Little advice on a Frank Thomas NNOF

[brob28]

Yes PSA has started recognizing GT's they are clearly still learning and miss-identify quite a few that I have seen. Al, I think there are around 14 1990 cards that were affected by the missing black ink, but (as fate would have it) the one that has the most dramatic change is the Thomas card. Most just have a bit of the black outlines missing, none have the player name missing except Thomas (99% sure of that but memory is not what it once was). If you google Thomas NNOF there are some great threads including one where as you pointed out someone has tried to re-create the card placement on the sheet...

BTW - don't stop, this is Variation-Hound fun!

[ALR-bishop]

Not mine. This has been on ebay a long time. It started out at a much higher price

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1990-Topps-K...item19f3e8fab0

[bnorth]

The CU thread is amazing and if anybody has interest in these cards it is worth finding and reading.

I do not remember the dealers name anymore but back in the mid/late 90's I was offered the color progressive proofs for the Thomas NNOF error. They wanted $15,000 each for them so I passed.

If I read his name again it would probably come back to me. I remember he was one of the biggest error dealers at the time and had prices several times what everyone else wanted for the same exact error cards.

[Tobacco&Gum]

Edit, just reread the thread and found the answer to my question.

Also, I think it would be cool to have a Thomas NNOF autographed where the name should be. Just a random thought.

[ALR-bishop]

Ben--that is fascinating about the proofs. That would seem to indicate the error was there from the get go and could or should have been caught before the first print runs started... no ?

Steve -- you are my printer expert ?

[brob28]

In one of the threads I read a theory that there was a stray piece of cardstock that became stuck in the printer and covered up these sections of the card during the black run and either dislodged itself or was discovered and removed. I know very little about the printing process so I'd be curious if the printing experts think the theory holds water?

Out of curiosity I checked the population reports: PSA - 164 graded, SGC - 4 graded. Not too many.

[bnorth]

Originally Posted by ALR-bishop

Ben--that is fascinating about the proofs. That would seem to indicate the error was there from the get go and could or should have been caught before the first print runs started... no ?

Steve -- you are my printer expert ?

I am not a print expert but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express once.

Proofs like variations have different meaning to different people. I never got pictures of the "Proofs" because of the price. I only found out about them because seller was trying to low ball be on around 500 different only known wrong back error pairs I had.

I would guess they were blank backs with finished fronts because only the black ink is missing not the black from blue, red, and yellow printed over each other to make black. So there would be no difference in the color progressive proofs till the final black stage of printing.

Some useless info. In that era Topps sold its scrap errors and misprints directly to dealers. From my understanding this was very common in the industry. Score in my understanding was the only company not to do this at least once in a while. I know Score did not and was asked by several dealers and myself on a regular basis to do it. I had several friends that worked for Score and they were serious about scrap being destroyed.

[ALR-bishop]

So they may have"just" been blank bank proofs of the regular card before any blank ink was used ?