Barker vs National Game

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Posted By: Al Davis

Within the span of several weeks a National Game PSA8 Cy Young sold for $256 while a Tom Barker PSA8 Cy Young sold for $810. Both were sold on ebay auctions. Could someone please explain this discrepancy? Are all Tom Barkers worth this much more than their National Game counterparts? Why?

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Posted By: davidcycleback

The National Games are plentiful and have long been cheap for period cards. That a PSA8 1913 Cy Young sells for $256 says they aren't condition sensitive.

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Posted By: Peter Spaeth

In my experience they sell for roughly the same.

By the way, who WAS Tom Barker? Seriously. I have asked before but no one seems to know.

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Posted By: dennis

the maker/creator of the game?

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Posted By: Rhett Yeakley

While we are talking about them, what is everyone's take on relative scarcity within the Tom Barker game of the Frank Baker and Score Card with the Fenway Brewery overprint versus those without them?

-Rhett

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Posted By: leon

You are killin me ....now folks will get wind of the fact these are pretty scarce. I rarely see them but would put them in the very scarce category. I haven't seen too many sold but they did bring a premium. You sort of take what you can on some things, condition wise...I believe I have one like the one you have shown and this one, which represent the 2 different varieties, I believe...(for those that might not know)

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Posted By: DMcD

Enquiring minds want to know. Googled Tom Barker baseball and this is the best I could find. VCBC #11 had a short article entitled "1913 WG6 Tom Barker Set - Clearing up the Confusion" by Dr. Mark Cooper in which he differentiates it from the WG5 National Game Baseball set. His closing paragraph, and I quote: "Hopefully some of the mystery and confusion of these two card games is now answered. But it still leaves one big question: Who was Tom Barker anyway?" And so, on back to Square Zero.