Real or fake?
 

Saw this for sale today. Thoughts?

Absolutely not authentic, it's a reprint. Carry a black light with you... that card is new, the paper it's on will fluoresce a bright violet.

Exactly what I thought. Told the antique store that I thought it was fake too. There was one T206 that they had that looked legit, but this one and the T207’s and Cracker Jacks they had all looked fake as hell.

Definitely a reprint/fake. The black ink on the card front showing the player's name/team is the first and most obvious dead giveaway.

Look at any real T206 card, that printing is always in brown ink.

fakes also
 

Those Cracker Jacks aint lookin too real either.... jus sayin

It’s not even a good fake. And I agree the CJs are very suspect too.

Um, those T207's look good. Obviously it's not a great picture, but I don't see anything obviously wrong with them. The T206 Donlin may also be OK, at least it doesn't have the goofy black printing in the wrong font on the bottom.

There is no way a legitimate dealer would have a bunch of fakes he's trying to pass off, and then happen to have some higher grade real cards mixed in.

My rule is...if there's one fake, they're all fake.

+1 Agreed

Sad/concerning that it is in a dealers display

Guy could ust be a general antiques guy and not have a clue as to what he has. Some real, some fake. I've seen that before.

I mean... the T207s are authentic, so in this case at least you are going a little strong with the "no way". Donlin also likely legit but I'm not certain on that one.

Maybe the T207s are real (I dont know the issue well enough). But the Karger is 100% fake and the CJs looks super-suspect as well. Personally, i would steer very clear of this guy. While he may not know he is selling fake stuff (although I doubt it), and despite that some stuff may be real, he is not someone I would want to deal with based on the fakes he is selling.

There plenty of cards and sellers out there -- no need to transact with this guy IMO

real fakes
 

I agree the T207s look fine - the others are horrible fakes (except for Donlin - hard to tell from the angle). The dealer is obviously not knowledgeable about cards - probably an honest mistake, but now that it's been pointed out, they should pull the fakes if they want to remain honest, obviously...

I agree with Tim and Luke on this. The dealer's response to being informed of the non-authentic cards would be how I would determine whether I wanted to deal with them or not.

Brian

Antique dealers are not dumb, they research stuff all day long while they sit behind their booth, and there is plenty of research available regarding baseball cards online.

Lets take the clearly fake 1915 CJ's, those are sold on Etsy all day long for $2. The giveaway is the bold typeface and the centering. If those were real the ask should be in the $300 range for commons that nice.

So this guy either got duped and is trying to pass on the dupe to an unsuspecting mark, or he's buying off Etsy for $2 and deceiving the public.

Either way, he knows what he is doing.

+1 on what Phil said above. They know. I deal with a certain antique store regularly. People consign. 2 sellers usually have baseball cards. Customers know this, and they go quickly, that is, the good stuff. 1 seller puts mint pricing on low grade cards. Amazingly, they sell. 1 seller puts realistic prices on cards. They sell even faster.

The things I have come to know about CJs, because I have some, is this. They are flimsy, like paper almost. They are fragile; they will come apart if you aren't very careful. They are stained and yellowed, because they were in boxes with caramelized popcorn. Finally, there is no white, per se. They were not printed with any white ink. And they were printed with very specific fonts.

I visit a local Antique mall where my brother has a booth. There is one dealer booth with some very nice 1950's and 1960's stars that are legit. The problem is that they all look like they were on a Slimfast diet.
Bob

To answer a few items that have been brought up (and an edit to clarify my original comments)…

This was not a card dealer. This was a guy who sold mostly records and had a crappy, dark display case with these cards. I knew the Karger was fake, no question. I knew the CJ”s were bad too….too much fake aging for the amount of wear seen.

The Donlin I felt was real. The T207’s at first looked suspect to me based upon my quick examination and seeing the other known fakes but after doing some checking online I realized that they were probably legit. I think what threw me off at first was the numbers that the dealer assigned on the labels. I was pretty sure that this was an unnumbered set.

Problem is, when you see a few bad cards, it taints the lot and puts a bad taste in your mouth. Without a loupe and better lighting, I wasn’t going to bite.

I told the old lady running the store and she said she’d talk to the manager and booth owner.

I appreciate everyone’s opinion and backing up what I thought.

Those T207's are 100% authentic.

So what's his grift?

His grift is the fake Karger and the fake CJ’s.

The Pro Set golf cards are probably authentic...

Napoleon Bonaparte famously declared: 'Never ascribe to malice that which is adequately explained by incompetence.'

Some people get a collection and assume everything's real. But the original owner bought some fakes along the way, either getting duped himself or because he wanted them.