BRSZ

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Posted By: vorthian 

brsz-2 = Broadway Rick.
Nsports = Broadway Rick.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=1824103685

This doesn't look good for our friend...

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=1843485321

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Posted By: HalleyGator

I met him once when he ran an ad in our local paper that he was in town to buy cards.

I went with my son to sell some old cards and I was gong to give my 6-year-old the money. He was pumped, and I was going to indoctrinate him into the hobby.

BUT ... my cards were PSA Graded, so Rick knew that I was not a sucker and that my cards had fairly established prices ...

so he was rude as crap and criticized the PSA grading of every card since he knew he wasn't going to "steal" anything from me.

Needless to say, my young son was crushed when Rick (short for Richard, which can also be shortened to Dick) offered about 10% of the SMR for all of my cards and I refused to sell.

I was probably the only "collector" to come in that whole day (the rest were probably kids trying to sell 2001 Metallic Upper Deck cards) and he couldn't even carry on a pleasant conversation with someone who might be BUYING from him in the future. Not smart.

Oh yeah, by the way.... I've spent hundreds of thousands on cards since then ... and I STAY AWAY from his auctions just because I don't like him. So HAH!!

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Posted By: Jeff Obermeyer

That's the worst example of shill bidding I've ever seen. At least most guys who run shill scams are smart enough not to use BOTH ID's to sell, mentioning the company name in the sell ads as well.

What a moron...

Jeff

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Posted By: john(z28jd)

Im guessing he didnt want to sell it for under a certain amount,which means he just wasnt smart enough to use a reserve. Also,do you know how much thats gonna cost in ebay fees.....But lets give the guy some credit,maybe he forgot he was the one selling it and thought it was a good deal,and jumped on it,wrote himself out a 3200 check,probably picked the card up himself to save on shipping,and is probably leaving himself great feedback as i write this(SUPER FAST DELIVERY!!! SEEMS LIKE I JUST WON AND I HAVE THE CARD ALREADY!)

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Posted By: john(z28jd)

everything nsports has bid on in the last month on ebay has been from brsz-2,amazing!

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Posted By: HalleyGator

If I was mason.titans ... I would turn the sucker in to EBay as soon as he calls (and he will call) and says: "The high bidder backed out, but I can sell it to you for your last bid."

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Posted By: Wesley Liu

I was really excited to bid on the Jackson card yesterday as I missed out on the very same card in the Mastro auction a few months ago. Thank goodness I noticed the bidding patterns prior to placing my bid yesterday.

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Posted By: TBob

This takes the case. Is anyone going to turn him in to ebay? If not, I will.

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Posted By: brian parker

I encountered the same thing from another dealer (at a much lower dollar amount) in an auction I won last year. I notified ebay and within 48 hours their account was suspended (although they were reinstated a month or so later--oh well).

Everyone cross their fingers--here's to slapping the shill out of him.

Brian

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Posted By: jay behrens

I have had sellers try this before. What I tell them is that I will gladly pay the next bid increment above the the next highest bidder after me becuase if this the high bidder had never bid, the seller would never have known what my max was.

Some sellers agree to it, others don't. They are usually the ones shill bidding to try and max the price they get.

I can also vouch for having a very unpleasant experience with BRSZ. I ended up with several trimmed m116s awhile back and he tried to give some cock and bull story about how they were from Rob Lifson's personal collection. Yeah, right. Like Rob can't sell them on his own. He finally ended up refunding me a chunk of money. I just wish Elliot had told who BRSZ was before I bid instead of after :-p I knew his bad rep from early days, just didn't make the connection.

Jay

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Posted By: Brian C Daniels

And we have discussed him before!

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Posted By: vorthian

<< and I STAY AWAY from his auctions just because I don't like him. So HAH!! >>

Hal: That's the spirit! If these dealers can't exhibit professionalism (being a man of their word, treating you with respect, etc) and common courtesy - what's the point of doing business with them? There are other fish in the sea.

<< But lets give the guy some credit,maybe he forgot he was the one selling it and thought it was a good deal >>

John: Do you think he offered the buyer a return policy?

<< I was really excited to bid on the Jackson card yesterday as I missed out on the very same card in the Mastro auction >>

Wesley: The JJ 8oc (lot 968) realized 4431 pre-juice in that Mastro auction. Ouch! I was on it as well, but I couldn't justify placing another bid. Last year I might have, but definitely not this year.

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Posted By: Elliot

Just to clarify--I would have told Jay before the auction, but he only told me about the purchase afterwards.

Also, this example just points out the inadequacy of eBay's "powerseller" criteria. How can somebody like Broadway Rick be a powerseller? There are people who rely on the powerseller designation.

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Posted By: Julie Vognar

sounds like sticking your finger in a light socket.

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Posted By: Bruce Moreland

Broadway Rick has a famously bad reputation. Every time his name comes up, people have bad things to say, and nobody has anything good to say.

My own personal beefs with him are as follows:

1) He took advantage of me when I was a newbie, giving me my first real really bad experience as a card collector.

2) He admitted to me on the phone that he rubs wrinkles out of cards. "It's just something that dealers know how to do."

I think that if you buy PSA-graded from this guy, you will probably get good stuff, but even then I would be worried that he altered a card and PSA didn't catch it. There was a $500 card up on eBay yesterday that I kind of wanted, and I didn't bid on it, because Rick was the seller. It made me feel GOOD to know that I cost him some money.

I would not only not buy raw material from him, I would not take it from him for FREE.

bruce

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Posted By: Lee Behrens

Hey Scott, Along with some type of name tags for the nationals we should have some signs made up for all the bad dealers that we have encountered. Stop by there table and leave them a kind little note.

I would gladly go to Festberg's booth if he is setup and tell him what I think of him and his dealings.



Lee

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Posted By: Dan Mathewson

...and here it is in its entirety:

You guys climb all over me every time I report criminal abuse to you, especially when it's one of your precious "Power Sellers". And, here I go again: Look at Item # 1824103685. The seller is "nsports". Look at the auction description. It's Broadway Rick's at brsz@mindspring.com Now, look at the item I'm primarily complaining about, Item # 1843485321. The winner is "nsports". The Seller this time is "brsz-2". If you look at the auction description here, it's Braodway Rick's AGAIN with e-mail address brsz@mindspring.com When is eBay going to stop this garbage? "nsports" and "brsz-2" are the same person and nsports keeps bidding on brsz-2's auctions!!! Look at items numbered: 1843484941, 1843485483, and 1843493727...these are all items where he was bidding on his own stuff!! nsports was the winner on these brsz-2 items. But, look at item 1843487168: nsports bid on this brsz-2 item, but someone else won it (dd9191) and paid more because of nsports' shill bidding of his own item!!! This is outrageous!!! I cannot believe you allow this continue just because people like this are "Power Sellers". This is fraud and theft. This should be punished. This person should be banned permanently from eBay for abusing this system and for stealing from the people who use it legitimately to buy and sell. In most states, fraud is a Felony, and eBay is simply allowing it to happen. There is no excuse. I only imagine that eBay Safe Harbor will, in response to this message, send me a warning for somehow violating this "Power Seller's" rights, or whatever. I am outraged by this kind of fraud and theft and eBay must take swift and decisive action when anyone uses their system as a vehicle for their criminal purposes. -dan mathewson

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Posted By: HalleyGator

Go Dan!!!

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Posted By: Eric

You can also file a complaint with the Internet Fraud Complaint Center (IFCC). I bet that what BRSZ is doing is against the law. Below is a link to their web site. This shill bidding really hurts the hobby - not to mention your wallet!

The complaint form is located at the bottom of the page.

http://www1.ifccfbi.gov/strategy/pressroom.asp


Eric

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Posted By: warshawlaw

and sent it to safe harbor. Lot of good it will probably do. Maybe if we all sent them the email they might act. Or not.

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Posted By: gates69

I also had dealings with this idiot.
I bought 2 lots of vintage basketball cards from him off of Ebay that were graded NM/MT.Well when I got them they were NM at best with some even being EX/MT.I got on the phone and told him I wanted my money back to which he said he couldn't do it.I told him if he didn't,I would be contacting my credit card company.
Well that changed his tune.I sent the cards back but still had to call 3 times before they credited my account.
This guy is bad news and should be shut down.

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Posted By: 2seamer

I had a reliable ebayer email me on one of his auctions saying they had proof that the 2 ebay IDs were in fact the same person.

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Posted By: Paul

I borrowed heavily from Dan's complaint to ebay, but decided to adopt the "sweet and innocent" approach, rather than the "I'm mad as hell and not gonna take it anymore" approach. Hopefully, between the two approaches, and with the help of other reports of this fraud, we may make some progress. Here's what I sent to ebay:

I want to report a clear case of shill bidding. An ebay seller, brsz-2, is using a second ebay ID, nsports, to drive up the prices of his own auctions. If you look at Item # 1824103685, the seller "nsports" states that he is Broadway Rick's at brsz@mindspring.com. Then, look at item numbers 1843485321, 1843484941, 1843485483, 1843493727, and 1843487168. They are all being sold by brsz-2, who also identifies himself in the description as Broadway Rick's at brsz@mindspring.com.

The problem is that nsports has bid on all of these items sold by brsz-2. In other words, Broadway Rick's has bid on Broadway Rick's items. In some cases, he has won his own items. In some cases, he has driven up the price for others.

I know this is against ebay rules. Ebay even has a specific complaint category for this type of conduct. Is there anything ebay can do in the case of a repeat offender like this?

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Posted By: dan mathewson

...nicely worded. I guess I've totally forgotten how to wor things outside of the "I'm mad as hell and not gonna take it anymore" approach, long ago. Especially if I am actually mad as hell and not gonna take it anymore...

There are times when I wat to tell ebay: , just because they make me so damm mad for protecting these fraudulent card trimmers and shill bidders, and only because they are "Power Sellers"...

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Posted By: David

To me, the biggest problem are the private bidder auctions. I don't doubt that there are valid uses for private auctions on eBay and honerable people may use them, but it appears to me that their popoular use is to hide shill bidding and to protect sellers like Libertyforall. I'm not neccesarily for abolishing private auctions on eBay, but wish eBay would be more restrictive and prudent in allowing their use.

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Posted By: jay behrens

I'll date my time on eBay with this post. Originally, private auctions were soley invite only auctions. If the seller did not invite you to bid, you couldn't. That seems to be a better use for it. You would still have the same basic problems, but now it would be inconvient for the seller to authorize everyone that emailed for permission to bid.

Jay

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Posted By: MW

Jay --

That's a good distinction. Perhaps eBay should re-label these types of auctions as "secret" or "furtive" instead of "private."

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Posted By: TBob

I turned him in to Safe Harbor also. I got an email saying that he was already under investigation and they would let me know something later.
<Yawn> I am not holding my breath...

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Posted By: leon

I will chip in with my unpleasant experience (and only experience) with Dick....I mean Rick......Early on in my collecting career (a whole 4 years ago or so) I bought a beautiful '32 US Caramel Lazzeri from him. I paid good money for it ( I forget but around $350 $400) and it was in real good condition ......at least about 4 years ago that was my description....today I would say EX-MT.........I sent it to PSA and it came back trimmed....after a month or so Dick said that I needed to send it to SGC also to see what they said....I did and it came back trimmed again (duh).....then finally about $45.00, and 3 months later, I got my money back......it was sort of a bummer......Completely different from a Foutz- Mayo I bought from Floridamoment ( Henry) when 3 months after I bought it I went to get it graded and it came back trimmed.....he immediately said send it back and gave me a quick refund....AFTER 3 MONTHS !!!.....and that my friends is the difference between a good and bad seller.....regards all......(BTW, I have taken returns even though I say I don't in my auctions)...

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Posted By: scott (runscott)

A bad seller looks for any excuse to avoid being inconvenienced by the buyer, and also for any excuse to suck an extra penny out of them. Example: Steve Verkman charging me $20 for s&h on an item. All he did was wrap a piece of cardboard around the two pictures - I opened it by sliding my fingernail across the tape at the top and pulling both photos out! Then he had the nerve to send me an auction catl'g!!! But here's where he loses: I read the catl'g, drooled over about 8 items I would normally have bid on, then threw it in the trash. (Was it worth an extra $15 s&h extortion?)

A good seller does whatever it takes (within reason) to keep his buyers coming back. Example: Mastro sends me provenance to support an item I bought from them one month earlier - I never asked for it, but they sent it as an extra.

Fortunately the good examples FAR exceed the examples of bad sellers: Cy Petras packs like you wouldn't believe - incredible! It doesn't really protect my cards any better than my own packing, but you can see his intent and it makes you come back. Bob McCann has never charged me insurance and every card comes in a box much larger (usually) than necessary. Again, it doesn't add that much but he is definitely a preferred seller in my opinion.

And the feedback thing...Sorry, but customer-oriented sellers leave feedback as soon as they receive payment. This does two things: it lets the customer know you have received payment and it "softens them up",i.e-the rest of the transaction will be smoother for you and they are more likely to ignore little problems and leave you good feedback. I have occasionally received a crappily-packed item, which of course chaps my A**, but when I see their glowing feedback about my lightning-fast payment and how friendly I am, what can I do? (answer: leave good feedback and move on).

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Posted By: Brian C Daniels

who would he have flipped off in his day?
I need icons!

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Posted By: Bruce Moreland

I disagree that feedback needs to be left at point of payment, but that's a different topic.

I agree with you that any auction seller who doesn't keep his bidders happy is an idiot.

If you sell for fixed prices, having a good customer doesn't always end up being that big a deal. If you have finite stock, and more buyers than you can service with that stock, adding more buyers won't help you. Even if you have infinite stock, the amount you make from each buyer can never be more than some percentage of what they spend on your stuff. Meaning, that if someone walks in with $100, you make $100 minus your total costs.

If you sell via auctions, a happy customer can be a tremendous asset. Every item he wins is an item that you made more money on than you would have otherwise.

Furthermore, for every item he's the underbidder on (and this can be a huge number of items), he has the same effect, even though he saves his money and can bid on another of your items.

I think about this sometimes when I bid $75 on an item and lose, when the third-place bidder has bid $25.

bruce

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Posted By: Julie Vognar

is flipping the bird in his N173, hands at waist, and also in a photograph, sitting with the Beaneaters and the Newyorks.

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Posted By: Bruce Moreland

I got an email back from Safe Harbor, explaining that there's nothing they can do about this, as there is not enough evidence.

bruce

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Posted By: warshawlaw

It is compelling and is clearly a case of shill bidding. There were five such incidents in the last week alone from BRSZ and nsports. I am writing an article which I hope VCBC will print on this matter. Please email me the ebay response you received; they might as well make it into the article too. warshawlaw@aol.com

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Posted By: jay behrens

Why not see if Mr Lemke is would be interested in such an article. You have to 'change the names to protect the innocent', LOL, but it would be nice to see eBay get hammered in something that is widely read by a lot of eBay users.

And just how did they dertermine there wasn't enough evidence? Did they even bother to actually check? At the very least there is enough evidence provided by the people of this board that all accounts involved should be suspended for 30 days or more. And I am sure this would lead to the creation of BRSZ-3

Jay

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Posted By: leon

just reported him to Safe Harbor.....I got an immediate response saying it was already under investigation and do I still want to report it?.....what do ya'll think I did?.....regards all...(this guy is a huge criminal)...BCD- I thought he (Rick) turned religious now?

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Posted By: warshawlaw

brsz-2 has gone to private auctions with its newly listed auctions since this matter went up on this board and the complaints started raining in on ebay:

1844670593Jul-17-02Jul-24-02 12:28:27$35.99Byron Nelson autographed signed 8x10 photo Private (*)
1550659925Jul-18-02Jul-25-02 13:56:07$44.601951 Marilyn Monroe MAKE IT LEGAL one sheet Private
1844670537Jul-17-02Jul-27-02 12:28:13$133.06Joe DiMaggio autographed signed Yankees Check Private
1550441326Jul-17-02Jul-27-02 12:28:40$3.251942 Lou Gehrig / Gary Cooper LOOK Magazine Private
1844670735Jul-17-02Jul-27-02 12:28:54$1.00Joe DiMaggio , Lou Gehrig vintage photo HOF Private
1550441491Jul-17-02Jul-27-02 12:29:08$1.501949 PRIDE OF THE YANKEES vintage photo still Private

I have started digging for my article. There is also a new suspicious bidder in many of the remaining "public" brsz-2 auctions. This bidder has bid on nothing but brsz-2 auctions in hockey, basketball and baseball cards in the last 30 days. All of the items I checked were bid on in the same pattern as the nsports shill, namely, a max bid was registered around 5-6 hours before the close, taking out legitimate bidders otherwise. Interestingly, there has been no feedback on any of these transactions so far, despite the fact that they closed on the 19th. I checked this bidder's email address and it comes back as having a residence in Gainesville, Florida. I don't know where this is in relation to BRSZ's location, nor do I know if this is a legitimate bidder or not, but the pattern is awfully close to that of the nsports pattern that got brsz-2 into hot water, before brsz-2 went private.

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Posted By: leon

When I had my only dilemna with this guy, about 3 years ago, he had just recently (and supposedly was still organizing his cards) moved to Florida....my guess is that there IS a relation to the bidder in Florida.....regards

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Posted By: rmacpa

the distance between gainesville florida and alachua florida is approximately 15 miles. both are in alachua county and residents consider alachua (the city) to be a suburb of gainesville.

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Posted By: chops*buster

http://www.msnbc.com/news/818257.asp