[brianp-beme]

Hello all esoterican collectors out there. The listing of available baseball player cards in the over 200 card multi-sport set 1926 Sports Co. of America (sometimes referred to as 'Spalding') issue has differences in the various sources I have checked. Perhaps because the cards are relatively uncommon, but also perhaps due to an ad back variation as well as blank backed hand cut cards that are believed to be cut from promotional sheets, this set has a murky checklist. Here is a possible checklist that I was able to assemble from several sources, including the Sports Collectors Digest catalog (I have the 2009 edition), the prewarcard website, as well as both PSA and SGC sites:

Babe Adams
Grover Alexander
Nick Altrock
Dave Bancroft
Jesse Barnes
Oswald Bluege
Jim Bottomley
Max Carey
Ty Cobb
Mickey Cochrane
Eddie Collins
Stan Coveleskie *
Kiki Cuyler
Hank DeBerry
Jack Fournier
Goose Goslin
Charlie Grimm
Bucky Harris
Gabby Hartnett
Fred Hofmann
Rogers Hornsby
Waite Hoyt
Walter Johnson
Joe Judge
Willie Kamm
Tony Lazzeri
Rabbit Maranville
Fred Marberry
Rube Marquard
Stuffy McInnis
Speck Meadows
Babe Pinelli
Wally Pipp
Sam Rice
Emory Rigney
Dutch Reuther
Babe Ruth
Ray Schalk
Joe Sewell
Urban Shocker
Al Simmons
George Sisler
Tris Speaker
Pie Traynor
George Uhle
Paul Waner
Aaron Ward
Ken Williams
Glenn Wright
Emil Yde


Of these 50 cards, there a couple that fall in the murky 'do they/do they not exist' category, that I placed an '*' next to player on the above list:

Tris Speaker - Listed in the SCD catalog and on the PSA site in their set information, but prewarcards website does not list it. Neither PSA or SGC has listings for it in their pop reports. - Speaker confirmed within this thread by JLange.

Stan Covaleski - Listed in SCD catalog, PSA set info, and prewarcards website. Not in either PSA or SGC pop reports.

Neither card's image come up when doing a Google search, nor do I remember seeing them. I have found images of all of the other baseball players. Does anyone have either one of these, or have seen them?

Pictured below is an example from the set that has the most commonly seen biographical writeup back. And Bancroft has a fun writeup, being identified as peppery, cagey, effiecient, and to top it off, he is classified as a wizard.


Brian (also just to note, I was surprised how small these cards are when I first saw them in person...they are about 1-1/2" by 2-1/4")