Baseball Player Printing Plate

[bbcard1]

i would bet it was used as a generic piece of baseball player art. Throughout the history of the printed word, there has been large stores of art that is used when you need to do a quick ad or schedule that uses a baseball player, car, housewife, etc. Unfortunately, few of us could draw and the artist was normally three drinks deep into happy hour, hence the need of a repository of generic art.

I have worked in the industry during the transition from hot type to cold type (metal type and graphics set by hand vs. computer generated). I would guess that if it is generic it might be worth $25-50 because of the content. Here's a similar lot of hand tool plates. Of course, baseball content is more popular. If you find it was used in the production of something famous or that the player is an actual person, not a generic image, it could be worth more.