are m116 "300 subjects" backs more valuable?

[Archive]

Posted By: sean

Is there some kind of way of deciphering worth on the 300 subjects backs on sporting life m116 cards?

[Archive]

Posted By: Mark T

The "Over 300 subjects" back is considered the (SS) Scarce Series. As far as i know, they were printed near the end of the season so they are less likely to be found. Also, to be found it NM/M shape is rare.

I would love to know what % are found with the "Over 300 subjects" back...

Edited to say: I have seen the (SS) back sell for 2-3 X common back.

[Archive]

Posted By: sean

Sent ya an email mark! thanks for the response. one more question:
Is it possible to have a pastel m116 and not be able to tell for sure due to condition problems?

[Archive]

Posted By: Bob

The pastel front images are very distinctive from the blue front images and are easily recognizable. There ahouldn't be any problem there.
As far as the 300 subject back question- it is a bit more complicated than that. Generally you are ok with saying that the "high number series cards" (last issued) have the 300 series backs and are therefore tougher to find and more valuable. The problem is apparently the Sporting Life went back and reissued some of the stars of the day and when they did, they used the 300 series backs on them so you find cards of guys like Brown and Matty with both 300 series backs (very rare) and the regular backs. We are talking pastels here. (We won't even get in to the black ink and blue ink backs in one of the series of issued M116s, that's a different subject for another day.
tbob

[Archive]

Posted By: sean

well this all came up cause I picked up a frank chance 300 back completely unaware it was a 300 back.

[Archive]

Posted By: Mark T

I have seen a Cobb and Wagner with the Scarce back.


The Blue back is distinctive but i do see a few that have faded, Jorge P. has a Bender that is Blue background but has faded and can be mistaken for a pastel. PSA has labeled a few M116 cards Blue backgrounds which are probably Pastel.


Sean, i would love to see a scan of the Chance.

[Archive]

Posted By: Mark L

I've heard it said that cards of some stars players were issued in great number with 300 backs. I sure wish that Tim Newcomb and TBob would publish their work on the set.

[Archive]

Posted By: sean

[Archive]

Posted By: Bob

One thing which causes confusion (especially to PSA when they grade them) is the term "blue back." Some collectors take this to mean the blue background cards and others believe this means the color of the printing on the back. This has caused a lot of mislabeled cards to be floating a round the hobby, especially in PSA holders because PSA has a hard time getting this right.
The M116s may be divided in to two categories: pastel backgrounds and blue backgrounds. The blue backgrounds are solid and refer to just that- the backgrounds (on the front) which surround the player's picture. Now, on the pastels, there is a series in which the printer used black ink on the back although almost all M116s have the blue ink-printed backs. Off the top of my head, you have cards like Tinker, Young, Devlin, Rucker, etc. which have the variation of having BOTH blue ink backs and black ink backs. (The Young card also has another variation because the picture of Cy was cropped differently on one of his cards and so you have the big head and little head variations. No jokes here please )
Most collectors have always assumed that the black ink print variations are the scarcer of the two but recent statistics tend to show it is the other way around: that on those handful of cards which exist with BOTH black and blue ink backs, the blue ink backs are the tougher, although you rarely see the price premium on them at auction because of so much misinformation and I suppose because very few of us actually collected both blue and black ink variations in trying to complete the master set.
This is all probably clear as mud but at least you won't have to shake your head in disbelief the next time you see an M116 encapsulated in a PSA holder which says "blue background" and the card is clearly a pastel with the back printed in blue ink. I have cracked a number of these out and submitted them to SGC or GAI.