e91 made from real picture - not generic

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Posted By: brian parker

I do not know about the actual photo images used for the E91-A set, but a few years back I researched this set and compared the cards to actual photos of the players, and concluded that at least 2/3 of the cards in the E91-A set have a reasonable facial likeness to the player depicted. In my opinion the E91-A set has always gotten a bum rap and is undervalued because of the generic appellation given to it in the catalogues-- the bodies of the players may not ring true, but for the most part the faces are decent likenesses. To me they are a lot nicer than the caricature-like drawings of some of the strip issues, and in some ways are also nicer than the T201 set, which on many of its cards the artwork on the player's faces is not up to the quality of the other Tobacco issues (examples of this would be the Cobb and Walter Johnson cards--I don't think their essence was quite captured). If American Caramel hadn't issued the second and third series of these cards and repeated the designs with different players, my guess is that this issue would have more collector interest.

Brian