Are these Old Judge cards legit?

[Archive]

Posted By: James Verrill

I feel that the second group of N172's is authentic, as well.

Aside from the cards themselves appearing authentic, a couple of other factors strike me as noteworthy:

- The seller also has Old Judge actress cards listed, which also appear authentic. My feeling is that, when a person is selling a reprint (or reprints) of an Old Judge BASEBALL card (or cards), rarely do they also have Old Judge cards that are non-baseball offered in other auctions. I feel this is because they recognize (on a subconscious level) that - even if authentic - non-baseball Old Judges don't carry the same earning potential (generally speaking, of course). Basically, I just look at this as evidence that supports the N172's are authentic. When a person REALLY acquires a group of old cards, they generally cover the spectrum with regard to value, condition, and often - genre. When a person sells reprints, they tend to try to maximize their return on just a small group (or single example) of known valuable cards. That is because (I feel) they KNOW what they are doing. I call this the Shoeless Joe phenomena. If you are selling a reprint - why sell one of an Old Judge actress card that will maybe get you enough to buy a cup of coffee, when you can just conceal the bidder ID's and try to land a big fish by selling a reprint of a Shoeless Joe card? Anyway - to me, the fact that this seller also lists the actress cards is an indication to me that he/she is not knowingly selling reprints. This does not, of course, mean the cards are NOT reprints (although, as I said, I feel they are authentic), it just (to me) supports the argument the cards are likely real.

- Other cards the seller has listed appear authentic - particularly the Fatima team cards (T200's) which are very difficult (impossible?) to create "real looking" reprints of.

And, as a side - the "J" factor is even more confusing when Julie posts messages as "JV". As you know, "JV" is also my own set of initials. A few times, I have had people email me, thinking it was me (James Verrill) that had posted a thread, when it was actually Julie (Vognar).

Bye for now...

"JV"