the hobby, when discovered trimmed, increased in value 4 fold. I imagine it'll be hard to gain sympathy from the masses when it appears the alterations are making everyone, including the buyers, rich.

Well, at least it is getting national attention. Thanks for what you are doing, Peter et al....

Many who've posted on various threads believe this story was not destined to go beyond readers of Net54. It will in fact be national news. We'll see how it all plays out. And yes, a thanks to Peter. He is always posting intelligently, and he also has a day job that warrants his attention. A multi-tasker for sure.:)

There was a time when an article about baseball cards would appear in The Times Arts and Leisure section, not the Money section.

And Brent is advising The Met now?! OMG:eek:

PWCC needs to start their own HE chat board with only members of exceptional quality, whose foreheads receive an indelible sticker. A threshold of net purchases from the marketplace would be a qualifying requirement for the forehead sticker (or a tattoo or branding as of cattle in the wild, Wild West).

Then PWCC should also consider starting a college of Card Restoration that would grant degrees to the students leading to full certification of Card Doctors. Why should the fraudsters have to linger in the alleys out of the sunlight. Let them be credentialed as in Medicine, Law and Engineering. The valedictorians of the college could also receive plaques, which could be displayed proudly, perhaps in The Vault.

I’m sure PSA would be complicit and create a division of the college to certify graders. In a year or two I would expect a “bumper” crop of graders to qualify with their own plaques for display in the Vault.

Why should their (PWCC and PSA) elite clientele have to be bothered by allegations of fraud thrown at them by the rinky-dinks of Net54 and Blowout. The gentlemen who want to redefine the hobby, just need to think outside the box.;)

Credit for getting the reporter interested in the story belongs to another member, but I'll leave it to him whether he wants to acknowledge that.

NYT is complete Bird Cage Paper but I might buy one tomorrow ...

Wow, this is going beyond the message boards. It might get picked up by other media now. I was waiting for this to happen. Baseball cards are finally getting some attention out there in the real world.

I found this part interesting.


It was upsetting,” Mr. Kendrick said of learning that the card had been altered. “I heard the rumors back in 2007 when I acquired the card, but they weren’t confirmable. I wanted to have the card, and I still want to have it.”

But the controversy only increased the value of the card. Shortly after the news broke, Mr. Kendrick said, he received an offer to buy it for four times what he had paid. More recently, an insurance appraisal valued the card at more than $10 million.

Kudos to you Peter and the other board member.

Think the article was well done.

Interesting that Moser was not afraid to talk to the media although PSA and PWCC were. Of course his claims are BS about just cracking and regrading without doing anything to the cards.

The story has been getting a lot of coverage here in the NW. Here are a couple recent articles, even though they lack any teeth.

https://www.bizjournals.com/portland...ace-under.html

https://www.oregonlive.com/business/...d-scandal.html

No politics please.

Then he should have no problem sending it back to PSA for an Authentic Altered slab.

I agree, but not liking the NYT doesn't necessarily suggest a political slant. Is there an assumption that the NYT is political one way or another????

Kendrick thinks Brent is a great guy, shocker. I must admit I'm intrigued by the fact that it seems the more discretionary income you have to throw at cards, the less you really care about this issue. The collectors / investors with truly deep pockets like Ken could care less, why IS that? Seems to me they are just increasing their stereotype as rich fools who buy something only to be able to say they own it, then throw it in a safety deposit box or lend it to a museum and then forget about it.

There's caring about the money, then there's caring about the principal. He clearly isn't bothered by the latter, and the former is a rounding error on his balance sheet. In my experience, the more money you have, the more you can afford not to care about it.

To many people, cards are a commodity. There is little (if any) nostalgic or personal value assigned to them. Brent understands that, Kendrick understands that and many others understand that.

The article talks about “purists” who believe alteration is a cardinal sin. Others look at alterations as an investment - improving the quality of an asset.

The purists will never understand that rationale and the people who have no nostalgic attachment to baseball cards will never understand why it’s an issue.

Is that a serious question? Do you think he said what he said because he feels the writers aren't literate enough for his tastes? I don't think so. It's politics, period, and I would like Net54 to remain a politics free zone, as per Leon's rules.

The Times is generally considered to be very liberal.

Wow, I think you are overreacting. If anything, you brought more attention to the politics of it. I think The NY Times sucks also, does that make my comment political?

I certainly prefer no politics on our forum. That said, when I was growing up I always thought the papers should just report the news and not take a political stand. I quit taking our paper, after many years, when they got all political. All that said, lets refrain from political commentary. This place has enough craziness already.

Back to the article, it is very good but it would have been nice to go a bit deeper on it. It didn't make the situation sound as bad as it really is, to me.

Kudos to Peter and the other board member. Keep up the good work!

But I can’t believe Peter didn’t make the reporter also note that the Wagner was also hand-cut and should only be an “A”! :)


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I am not sure he would have grasped that subtlety LOL.

In all honesty, my question was serious. I don't read newspapers and rarely link to their online content because it requires you subscribe when trying to read an article.

I appreciate all of the footwork Peter has been doing to keep the board informed of this issue. It's obvious the hobby has MUCH more of this kind of crap going on outside of this specific issue. But, it's a great reminder to be mindful when transacting with your hard-earned money.

I am surprised no one has mentioned the Dallas oilman Mr. Donald Spence and the impact this might have to his extraordinary collection, virtually all of which is PSA-graded.

I thought Don sold to Thomas Tull years ago.

Agreed....when I was growing up, the news outlets just reported the news. Walter Cronkite stated "..and that's the way it is".....no bias. No slant. Then came news outlets with their liberal slant...which gave birth to Fox news and its opposing slant.....now the news is nothing but puffery and opinion pieces.

He sold a bunch of it to him.

Still has a few sets left on the registry but nothing like he used to.

xxx

It depends why you think it sucks, so I have no idea.

Fair point. I've noted that the sports section has gotten very tiny too. How about we all move on. If I was oversensitive, I apologize.

Hi Leon, everyone, I found this finance article about PWCC and PSA earlier this week by Philip Lyon of Seeking Alpha -

https://seekingalpha.com/article/426...aiting-exposed

This us really blowing up. Nice quotes in NYT Peter!


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My hometown newspaper shrunk so much in side that I'd joke "I read the newspaper. Both sides."

Anyone wanna throw up a quick link to some examples? I saw the 52 mantle PSA 4.5, but nothing else. Thanks!!!

Also, yeah, this is so annoying. I guess you get more fraud when the values go up, but these people are such scum. Sucks.

There is a thread on this already. I posted it days ago.

After those embarrassing local news reports on that Babe Ruth card, the NYT article is good and I was impressed. Especially considering, I assume, the reporter isn't a baseball card collector.

He is not. A quick study though based on my interactions with him. It's interesting, the quote from me was practically the first thing I said to him as I was trying to give him some background to put this all in context.

https://www.blowoutforums.com/showth...90614&page=110
Just keep scrolling forward or back. Hundreds of examples.

Notwithstanding the lame rhetoric by Orlando and Moser and the mute response by Huigens, I'm glad to see this scandal is making national news. The more publicity, the more pressure will be put on PSA to proactively address the problem. Great work Peter!

By the way, has anyone heard from Michael O'Keefe of the New York Daily News? He was the lone voice in the wilderness in the media many years ago on hobby news like this.

I do have one question. Does anybody know what are these "25 rarest baseball cards" that Ken Kendrick owns? Surely there are more than 25 unique baseball cards, so the claim can't be accurate; I'm just wondering which cards are being touted as the 25 rarest.

Yes, Thanks Peter. Always the voice of reason around here. ;)

Not really the rarest (unless you consider them the rarest for their condition?), but certainly some of the most valuable.

https://www.sportscollectorsdaily.co...on-on-exhibit/

Glenn—Ken’s collection is more condition rarities than really rare cards. He has the trimmed Wagner, a PSA 10 ‘52 Topps Mantle, and other high grade cards such as the M101-5 Thorpe, a nice, albeit blank back, M101 Ruth, etc. None of the rarest cards in the hobby are in his collection.