Finally found an e98 printing variation - Black and White e98s.....

[Tim Kindler]

Brian, would love to see them in person someday to truly make up my mind on which way I truly think these cards are- A printing goof or faded. I agree with a few others that they aren't true black and white proofs like the E97 Black and Whites, but I could go along with the arguement that they are some sort of "Freak" print where the printing process was not completed at a one of the various stages. I know there have been alot of T206s that look really weird because of the various printing process that have been omitted. I think there was a thread on these some time back and there is a cool example of one of these freak prints in the recent Tough Matty Cards thread. But I'm still not convinced that they aren't just faded, but I can see the other side of the debate. Don't know for sure because I'm certainly not an expert ( Not even close)in printing, paper, ink etc.. Whatever the reason why these are whitish looking, they are really neat cards. Best wishes with building your E98 set. I'm at 79 on my quest towards the Master Set of E98s and they are getting tougher to find and more expensive all of the time, so it is going to be awhile before I reach my goal; heck some of the ones that I need I've never even seen that player/color combination like a Blue Davis for example. Take Care.
Oh, yes that was your Green McGraw at one time. The other two that I have seen are missing the pink on his face as well.

[shammus]

Steve - You made an interesting point on caption fading. I can't say that I've seen too many captions where the print has simply faded so you might have a good point there. I do believe that for these cards to be missing color because they have faded, the amount of "exposure", etc...would be so severe that it's essentially removing all the color under the assumption of course, that the card started off resembling a normal e98. Well this sort of exposure would be making the rest of the photo lighter too...not just removing the color. The main reason I don't think fading has taken place here is because these photos are still dark and have lots of detail. So I'm basically saying the entire card would be affected...not just the color.

Also, Tim is right, you sort of need to see the cards in person. A couple have pinkish hues like the Chase. However the McLean and Davis in particular look completely void of any color.

I think that we're pretty much all agreeing at this point. They're definitely not true black and white cards....rather cards that went through an initial color pass - which was faulty or too light - and then the cards were pulled before other color passes could be made - such as those for skin tones, gloves and clothing. Either way, I think that saying the cards missed some, if not all, their color passes and referring to them as printer's scrap would probably be the most accurate way to describe these cards.

[hammertime]

Alright who snagged the "Cy" Young that popped up on eBay today?