Opinions welcomed and requested on the number of t206 Cobbs in existence.

[jbbama]

I realize this is a rather vague question given all the variations out there. However, i would like the learned opinions of some of our knowledgeable members. Given the Green portrait Cobb sells for more than the others (grades being equal) naturally i assume this issue has fewer examples available. Really any general guesses/estimates of the numbers (graded/raw) of each of the four Cobbs is appreciated. I really have no clue............

Thanks,JB

[tedzan]

Data from years of T206 surveys show the following availability of the four Cobb's in this set......

Normalizing the data to "100" for the Red Cobb, the relative numbers for the other three are......

Red Cobb....100........(found with 24 diff. T-backs)

Bat Off........55.........(found with 18 diff. T-backs)

Bat On.........48.........(found with 8 diff. T-backs)

Green..........42.........(found with 8 diff. T-backs)


How many of these Cobb's are actually in circulation is virtually impossible to account for.


TED Z

[T206Collector]

Originally Posted by tedzan

How many of these Cobb's are actually in circulation is virtually impossible to account for.

I believe Scot Reader's Inside T206 has population estimates -- or at least the tools for a population estimate.

[tedzan]

Scot Reader's excellent book...."Inside T206" (Centennial Edition)....discusses the general "Survivability"
of the T206's and provides availability numbers of the "Big Six" cards.

I do not find any specific numbers on any of the four Cobb cards.


TED Z

[jbbama]

Thanks guys............it would be tough to know the amount of raw cards still out there, however , i could get an idea of some numbers by accounting for the graded issues of each Cobb from (PSA, SGC,BVG). Just a thought?

[T206Collector]

That is what I was talking about. From Scot Reader's book:

Thus, if one assumes that roughly 200 of each of these rare subjects remain in existence, and further assumes that survival rates for these subjects conform with those of other subjects, the surviving quantity of a typical 350-only subject is somewhere in the neighborhood of 3,000. Finally, assuming for the sake of rough-and-ready calculation uniformity of survival among series, the total number of T206 specimens in existence today is estimable in the general vicinity of 1.6 million. Of course, if there are 400 examples each of Demmitt (St. Louis) and O.Hara (St. Louis) extant instead of 200, the presumed number of T206 cards with us today doubles to 3.2 million, or about 6,000 per subject on average, under this same analysis.

In any case, of the likely hundreds of millions of specimens initially produced, it seems highly probable that the number of T206 cards in existence today is in the low singledigit millions, or a few thousand for a typical subject. This is quite possibly less than one percent of the original production, with the vast majority of these survivors being in lower grade.


If Red Cobb's were double-printed, you'd be at about 10,000 for those. And then you could deduce from relative scarcity how many of the others might be there. Again, this is all rife speculation, but I like his analysis.

You can read the whole darn thing here (and yes, it takes into account relative numbers of cards graded by PSA, etc.):

http://www.oldcardboard.com/t/t206/I...-3-edition.pdf

[barrysloate]

12,000 seems high...I'll guess half that number, or 6000. It is based on nothing scientific.