OT: HBO's Real Sports - A Must See Episode

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Posted By: Daniel Bretta

Just got through watching the new episode of Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel and they had a story on about the sports memorabilia industry. It dealt with autographed items and the forgery ring that got busted a few years back that was getting all of their stuff authenticated by Donald Frangipani. They took a hidden camera to Frangipani's business and showed him 7 different forged items and he gave every single one of them a COA....They went back later and showed him that he got every single one of them wrong.

The best thing about the show was that our own Richard Simon and GAI were the only authenticators who were 100% spot on in their authenticating. They both rejected all 16 items sent to them. I can't remember how many different authenticating companies they sent items too, but most of them gave COA's on the forged stuff.

Another item of interest in the show was that Upper Deck autograph card that had Walter Johnson, Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb and ??? (Can't remember the fourth name) which sold for $85,000 on ebay has forged signatures of Ruth and Johnson according to Richard Simon, GAI and PSA/DNA.....One of the guys who was associated with the forgery ring is certain that the Ruth signature was done by his forger.

Well worth watching and if you get the West Coast HBO feed then you should be able to see this episode again tonight.

Edited to change Topps to Upper Deck.