What is the origin of Barry Bonds Open.Day ERR?

[RiceBondsMntna2Young]

Hello, I’m new here though I’ve already made a few major purchases on the B/S/T. I was just reading through the NNOF thread and realized that it’s basically all the world’s knowledge of that card assembled into a few pages on this board. And I’m wondering what is known about the Bonds error card: 1987 Donruss Opening Day Barry Bonds #163A ERR J.Ray?

Donruss was printing in Memphis back then?
Was there an east coast bias to this error distribution as well?
Did anyone track down the person who caught the error or made the error?
Were there letters to Beckett about this card too? What did it confirm about where in the print run the error happened?
Has anyone ever seen one get pulled or know someone who did?
How many copies of the error were ultimately made before it got caught?
How many copies are graded? How many remain raw?
How many remain out there in unopened sets?
How many sets were printed and released?
How can you (or a professional grader) distinguish between an authentic example versus a counterfeit?
There’s a collector named bobsbbcards on CU who owned multiple copies of the card in 2010. Does anyone know him or know if he still does?
Anything else known?

Eventually, I want to start a tracker thread on the card to see if I can account for as many of the graded examples as possible, at least. Thanks very much for weighing in if you can!

Alan

[Rich Klein]

I can not answer the letters to Beckett question as I did not get there until 1990 and I'm sure any 1987 correspondence is long gone into the ether.

Rich

[Cliff Bowman]

Originally Posted by RiceBondsMntna2Young

There’s a collector named bobsbbcards on CU who owned multiple copies of the card in 2010. Does anyone know him or know if he still does?

He is here with the same name.

[ALR-bishop]

Bob is always lurking around in some chat board or another

[swarmee]

Why does there have to be an origin? The card company just screwed up and put the wrong guy on the card. Happened a thousand times. Heck, Topps swapped Hank Aaron and Willie Mays back in 1956.
Just because baseball fans knew what Barry Bonds looked like in 1987 doesn't mean some graphic designer in the layout room did.

[nebboy]

Or it could be that card companies know error cards that involve a prospect or star drive sells. And the have for many years been creating error card and collector and speculators eat them up trying to make $$$$.

[swarmee]

LOL; this card was included in a box set, not packs. Cute though.

[HasselhoffsCheeseburger]

Originally Posted by nebboy

Or it could be that card companies know error cards that involve a prospect or star drive sells. And the have for many years been creating error card and collector and speculators eat them up trying to make $$$$.

I think if it was done on purpose they would have done it with one of the hyped rookies, like someone in their Rated Rookie subset.

Arthur

[bobsbbcards]

Originally Posted by RiceBondsMntna2Young

Does anyone know him or know if he still does?

I know him, and he still does.

[magicpapa]

1987 Donruss Opening Day

Barry Bonds error
A card of Barry Bonds showing the picture of his Pirates teammate Johnny Ray was corrected very early in the press run, and supposedly less than two percent of the sets have the error.