One of the other more disturbing (Though perhaps maybe not surprising) things I've noticed recently is that PSA will mislabel these as well. I have come across many that PSA has certified as a "gray back" but clearly are not. So, I guess my point is to be careful in what you are buying, I see a couple of very highly priced "gray backs" on ebay, certified by PSA that absolutely are not gray backs. You really need to understand what you are looking at.
Regarding identification, I agree with the posters above, once you've seen a few of these and recognize the paper stock differences, it's hard to unsee and you tend to be able to tell the difference in patina vs. paper stock but putting the card next to a non-grayback will immediately help you tell the difference. If you can't tell when you do that, it's not a gray back.
I'm an avid collector of these and find them as a really unique and underrated subcategory of a fantastic set. As a bit of an advertisement, I have many but not all of them. I also have many duplicates and would be interested in trading/buying any that the community and cards gods send my way.
Thanks for a great discussion on a great variant of the 54 set.
James
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