Mastro and FBI

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Posted By: Marc S.

<<It was part of their live auction at the National. Refresh your screen a few times, and you'll see that Leon still has one of the banner ads for the auction up and in rotation (it's on my screen now as I type this). Click through it, and you'll find the shirt. >>

each time you click through, this site makes more money from Mastro. It's a function of a) people seeing the ads (CPM) and b) the click-through rate (CTR)

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Posted By: Sean C

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Posted By: Aaron M.

leon, come on. You are smarter than that.

Did Doug not see the e-mail that the Gameused forum's administrator sent him?

Did Doug not see the threads on this forum and on the Game used forum openly discussing the shirt several days before the actual auction?

Did no-one at Mastro alert Doug to the MEARS letter and/or to these threads and/or to efforts to contact Mastro about the shirt?

At minimum, this indicates: (1) a shocking lack of over sight over what was a very small auction (just 80-somthing items), (2) a shocking lack of checks and balances within Mastro's authentication system, and (3) and a shocking willingness within Mastro to list an item that had been strongly discredited by an authentication service not known for standing up to Mastro. (Or are you willing to go so far as to assert that no-one at Mastro ever read the MEARS letter or was aware of the discussions threads or e-mails?)

I complained about not receiving photos of a set of cards in a Mastro auction earlier this year on this site and within hours was called by a very apologetic Mastro employee and had the photos sent to me.

You're telling me two forums discussing a $10,000 shirt that was carrying a questionable LOA that was about to sell in Mastro's inaugural live auction just slipped under the radar?

Uch, leon, come on.

In this instance Mastro screwed up (perhaps fraudulently, perhaps simple bad management). And they owe the collecting community a forthcoming explanation and an apology and publicly stated new measures to ensure that this doesn't happen again (like either declining to sell items that their authenticators have been unable to authenticate or at least disclosing such in an item's description).

Simply voiding the sale for the deceived buyer is not nearly enough, because it doesn't address everything that went wrong before Allen voided the sale.

As to your belief that O'Keefe has a vendetta against Mastro as fact, by the same token posters can just as credibly assert as fact that you are an apologist for Mastro, hopelessly biased because of personal and financial reasons. I'm not saying either stament is true. Just that the neither statement is any more a "fact" than the other.

And again, I don't care if O'Keefe is biased. I think what you see as a "vendetta" is his belief that there's a story at Mastro and he wants to be the reporter who blows the lid off it. And like I said in my earlier post: more power to him. His applying heat to Mastro is in our best interests (this article is yet another example because it shed light on Mastro's authentication process and an obvious breakdown in ethical judgment), so have at it.

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Posted By: Aaron M.

Joann, that was a very thoughtful response, but I would again have to repeat: O'Keefe's bias (whether it exists or not) is irrelevant to the collecting community.

Take the Mastro name out for a second and think about the consequences of his stories even in a biased light:

At worse, he is sensationalistic in shedding light on some of the misdeeds of the major auction house in our collecting field, which benefits us by bringing more information to the table and applying public pressure on that auction house to act more honestly.

And at best, he is on the cusp of a major story involving corporate and consumer fraud, which also benefits us by leading the charge and keeping us updated as to a possible criminal investigation into that major auction house.

I just don't see a down side to O'Keefe's articles. Biased or not, his articles help collectors.

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Posted By: JimCrandell

Leon,

Why not put it up to a vote of Net54 members--now or if new evidence surfaces.

Should Net54 stop accepting advertisements from Mastro Auctions?

Jim

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Posted By: Chris

I think it would be interesting to know the story behind Mastro voiding the sale. Did they do it because the buyer saw these posts and demanded it?

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Posted By: Jay

Jim--With all due respect, the board is not a cooperative. Leon owns the board and the revenues that he takes in from banner ads in some very small way compensate him for his time, effort and expenses. It is not your choice or my choice to decide who should be allowed to post ads-it is Leon's. That being said I support Mastro and hope that he decides to keep their ad.

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Posted By: Dan Paradis

Very simply put:

1. They either knew the jersey was a fake and sold it anyway
or
2. They didn't do the proper research and let a fake slip through the cracks

Both produce the same results (the buyer gets screwed) and both are UNACCEPTABLE!!

I'm not impressed with MASTRO refunding the $$ (just as I wouldn't be impressed with a bank robber offering to return the $$ to the bank after they got caught to avoid prosecution). MASTRO had no other choice.

Now if there are instances in the past where MASTRO discovered an item was fake after an auction ended, notified the buyer and refunded $$ without any pressure from any outside party that may help their credibility (or even hurt it more depending on how you look at it).

I don't trust any autographs, game used bats, shirts, etc. I don't care who authenticated them!!

Just my 2 cents.

Dan

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Posted By: JK

I for one also find it difficult to believe that the company was not aware of the questions surrounding this jersey in time to pull it from the auction. Call me a skeptic, but I wondered whether the sale of the Jordan jersey may have been cancelled for ulterior reasons. While I dont collect memorabilia, and dont know this for sure, but I would have thought that an unquestioned Jordan jersey would have sold for far more than the 11k this one sold for. If so, I wonder if the cancellation had more to do with the price realized than it did with the item's authenticity.

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Posted By: martindl

O'Keeffe clearly has an anti-Mastro bias, but has been said, that shouldn't matter as long as what he writes are facts. The facts are pretty damning.

Any memorabilia item with a Lou Lampson letter is considered to be suspect by most in the memorabilia collecting community and has been for quite a while. That doesn't mean that every item is not what it purports to be, but many, many people will just skip any item with a Lampson letter. This is akin to Mastro offering up PRO authenticated cards - people here would seriously question the legitimacy of any card offered and likely the overall auction. Ignoring the fact that people were waving the red flag on this Jordan item before the auction went off, why Mastro continues to align itself with Lampson is a mystery.

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Posted By: leon

I stated what I stated on purpose full well and knowing that what I was doing was overboard in the OPPOSITE direction of O'keefe. I did it for that very reason. He is so one sided that I wanted my statement to be that way too. That was probably a mistake on my part. The auctioning of this jersey was a mistake on their part. Their mistake was corrected. I still get to deal with mine ......

Jay M is correct...this is not a cooperative and the time I put into this board vis a vis the little bit of banner ad revenue I get from it is almost negligible. It is not even a question in my mind as to "allowing" Mastro to advertise if they so desire. I hope they will continue forever. For the record I also don't mind O'keefe and internet forums being watch dogs for the hobby. If they make it a safer place then that is all the better

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

None of this adds up Leon, and the fact that they continue to make "mistakes" like this when you don't see REA or Leland's making these monumental mistakes on a regular basis tells you something. Their own guys (MEARS) gave this jersey the thumbs down and they went with the guy who will authenticate anything...the same guy who was mixed up in their last debacle with the football helmet. (which still has never been explained satisfactorily)

Mastro's excuses are starting to sound like my six year olds excuses when he gets in trouble. What's their excuse going to be next??? "My dog ate the COA".

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Posted By: JimCrandell

Jay and Leon,

I know it is Leon's decision.

I just thought with all the recent negative stuff regarding Mastro Auctions that if Leon did not want to ban them as an advertiser because of a personal relationship then a way out for him would be to put it to a vote of the board. My humble opinion but saying that one hopes they advertise forever no matter what the evidence turns out to be is not the right answer.

Jim

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Posted By: David Davis

Leland's may not have made mistakes, but they have put up questionable items, such as pieces of the plane Roberto Clemente crashed in.

I feel it is Leon's board to run, and he is entitled to his opinion. I think his integrity does not need to be questioned, and while I can't speak for him, I would bet that his opinion in this situation would be the same, even if there were no banner ads.

While some people seem to have it in for Mastro, there are a few who seem to have it in for Leon. If you don't like the banner ads, or his implied defense of Mastro, you can start your own board; oh wait, that's been done already.

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Posted By: Jimmy

This is the last thing I wanted to here again, but its news to talk about. Anyways Mastro really needs to start selling what may be questionable such as game used items. They really need to get back on track or they will lose good customers.

Jimmy

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Posted By: Mike

Do we know who owned the shirt? Maybe Mastro Auctions was the consignor.

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Posted By: Corey R. Shanus

The item in question amounts to approximately 0.25% of the gross of the auction, truly a de minimus amount. It would be beyond imbecilic for a profit-maximizing auction house to consciously misrepresent such an item, the ramifications of which could materially impact the future profitability of the company. That's not to say it can't happen, or that companies don't do stupid things. But between choosing between that scenario or an alternative one (i.e., oversight in need of improvement) that does not involve intent to defraud, I would choose the latter. As to the point that the auction in question had only 80 or so lots, I am certain Mastro Auctions at the time the authenticity issue came up was also dealing with the thousands of lots to appear in its other upcoming auctions.

Presumably the company will have learned from this episode and will going forward implement better oversight procedures.

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Posted By: Tom Boblitt

on this one. Hopefully they will rectify the situation going forward. I don't know how anyone can realistically collect game used jerseys, bats, gloves, etc, etc given the amount of mistakes that we've seen. I remember Billy Crystal or someone buying a glove of Mantle's that turned out to be completely represented (not by Mastro either!). There have been multiple issues with things like that in the hobby. Also, the supposed EXPERTS are really just people who've handled hundreds or thousands of items during their long career. While that makes them experts to a certain extent, I don't see how someone can say that without question a certain player wore, used, etc an item unless the provenance is just so overwhelming that an EXPERT really isn't needed to begin with.....

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Posted By: Aaron M.

I don't think leon should stop accepting ads from Mastro -- that's akin to making a final judgment on them and agreeing with those that believe Mastro is up to no good. We aren't in a position yet to do either.

Until (and if) the FBI formally charges Mastro with some sort of criminal charges, I don't think any of us needs to do more than make their own judgment as to whether or not they as individuals wish to continue to do business with Mastro and even then, it's still up to each person (although you would have to be pretty foolish to continue to do business with Mastro at that stage).

I have had nothing but positive experiences with Mastro (as far as I know). They have solid customer service and terrific material and they are reliable. But that doesn't make me any less inclined to want to know if they are up to something (hence my appreciation of O'Keefe's articles) or look at how they handled the Jordan jersey and think that it was a major (and easily avoidable) screw-up.

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Posted By: Aaron M.

Thanks for clarifying that leon -- you had me worried! But I don't think you need to "editorialize" in that manner in order to even things out. Bruce ("We") Dorskind just linked a very positive article about Mastro from USA Today a couple days ago. That allows for balanced representation of Mastro from the media in general (and not just O'Keefe) that doesn't require any of the board's posters to appear like a "sucker".

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Posted By: leon

I couldn't agree with you more. It just pisses me off so much I do stuff that I eventually regret..I am sure most board members have done the same thing before......I don't regret taking up for a company that hasn't been found guilty of anything but I regret the way I did it. I am going to try to stay out of threads from now on when they concern an advertiser. No promises but I am going to try. Thanks for your understanding... I do hope that Mastro has learned from this experience but quite honestly, with game used equipment and memorabilia the way it is, I bet something happens again...If any advertiser is found criminally guilty of something we can debate their banner at that time....Actually it can be debated anytime, as it was in this thread, but I am probably not going to do anything about it.....This needs to remain as open a forum as possible and I hope everyone can see that it is that way....best regards

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Posted By: JimB

Jim Crandall,
Are you personally boycotting all future Mastro auctions, no matter what card comes up that you may need? If so, then I appreciate your conviction. If not, then why would you ask Leon to do so?
JimB

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Posted By: barrysloate

Leon- because you are the forum owner we all hold you to a higher standard, and some of the opinions shared by board members are more allowable than those of a moderator.

A jury is expected to render a verdict of guilty or not guilty; a judge is not supposed render any opinion at all. His role is just to make sure everybody follows the law.

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Posted By: PAS

Your reasoning, interestingly, parallels that of the US Supreme Court in a recent securities fraud case: you must consider the competing plausible non-fraudulent inference as well as the fraudulent inference.

I REALLY doubt anyone tried to commit fraud here. Doug surely understands the issues with memorabilia and obviously is aware of the scrutiny to which Mastro is subject in the media, on chatboards, and so forth. Absent anything more compelling I would go with the inference there was some sloppiness here and miscommunication but not attempted fraud.

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Posted By: Cobby33

REA really auctioned-off pieces of Clemente's ill-fated plane? If that's true, that is purely disgusting.

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Posted By: leon

Lelands did that a few years ago, not REA, and I believe they pulled the auction lot(s) before close of auction....

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Posted By: Cobby33

L- Thanks for the clarification.

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Posted By: JimCrandell

JimB,

I am not participating in the next Mastro Auction and I did not participate in the last one. As long as I am not happy about the way they conduct themselves I will not participate in their auctions--and I have spent a lot of money with Mastro over the years.

For the first time ever they took my name off their mail list.

Thanks for your appreciation.

Jim

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Posted By: PAS

I am not sure I agree with your judgment about Mastro, but I admire a man who follows through on his convictions and doesn't try to have his cake and eat it too.

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Posted By: jay behrens

I have to chuckle when I read people saying that hopefully Mastro will learn from this mistake. Mastro has been around way too long to be making mistakes like this.

Jay

The richest person is not the one who has the most, but the one who needs the least.

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Posted By: JimCrandell

Peter,

Doug Allen has admitted to taking creases out of cards to prepare them for grading.
That in my book is plain and simple card alteration...and it is unacceptable.

I think my new friend Dan Bretta said recently that all this stuff about Mastro won't matter because at the end of the day collectors will still buy if they see a card they need. Well I for one won't--and I know others who have told me they won't as well.

Jim

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Posted By: leon

Just for a little edification I did personally ask Doug about his policy, for his company, as it pertained to removing wrinkles or creases. I know I have changed my view on them as it's too gray of an area. He told me that it wasn't worth the grief and that he no longer has his staff remove wrinkles or creases from cards. This was right before he got up and spoke at the Net54 Dinner at this last National. I sort of wanted to know since I figured the question would be asked. It wasn't.....Whether you bid in Mastro Auctions or not is obviously up to you. I know I put in extra bids last night just for general principle. Somehow I still don't think I will get any steals.....If you ask why Doug wouldn't come onto the forum again I think the answer is obvious. I am sure anything I say here will be taken to task by Jay B...but I know it's coming so what the heck...Again, just wanted to shed some light on that one fact...I will try to keep my nose out of these threads for the most part...best regards

edited grammar...but it still ain't so good..

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Posted By: P Spaeth

My recollection also was that Doug said he would not do it any more after it was pointed out PSA officially considers that alteration. Of course if it can't be detected there is no way to know he isn't still doing it, but I believe he did say the policy had changed.

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Posted By: P Spaeth

So Jay your theory is that Mastro tried to commit intentional fraud with respect to the North Carolina jersey?

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Posted By: barrysloate

Jim- in January Doug was your invited guest when we all met in your office. It's about six months later and Mastro Auctions has removed your name from their mailing list.

That's a precipitous fall in a short period of time.

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Posted By: jay behrens

Peter, I have no idea if the Mastro blunder was intentional or not. My point is that this sort thing shouldn't happen to one of oldest auction houses in the hobby. If it was an honest mistake by Mastro, it doesn't speak well to their competence to be selling this sort of stuff. If it was deliberate, then we are all in trouble.

Jay

The richest person is not the one who has the most, but the one who needs the least.

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Posted By: Jeff Lichtman

Will Mastro continue to sell game used items authenticated by the consignors without disclosing this relationship?

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Posted By: Tom Boblitt

I agree that it's good you don't bid if you state you have concerns and I think that's admirable.

BUT.....do any of the guys or other dealers you buy from buy from Mastro? If so, you would be buying PSA stuff from them. I'd bet that MANY of the people you might otherwise buy from buy from Mastro. Kinda hard not to I guess if you're in the business--especially for high graded cards.

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Posted By: JimCrandell

Leon,

I asked him a number of times to clarify his remarks about what he would do and would not do to cards. He refused to.

Barry--sometimes you gotta take a stand for whats right.

Jim

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Posted By: JimCrandell

Tom,

Mastro is not the only dealer I won't buy from.

I pretty much would not buy any expensive(over $5,000 graded card) unless it was looked at by Kevin or perhaps SGC.

I gave a lot of graders the chance to elaborate on their policies on Net 54--most refused to do so--people can draw their own conclusions--mine were negative.

Jim

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Posted By: Gilbert Maines

We all make mistakes. I know that I sure do.
But some things I do not make mistakes on because the subject is important. some of these subjects include driving at 65 mph, others are work related, some are payment related (such as taxes), and others are personal (I again remembered our wedding anniversary - whew).

At this stage of the game, I find it difficult to believe that Mastro has holes in their communication network. Authentication is a key element in what they do. It is extremely high on the "must not err" list. I find it very, very difficult to accept that this error is possible.

Its like Ford saying "what? you wanted tires that don't explode? Nobody specified that". Well ... going foward we will be sure to include that value added feature. Spare me the cliches, neither of us were born yesterday.

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Posted By: PS

Jay I don't disagree with you that there is no excuse for that kind of carelessness, I am just hard pressed to believe there is any motive to have tried to defraud anyone.

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Posted By: peter chao

I agree with you. Mastro probably has dozens of items in their warehouse that are more valuable, why would they want to defraud somebody on a Michael Jordan shirt? All I can say is that they have a problem with their quality control. That being said, they need to get their act together or their customers will go elsewhere.

Peter C.

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

Where are the customers going to go Peter? I still think Mastro can continue to make "mistakes" like this and get away with it because of the nature of the market. They have it and nobody else does which means people for the most part are going to continue to do business with them. I like to think of myself as principled, but if they come up with a rare Nebraska related baseball item that I "need" I'm probably going to bid on it.

At the moment I tend to believe that this was not a mistake...I'm not saying that they knew it wasn't Jordan's jersey, but I think they had a good amount of reasonable doubt and still put it up for auction.

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Posted By: jay behrens

Pete, money is a great motivating force and makes people do things they would otherwise not do. Also, any game used Jordan item is something of a coup and a highlight in any auction regardless how much or how little it is worth. If they can cover up a questionable report and get the item sold for maximum $$$ without getting caught, then they've just put a nice chunk of coin in their pocket. If they get caught, as here, they say oops, come up with a plausible deniability story and void the sale to try and make themselves look like good guys.

Jay

The richest person is not the one who has the most, but the one who needs the least.

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Posted By: dan mckee

In Leon's defense, when I posted the problem I had about the T207s having paperloss and that the backs were not pictured and no paperloss mentioned, Leon allowed the post to stay up when it technically violated the rules. I like and agree with Jeff most of the time, but Leon will also take the defensive against Mastronet or anyone else when he feels they are wrong or negligent. Doug Allen is a true class act and has an excellent staff. I am game worn and game used ignorant but agree that Mastronet acted as best they could here. But then again, I have been shredded on here before! Dan.

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Posted By: Chris

Let's assume the Jordan jersey was an honest mistake. Why did they let the Darrell Griffith jersey run when it was obvious it wasn't real?

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Posted By: cmoking

Dan McKee wrote: "In Leon's defense, when I posted the problem I had about the T207s having paperloss and that the backs were not pictured and no paperloss mentioned, Leon allowed the post to stay up when it technically violated the rules."

I vaguely remember that thread, but I don't remember that you technically violated the rules. Which rule did you technically violate?

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Posted By: Corey R. Shanus

While the purpose of this post is not to defend Mastro's actions, I'm trying to see the distinction between their actions here and the actions of shopping a card around among the different grading companies and failing to disclose if the card had ever been rejected as altered (or if not altered been given a lower grade). My understanding is that this kind of "card shopping without disclosure" is routinely done by the great majority of auction houses, and I dare say with the full blessing of their consignors. I'm also struggling to see the ethical distinction between what happened with the Jordan shirt and the actions of collectors/dealers/auction houses to consign or sell slabbed cards from certain issues (e.g., T206s) that have not been re-examined, knowing full well that a number of the cards are altered and will be acquired by good faith purchasers who will not be getting what they paid for. Just seems to me that there is a lot of hypocrisy at play here and maybe the best thing to come from this incident is to highlight the need to impose a duty on all auction houses and other sellers to disclose all opinions rendered by reputable grading/certification companies regarding for auction/sale items. Perhaps in the alternative the grading companies could compile a data bank of rejected cards, which would show an image of the card, the date of submission, the basis for rejection and (assuming any privacy issues can be overcome) by whom the card was submitted.

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Posted By: PS

A seller has a duty to disclose all "material" facts. A material fact is one that, in layman's terms, significantly affects the total mix of information available. At first blush, one would think in certain cases grading history is obviously material. For example, a PSA 8 Ruth card that had been previously rejected twice by PSA itself and once by SGC for trimming. Then again, I am not sure buyers really care, as long as the card eventually is slabbed. One could cynically take the point of view that buyers know the games that are played and the fact that (except for Corey) no one seems to be demanding to know grading history shows they don't care.