t206 Blank Back vs Printers Scrap

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Posted By: davidcycleback

Assuming it hasn't been skinned, a blank backed card is a card that has a blank back. It's a literal and self-explanatory term.

A scrap was a printer's mistake, the sheet tossed away. The singles were later handcut off the sheet by a worker, worker's kid or whomever. As they were mistakes, the usually have printing mistakes-- ghosts, bad alignment, other. Most scraps have tobacco ads on back. Scraps never made it to the inside of tobacco boxes, so were unissued. As the printing mistakes can be wild and even psychedelic, some get a premium as oddities. Some scaps are oversized.

Presumably, there were factory cut blank backs that no one noticed and got into the packs. It was possible to find blank backed Topps cards in gum packs also. When you're making and packaging that many cards, mistakes slip through.

Many card collectors differentiate between issued trading cards and production items-- proofs, scraps, original art, etc. This is why a collector may differentiate between a factory cut blank back and a scrap blank back, and prefer the one that was sold inside a pack of cigarettes. Most baseball card collectors focus, which is not to say focus exclusively, on the final product given to the public. Though as T206 proofs, unusual scraps and uncut sheets sometimes show us, production items can fetch good money.

I believe all T206 blank backs are tough and examples in any form will have good demand. Blank backed 1989 Topps, on the other hand, garners little demand.