1971 Pirates Sunday Autograph Photo Clemente card question. Help needed with PSA

[71buc]

Sorry for the late response. The 4X5 photos you shared are a bit of a mystery. Nonetheless I’ll share my thoughts and opinions based on my experiences collecting them.

I believe that the 4X5 portraits that have the text aligned to the far left are a 1971 issue. I believe this to be true as I have all of the team issued 8x10 player publicity photos using these same images. Although they are undated I do have a few that have editorial markings on the back indicating they were used in the production of the 1971 Orioles World Series program. Also September call ups Richie Zisk and Lorenzo Lanier appear in the 8X10 size. The Zisk photo features him wearing #10. He only wore this number for the 6 games between 9/8/71 and 9/23/71. He changed to #22 when Frank Tavares joined the team on 9/25/71. Lorenzo Lanier only appeared in four September games before returning to the minor leagues. Those were his only 4 games in his MLB career. Neither Zisk or Lanier appear in the 4X5 versions of these photos. It would make sense that neither player would have been featured on a Sunday autograph cards due to their late season call ups.

The following year Zisk does appear wearing #22 with a 4X5 photo that has the text centered in the lower margin. A number of the portraits used in the 1971 8X10s also appear once again in the 1972 4X5 photos with the centered text. The Joe Morgan with the centered text you shared also supports my 1972 theory as he was only a Bucs coach in 1972. He returned to the minors in 1973 when Mazeroski retired and was named the infield coach in 1973.

The 1971 4X5s do appear in a variety of paper stocks. The 1971 color autograph cards can also be found in printed on a variety of paper stocks. I attribute this to a belief that they were produced multiple times throughout the season as the need arose.

The 1971 Action cards on the slick magazine paper are undoubtedly a 1971 product. Their 4X5 counterparts on card stock I suspect were also issued as Sunday Autograph cards. The paper stocks of the 1971 Action photos wouldn’t be a good medium for autographs. I don’t have much to support that assumption other than my experience in collecting them. I have encountered many more signed copies of those than unsigned copies. They are also more difficult to find than the 1971 4x5 portraits.

I hope this helps.