Has anyone risked a "too good to be true" purchase online, and had a positive result?

[thatkidfromjerrymaguire]

We've all seen the plentiful ebay listings with UNKNOWN authenticity vintage cards claiming to be attic finds, flea market finds, "selling a collection of a family member", etc., etc. where the seller claims to have no knowledge of baseball cards and the listings typically have low starting bids and a NO RETURN policy.

I think we all assume that 100% of them are fakes/reprints.

Even though I know there is almost NO CHANCE any of those are real, I'll occasionally come across one where the card looks tantalizingly real, or the listing seems particularly genuine. But I've always come to my senses and talked myself out of taking the risk...even on a really low bid. Because 100% of them are fake, right?

So I'm curious...has anyone taken a chance on one of those "too good to be true" ebay listings, only to have it actually work out, and you got an authentic card at a great value?

I'm curious if there are ANY success stories from Net54 members.

[bobbyw8469]

Originally Posted by thatkidfromjerrymaguire

We've all seen the plentiful ebay listings with UNKNOWN authenticity vintage cards claiming to be attic finds, flea market finds, "selling a collection of a family member", etc., etc. where the seller claims to have no knowledge of baseball cards and the listings typically have low starting bids and a NO RETURN policy.

I think we all assume that 100% of them are fakes/reprints.

Even though I know there is almost NO CHANCE any of those are real, I'll occasionally come across one where the card looks tantalizingly real, or the listing seems particularly genuine. But I've always come to my senses and talked myself out of taking the risk...even on a really low bid. Because 100% of them are fake, right?

So I'm curious...has anyone taken a chance on one of those "too good to be true" ebay listings, only to have it actually work out, and you got an authentic card at a great value?

I'm curious if there are ANY success stories from Net54 members.

I took a chance one time on a raw 1948 Leaf Satchel Paige because it was sold by the "Hardcore Pawn" people who had that TV show. You know...the Gold's??? Unforutnately, it was NOT a happy ending...the card was fake, and although I got reimbursed, I lost out on a hefty grading fee.

[yanks87]

I did it one time 4 years ago on a 1948 Leaf Jackie Robinson. The card had been listed on eBay, sold, listed again. The seller was responsive, but odd in their replies. I poked and prodded on how it was acquired, the back story etc, and it fits into everything that you listed above. Estate find, selling for a friend, EVERY RED FLAG was up. But for whatever reason, (probably because it felt right after collecting Leaf cards for so long), I pulled the trigger and bought it for $500. I was nervous as HELL, even after the card showed up. I shipped it to PSA, and checked every minute, every day until I heard back from them. PSA 4. It was the first, and last time that I would do that over the internet. I bought a '33 Goudey Ruth at an estate auction 8 years ago, and being able to hold and examine the card makes a HUGE difference.

[bnorth]

I was looking for a complete beater set from the 50's. I had a limit on price that I could afford. Had a fellow member email me saying he had one for sale. His price was firm and about 10% above my limit.

Really glad i bought it. I paid beater price for a complete set that SGC graded at a NrMint average.

[packs]

My luck has only extended to autographs. I bought this Grover Alexander baseball for $80:

[drcy]

As someone who worked in art and artifacts authentication, I've seen lots of fakes but have also had people who said they had no clue but had the real deal.

Including a guy who bought a Salvador Dali original print on a lark, and said "Not only do I not know if it's real, I have no idea how to find out." It was genuine.

[mouschi]

Originally Posted by drcy

As someone who worked in art and artifacts authentication, I've seen lots of fakes but have also had people who said they had no clue but had the real deal.

Including a guy who bought a Salvador Dali original print on a lark, and said "Not only do I not know if it's real, I have no idea how to find out." It was genuine.

I hear this ALL the time. "I don't know much about this piece, but I know 100% it is real."

[Howe’s Hunter]

Sometime between 1998 and 2003, there was a Maggie error card was on eBay that the seller listed as having just found, had done some research but said he didn’t know if the card was altered or the real thing. Everyone agreed it was an original but didn’t know if it had been scraped, erased, etc. Looked real to me but I was under-bidder by what ended up to be less than one dollar. In those days, you could contact the winner of a lot by eBay messages so I just asked if he planned on grading and if so would he let me know how it turned out. We exchanged messages off and on for about a month before he got his PSA 4 Maggie error card back.

That he won on eBay for $198.00.

Missed it by this much ...

[bobbyw8469]

Originally Posted by Howe’s Hunter

Sometime between 1998 and 2003, there was a Maggie error card was on eBay that the seller listed as having just found, had done some research but said he didn’t know if the card was altered or the real thing. Everyone agreed it was an original but didn’t know if it had been scraped, erased, etc. Looked real to me but I was under-bidder by what ended up to be less than one dollar. In those days, you could contact the winner of a lot by eBay messages so I just asked if he planned on grading and if so would he let me know how it turned out. We exchanged messages off and on for about a month before he got his PSA 4 Maggie error card back.

That he won on eBay for $198.00.

Missed it by this much ...

Ouch....that is one of those that you should have went a little stronger on the snipe!!

[mantleman]

In 2007ish there was a guy on Ebay (with very low feedback and nothing related to baseball cards) who had a large amount of 1955 and 1956 Topps singles he claimed were from his relatives collection when he was a kid in the 1950's. They were all raw and included all the stars from Ted Williams, Hank Aaron, and Sandy Koufax, no Mantles though.

They were all BIN's, not auctions, and only lasted a couple of weeks for sale. I purchased 3 1955 Topps Ted Williams, 2 1956 Topps Sandy Koufax and a 1955 Topps Hank Aaron for I think $300 total. When I got them back graded, they were all SGC 84 (7), except for one of the 1955 Ted Williams which was an SGC 88!!

By the time I went back to see if more were still available they were all gone.

Andy

[Huysmans]

Originally Posted by packs

My luck has only extended to autographs. I bought this Grover Alexander baseball for $80:

Killer ball
That is by far the most impressive deal in this thread!

[Popcorn]

I took a chance on a 52 Topps Mantle a couple years ago that was listed as a $150 BIN. It was beat to heck and only graded Authentic but I was very pleased obviously.

[Case12]

Originally Posted by packs

My luck has only extended to autographs. I bought this Grover Alexander baseball for $80:

Wow!! What year did you get it?

[TUM301]

Being a Ruth fan can be expensive so I decided to concentrate on somewhat of a "niche", St Mary`s Industrial School related items. About 3 years back guy posted 3 or 4 1913 school calendars on EBAY with no reserve. Had seen maybe 1 before so decided to take a chance and won 2 for a very decent amount. Enclosed is the link to the "better" of the 2. On a side note, years later found a nice companion piece for them. A period ruler advertising the school and all the services they offered the general public. Great topic !

https://www.flickr.com/photos/154296...5/47977814548/

[packs]

Originally Posted by Case12

Wow!! What year did you get it?

I bought that ball 6 or 8 years ago and sold it to a board member. Best $80 I ever spent. It's also signed by Babe Didrickson and a career minor leaguer on other panels.

[robw1959]

One time I saw an eBay ad selling a 1933 Goudey Babe Ruth card #144 for $1,000 on a Buy-It-Now. The card was supposedly graded PSA 3, but there were no pictures in the ad, and the seller's eBay rating was just 1. I pulled the trigger on it anyway, figuring that both eBay and PayPal had my back. To my surprise, about four days later the card came in the mail as a nice looking PSA 3 Ruth card, with the only issue being some light water staining around the edges. Nice deal!

[icurnmedic]

Bought a 1951 Mantle around 2010, raw, $1000. Came back SGC 2.5 at the time $1700 ish. However, interestingly enough, eBay cancelled the transaction as if it never happened, AFTER I had already paid for and received the card. Never figured that one out.

[Promethius88]

Not pre-war and not all ungraded vintage, but... back around 2000, there was a lot of cards listed on Ebay, mostly graded and had a reserve set. Seller didn't have high feedback. I was the high bidder but it hadn't reached the reserve. Seller reached out to me asking if I still wanted to buy it for the same price. He claimed he was in college and needed the money to fix his car. His story about where he got the cards was odd because I could see in his purchase history that he bought them within the last few months...and paid a lot more. He lived about 2 hours south of where I lived at the time so we agreed to just meet in public. When we met up, he sure as heck had what he said. I don't remember everything, but it was about $3k worth of cards at the time. PSA 8(centered) 58 Topps Mantle AS, Brock rookie PSA 8, Bench rookie PSA 8, Bird/Magic PSA 8, 2001 Topps Rookie Reprints Auto Walter Payton PSA 10 as well as a few other higher graded stars. The lot also included a raw NM Ryan rookie. The card had a wavy top border and I thought it may have been trimmed. Turns out it was just oversized and miscut. Best part was the guy wanted me to pay the $10 shipping charge he had listed in the auction. I pointed out that he didn't ship the cards but gave him the extra money anyway. Good deal for $710

[thatkidfromjerrymaguire]

Some good stories so far. It sounds like every once in a while some of these suspicious sounding deals turn out to be the real deal. Which will only make it that much more tempting in the future when I see a fuzzy scan of someone selling his uncle's Babe Ruth card of unknown origin

[lowpopper]

Bought this raw on ebay and slabbed it at the national a few years ago. It has had a few owners since then.

[swarmee]

Still waiting for confirmation from PSA that the three 1952 Topps 3rd series gray backs I bought on COMC are actually authentic. But they don't seem to have logged my order in, so maybe I'm on double-secret probation from submitting cards to them.

[sreader3]

I missed the REALLY early days of eBay, but even in the 2003-2008 time frame one could still find amazing raw cards on eBay that were not trimmed.

I would get burned occasionally, but overall the math worked well.

A couple examples of wins:

T206 Green Cobb SC 150/25. Purchased raw on eBay in 2005 for $2100 via Buy It Now. It’s now in a PSA 4 holder. A very nice crease-free example. I would not take a chance on a raw Green Cobb today, but 15 years ago it still made sense. Pulled the trigger and won.

1933 Goudey Gehrig #92. Purchased raw on eBay in 2006 for $788 via auction with $0.99 starting bid. It’s now a PSA 5. The seller had limited feedback and presented the full story--a “smoke-free home” yada yada. But it looked good to me. I would have second thoughts about pulling the trigger today. But back in 2006 it worked out.

The Piedmont Factory 42 Era

There was a time in fairly recent history when T206s with the Piedmont 42 back were underappreciated. Two examples:

T206 Leifieid (Batting) P42. I was working on the T206 set in PSA 4-6 back in the day. In 2005, a nice looking Leifield (Bat) PSA 4 popped up on eBay. No back scan. At $50, it was a decent if not great deal for a PSA 4 common so I pulled the trigger. The card shows up in the mail, I flip it over, and … it’s a P42! Big win! It’s so nice I crack and resubmit it to PSA and … PSA 5.

T206 Lajoie (With Bat) P42. It’s early 2004. My favorite card ever is Lajoie (With Bat). I see a nice PSA 5 copy listed BIN at $700, which is reasonable but no deal. I look at the back scan and it’s a P460. The factory designation is fuzzy but the script extends end-to-end which I know Factory 25’s don’t do. So I figure it’s a Factory 42. Trigger pulled.

I won’t bore anyone with the many occasions that I have been burned and lost money by "going for it." They are not nearly as fun.