Two hour interview with.... Bill Mastro
 

https://youtu.be/Omp0P5kJ9Cs?si=qh--N2f3hoLvhui5

Wagner discussion, I am told, at 1:06

I have to admit, I went straight to 1:06. It's interesting.

The Wagner is sheet cut. It was never better than an AUTH. It should be in an AUTH now because it's sheet cut, not because it was subsequently trimmed. The focus of this story has been wrong all along IMO.

Two hour interview with.... Bill Mastro
 

Exactly.

And PSA, complicit in the skulduggery from the word go - knew it was sheet cut and gave it an 8 anyway.

What a fine opening chapter for the attitudes on grading and tone of things we find today.


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Two hour interview with.... Bill Mastro
 

Thanks for posting this, Peter. It was entertaining to say the least.

An actual quote from later in the video: “If you cannot detect the alteration, okay, in any way, shape, or form, is it altered?”

Great share.

I will watch over the week and I am sure I will report back on my thoughts. :)

is it known where the sheet came from before the Wagner card was cut out of it?

How similar to cutting out a particular card from a 1960's Bazooka panel - getting a number grade.

I presume because the Bazooka panel was meant to be hand cut and the T206 was not.

Aren’t most cards sheet cut? The argument is who cut it, no?

What if it was cut using the same cutters as the day it was printed only 90yrs later?

If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?

It was a strip as opposed to a sheet, and someone will correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't it Long Island?

IIRC, I have heard different things, one being Long Island, one being that Alan Ray or maybe his father bought it at some obscure venue in Florida.

For a hobby history board (or at least how we are sometimes) please don't skip to the 1 hour 6 minute point. Listen to the whole first hour because there is a TON of hobby history talked about by a person with first hand experience.

In fact, at some point I'd love to hear more about Bill's adventures at the early 1970s shows before any of us really knew about the hobby.

In other words, listen to the whole darned interview.

Rich

Yes, if it's cut by the factory and issued as a single that is different from an individual cutting it from a sheet or strip. You can obviously do a Socratic method on it, but the hobby distinguishes.

Yes, it is. Stupid point. Next question?

Listening now, thanks for posting the link

Yeah, the common understanding seems to be that Mastro took a lower grade card and trimmed it into a higher grade one, and PSA missed or overlooked the trimming. Thus, all the emphasis has been on the trimming. Not really accurate.

I feel the same. His recollections mirror what I remember during the early 1980s and more importantly, what other collecting folks before that have said.

Yes.
There is no alternate reality in my world.
And if a card is altered and no one detects it, it's still altered. And I fully understand that is not the way it is in the hobby for many, if not most.

Bob Sevchuk
 

The Wagner card was trimmed in the back room of a card shop owned by Bob Sevchuck, located on Jerusalem Avenue in Hicksville, Long Island. I used to go there frequently and talk to Bob, who was very knowledgeable about baseball cards. Unfortunately, the Wagner card did not come up.

Right, but I think the question is the origin of the strip from which it was cut?

I enjoyed listening to the program--I stated selling cards in 1977-78--but I met Mastro years ago, we were not buddies--but I knew him--but listening to him, I enjoyed it and his love for the hobby--The other guy drove me crazy budding in all the time--I really wanted to hear Mastro with his story. Thanks for the listing Peter.

Two hour interview with.... Bill Mastro
 

Right.

The problem seems to be in Mastro’s insistence that he didn’t hide it (the fact it was cut) from anyone, vs. the stories that started circulating after Gretzky and McNall bought the card and PSA graded it.

You can kind of see Mastro’s side of the story though. At the time he cut it from the sheet or the “oblong football” of a card he bought, there were no grading companies. Even after PSA graded the card in 1992 or whenever, there still was not this widespread focus on the deceptive practice of trimming, what a certain type of card should or should not measure to up to 1/72 of an inch - and things like that. Mastro likely wasn’t asked much about the circumstances in which he acquired the card and what he did with it before selling it to Jim Copeland in the late 80’s. There was not this cloud of eternal suspicion over things like that, as we have today with just about anything in a slab that is vintage that appears perfect or near perfect to the naked eye.


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So what you are saying is that there just may be no way to know whether or not many cards are altered. Even if we suspect they aren’t, and reside in numbered PSA slabs.


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Agreed.

I did, and it was fantastic. I had been looking forward to some type of tell-all by Mastro including that story for some time.


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Two hour interview with.... Bill Mastro
 

+1

Yeah, the guy who conducted the interview was tripping over himself interrupting and making irrelevant comments about his own experiences. I wished for a large part of the middle section that he would just shut up.

But all in all, worth listening to for Bill’s perspective. If that guy made it happen, then more power to him.


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Every thread needs a card
https://www.t206resource.com/Wagner-Gallery.html

It aint a tree... Unfortunately, when Mastro farted this one out, everyone has to smell it, and this scent will linger as long as that card is in an 8 holder.


I guess we could look at it that the "original" cut (per Bill) is that it looked like a football. So that was the "original" cut. When it was cut again, wouldn't that be an alteration to the "original" cut? :p

It may have been more widely accepted and not considered fraud if there was full disclosure from the beginning, however that would have opened up all cards that are trimmed to have a numeric grade (which seems to be where this hobby is, anyway).

That is Brian Gray being Brian Gray. Nothing more, nothing less.

Sort of an unlikely interviewer, no? A guy firmly in the world of shiny stuff.

https://www.sportscollectorsdaily.co...y-leaves-leaf/

I have never heard of that guy. But he mentions being chummy with Dr. Jim, and thus I assume he knows Rich as well.

I appreciate that he took the time to put that interview together.


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Yes we know each other fairly well.

Mastro
 

Growing up in Chicago, as a collector got to know Bill and his workers as I was over to his office many times and they also stopped by my house several times back then.

Employing simple logic: "If a card is trimmed it is trimmed." "If a card is trimmed..." is self-answering.

So has this card smashing been going on for a long time or recent phenomenon?

What do you mean by "card smashing"? Are you referring to all the discussion about how the very first card graded by PSA was subjectively given a NUMERICAL grade?

If so, then the observation is that you've somehow missed out on MANY threads that regurgitate the disgust at PSA for not doing what they were set out to do in the first place. TPGs are supposed to provide an honest unbiased opinion about the condition of a card that's to be slabbed.

The very first card that PSA encapsulated is a fraud. PSA has rejected MANY cards as being altered and has not provided numerical grades to what they determine is a trimmed card.

TPGs are supposed to protect the collecting public from these shams by not encapsulating trimmed cards with NUMERICAL grades. For example, look at the price of a PSA8 T206 common and then look at the price of a trimmed (nice looking) PSA-A graded T206 common. Not to mention a T206 Wagner.

This "hobby" has boiled down to being driven by $$$ based on these grades. Soooooo... go back to the beginning of this semi-rant and you should begin to understand this not a recent phenomenon. The topic of so many trimmed encapsulated cards is also not a new phenomenon.

I believe he was referring to the discussion in the video about pressing cards to make them oversized so they can be trimmed without measuring small.

Got it! It was about literal card smashing and not a metaphorical reference to incident bashing.

Yes, card smashing/pressing has been around for a long time. So many ways to "improve" the appearance of a card without actually cutting it for sharp corners.

I just got through the entire interview. It was very interesting to hear about the condition of the Wagner when he bought it, the other cards involved and of course the cutting with the paper cutter. Since I am about the same age as Mastro, his talking about his early years buying packs brought back great memories. I feel very fortunate to have lived during that time period.

Mastro interview
 

Three years ago, in September of 2021, Rick Probstein did an long interview with Mastro that is still available on utube. I forget the details, but it might be interesting to see the extent to which Mastro has stuck to his stories.

You wonder what might have happened if Mastro had decided to take other major players in the hobby down with him, rather than keeping mum.

Contrary to my expectations, I actually really enjoyed listening to Mastro. I would love to grab a beer with him some day and listen to his stories.

I do not know who Brian Gray is, but he was hard for me to listen to. He consitently talked over Mastro. It seemed as though he was interviewing himself half of the time. His name dropping and bragging really spoiled what could have been an epic interview.

Or at least the hobby wishes to distinguish. The fundamental problem though is that the hobby in fact cannot distinguish.

+1

Every time Mastro started to elaborate or say something interesting, he was abruptly cut off and/or redirected. A good interviewer lets the interviewee do 80% of the talking. This was the exact opposite. Difficult to sit through it and I would have loved to hear more from Bill about how he grew Mastro Auctions into the "empire" it once was.

I watched from beginning to end and really enjoyed the back and forth dialogue. It was less an interview and more a lively conversation between two old hobby friends-felt like I was a fly on the wall for a really epic conversation between two industry titans, unique in their own way and experiences.

+1

I used to be a reporter. It's closer to 95%, unless the interviewee won't say anything or gives you one word answers, which is not a problem you have with Bill Mastro. I understand that Brian is not a reporter, but he was way too much of an "agree-er" and explainer (and almost an outright apologist), for Mastro, rather then just letting him talk. That whole fawning part about wanting Mastro in the Hall of Fame was painful to listen to. Mastro didn't need that. He did fine on his own, and I came away with more respect for him. I do think the landscape was very different back then before grading companies came into play, and there emerged such a focus on pristine unaltered cards. I think back then there was more of a focus on present appearance than on provenance and original condition. And he's right that most of the legendary paintings in museums have been restored and touched-up in some way. I actually believe that Mastro may not have had devious intent from the beginning. But he should probably have spoken up at some earlier point. I am also very curious whether the guy who bought it from Mastro for $100,000 asked him if it had been altered in any way, and if so, how did Mastro respond. That is a question Brian should have asked. Because that goes to the heart of his culpability, perhaps more than the actual act of cutting the card. But I did find myself liking Mastro. We are all imperfect.