Month: July 2018

Group of 80 Hand-cut T206 Polar Bears Surface at Auction

Recently, a group of 80 hand-cut Polar Bear came to market via Weiss Auctions.  To my knowledge, this is the first time these cards have been known to the hobby.  When I first heard of Weiss Auctions, I assumed it was a small auction house, but upon checking out their website it looks like that is not the case at all.  It looks like they mostly deal in antiques, but they have sold some high profile baseball items in the past including a SGC 40 T206 Wagner (which sold for $791k).  I don’t think Weiss Auctions is on the radar of most T206 collectors, but it may be a good site to bookmark just in case they get some more cards in the future.

The cards were sold in two groups, one had 44 cards and the other had 36.  If my count is correct, there are 59 unique poses in the group, with 21 of them having a duplicate.  You’ll notice that all 80 cards feature poses from the 350 Only Series.  There are two Hall of Famers in the group, Joe McGinnity and Jake Beckley.  Unfortunately, neither of them is duplicated.

The quality control on Polar Bears was pretty good, so it’s rare to see a significant print flaw on a card with a Polar Bear back.  Prior to seeing this group, I had never seen or heard of a hand-cut T206 with a Polar Bear back.

When a friend of mine told me about these cards, I couple of questions came to my mind immediately:

  1. Did these cards all come from the same sheet(s)?
  2. I wonder if they can be lined up and put back together like a puzzle?

A friend of mine won the lot of 44 and sent them to me so that I could take a look at them.  I was excited to see if I’d be able to line them up and re-create a partial sheet (or even just connect a few of the cards).

When I received the cards in the mail, I realized pretty quickly that it was not going to be easy.  While all of the cards are clearly hand-cut, only a few of them have a really unique cut.  Ideally they’d all have some wacky cuts that would make it easier to figure out how they fit together.  When I sat down to work on the puzzle, I was hoping to make some cool discoveries about how the sheet may have looked.

I’m sad to say, I didn’t find any cards that I’m 100% sure were situated next to each other on a sheet.  The only possible match is these two Bugs Raymond cards below.  I’m not totally sure they are a match though, as I think the space between the to cards looks a little thin.

I still think these cards came from the same sheets, but unfortunately I was not able to prove it.  My hypothesis is that the cards were cut from a sheet by hand, but whoever cut them did a little extra trimming on some of the cards.  If that happened, it would explain the difficulty I had in trying to piece them back together like puzzle pieces.

I don’t know who won the other lot of 36 cards.  If you won it, please reach out to me and let me know.  There’s still a chance that some of the cards I have fit with some of the cards in the other group.  It would be pretty significant if we could re-created a partial 350 Series Polar Bear sheet.  Even if we’re not able to learn more from this group, it’s still pretty cool that there are now some Polar Bear backed examples of printer’s scrap in the hobby.

T206 Short Prints: Six Poses That Were Pulled Early from the 350-460 Series

Five poses that were intended to be printed throughout the 350-460 Series were instead pulled early for various reasons.  The Joe Doyle error headlines this list, while four of the remaining five poses fly very much under the radar.  Joe Doyle’s corrected error (N.Y.) always sells for a premium, while the relative scarcity of the other four poses remain unnoticed by most collectors.

  • Doyle, Joe (N.Y. Nat’l)
  • Doyle, Joe (N.Y.)
  • Kleinow, Red (New York – Catching)
  • Nichols, Simon (Batting)
  • Rhoades, Bob (Right Arm Extended)
  • Smith, Frank (White Cap)

Because the above poses were pulled from production early, they were not printed with any of the “460” backs that other poses in the 350-460 Series went on to be printed with.   Due to being pulled early, the above poses were not printed with the following backs:

  • American Beauty 460
  • Broad Leaf 460
  • Cycle 460
  • Lenox
  • Piedmont 350-460 Factory 25
  • Piedmont 350-460 Factory 42
  • Red Hindu
  • Sweet Caporal 350-460 Factory 25*
  • Sweet Caporal 350-460 Factory 42*
  • Sweet Caporal 350-460 Factory 42 Overprint*
  • Uzit

Obviously, the absence of any 350-460 Piedmont or Sweet Caporal backs makes a huge difference to the overall population of the five Short Prints**.  Less so for the other backs, but even if they would have added up to 30 or 40 cards, that still makes a difference.

Now that we know that these poses were short-printed, let’s take a look at why.

Joe Doyle:

Doyle pitched in 17 games in 1909, going 8-6 with a 2.58 ERA.  However, his career came to an end abruptly in 1910.  After appearing in 3 games with New York Highlanders, he was sold to Cincinnati for $2,000 on May 31, 1910.  He appeared in just 5 games with Cincinnati.

Red Kleinow:

Kleinow’s contract was purchased  by Boston from New York on May 26, 1910.

Simon Nicholls:

Nicholls played 21 games with Philadelphia in 1909.  In 1910, he appeared in just games with Cleveland.  In addition, his name was mis-spelled on his (With Bat) card as “Nichols”.  ALC probably didn’t need another reason to pull his card, but it probably made their decision easier.

Bob Rhoads:

Like Nicholls, Rhoads’ name was spelled wrong on his (Right Arm Extended) card.  On the field, there was also reason to pull his card early.  He went 5-9 with a 2.90 ERA in 1909, but did not appear in a single game in the Majors in 1910.

Frank Smith:

Smith was traded to the Boston Red Sox on August 11, 1910 along with Billy Purcell in exchange or Harry Lord an Amby McConnell.

*You might notice that Sweet Caporal 350-460 Factory 30 is missing from the list above.  This is because 350-460 Series poses were not printed with this back.

**I mention just five poses, because the Doyle N.Y. Nat’l error stands alone.  If that error had never been corrected, we would just be talking about five poses.

George McBride and the “Blue Flame”

Take a look at the scans above.  Just below McBride’s belt is a little blue print mark that Pat Romolo has dubbed the “blue flame”.  Pat and I talked about this print mark a year or so ago and I had planned to write an article about it.  It was one of the (many) topics that I intended to write about, but never got around to.

Recently, I was very excited to pick up the McBride Tolstoi below.  When I got it in hand, I noticed the blue mark on his left shoulder.  I remembered the “blue flame” that Pat and I had discussed, but I thought this one might be slightly different.  I went through our old emails to see if I had just found another example of the “blue flame”, or if this was a mark we hadn’t seen before.  To my surprise, this blue mark was in a completely different place.

Excited about this new discovery, I sent an email to Pat.  As usual, he noticed something that I had failed to see.  It’s pretty rare to find one pose with two separate and distinct print marks.  But what makes this even more interesting is that both my Tolstoi and the five cards at the top of this article all share another print mark in common.  It’s hard to see (at least it was for me) but there’s a blue dot just to the right of his left elbow.  On my card it’s pretty faint, but it’s a lot more noticeable on the “blue flame” cards.

I wanted to understand more about these three different print marks, so I went through all of the recorded sales of McBride T206s on cardtarget.com.  I found two things that surprised me, and one that didn’t.  I was not surprised to confirm that every card that exhibits the “blue flame” print mark also displays the “blue dot”.  On the other hand, I was surprised to not find another McBride card that has the same print mark that my Tolstoi backed copy has.

Perhaps the most interesting discovery I made is that the “blue dot” appears on more cards that just those with the “blue flame” and my Tolstoi.  However, it does not appear on all McBride cards.

Card Target has four recorded sales of American Beauty backs.  One has both the blue flame and the blue dot.  Another has just the blue dot, and the other two cards don’t have any print marks.

Of the eight recorded sales of Cycle 350 backs, two have both the blue flame and the blue dot, five others have just the blue dot, and just one of them has no print marks at all.

The Sweet Caporal backs carry roughly the same ratios.  Of the nine recorded SC 350/25 backs, one displays the blue flame/blue dot combo, 6 others have just the blue dot, and three cards exhibit neither print mark.  Of the 28 SC 350/30 backs, two have the blue flame/blue dot combo, 16 have just the blue dot, and ten have no print mark.

Things got a little interesting when I looked through the Piedmont 350 backs however.  The vast majority of them display no print marks, while a small minority have just the blue dot, and an even smaller percentage exhitbit the blue flame/blue dot combo.

The reason I find print marks so interesting is that I think there is a potential for them to teach us some things about the printing process.  The fact that multiple cards can be found with the same recurring print mark tells us that many sheets were printed with the same layout.  That the “blue flame” is found with American Beauty 350 Frame, Broad Leaf 350, Cycle 350, Piedmont 350, and both Sweet Caporal 350/25 and Sweet Caporal 350/30 backs means that the layout of the sheet remained the same as each subsequent back was printed.

Having said that, I’m not sure I am any more knowledgeable about the printing process now than I was before I started to research these print marks.  It’s definitely interesting that so many of McBride’s cards have at least one print mark, but if there’s a pattern, I’m not seeing it.

My hope is that by studying these print marks and others like it, we may be able to shed some light on how these cards were printed.  Pat and I are working on a set of future articles where we will catalog all of the known print marks, and examine many of them in more detail.  We don’t have a timeline for when we expect to finish, but I am hoping it will be completed before the end of the year.

McBride Sweet Caporal 350 Factory 30 with just the “blue dot” print mark

Pulled From T206 Production Early: Tubby Spencer (and the recent sale of a Piedmont 350 SGC 40)

In honor of the Tubby Spencer Piedmont 350 in a SGC 40 holder that sold for $2,839 on June 11, 2018, it’s time for the next exciting episode of Pulled From T206 Production Early!  Spencer is one of the 11 players who were pulled from T206 production very early into the “350” portion of the 150-350 print run.  This group of players are known as the “Elite Eleven” among T206 collectors.  The term was coined by Ted Zanidakis in this Net54 thread, which was published in June of 2013.

Tubby Spencer was a light-hitting backup Catcher for the St. Louis Browns from 1905 to 1908.  He averaged just 68 games played in those four seasons, which makes it a little surprising that he was included in the set in the first place.  In 1909, he appeared in just 28 games with the Boston Red Sox, which presumably made the decision to pull him from the set a fairly straight-forward one.  He spent most of 1910 and 1911 with the St. Paul Saints of the American Association, and then had an 11-game cup of coffee with the Philadelphia Phillies in 1911.

For the next five years, he bounced around the Minor Leagues before catching on with the Detroit Tigers.  In 1916 he played 19 games, and followed it up with 70 in 1917 and 66 in 1918 before returning to the minors for good.

I’m not sure exactly why, but it seems that backup catchers got a lot more love in the deadfall era than they do now.  Spencer’s inclusion in the T206 set seems a little surprising based on his lack of playing time offensive output.  What’s really shocking is that he was chosen to be included in Philadelphia Caramel’s 30-card set (e96) released in 1910, about the same time that he was being pulled from T206 production.

Spencer is considered by most T206 back collectors to be the scarcest of the “Elite Eleven” *.  The recent sale I mentioned above resulted in a few messages from friends, all of which sounded something like, “Did you see what the P350 Spencer just sold for????  What the (heck)???”  Going into the auction I was asked by a couple friends what I thought the card would sell for.  I did give a range that I thought it might fall in (which was way off, sorry guys) but I told them that I didn’t have a great feel for where it might end up.

At the moment it seems that these tough Piedmont 350s are among the most volatile T206s in terms of what they will sell for on the open market.  It makes some sense.  We have near perfect information about many front/back combos, but the “Elite Eleven” Piedmont 350s are still a gray area.  It’s hard to know how many of each player are out there, and even tougher to guess what they’ll sell for when they hit the open market.

* This seems to be the consensus among the collectors I talk to.  If not the toughest, Spencer is certainly in the top three in terms of scarcity

T206 Budget Series: If You Had $1,000 To Spend (4/4)

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This PSA 1 Cobb Red Background Portrait recently sold on eBay for $912

For the last installment of this series, we’ll take a look at how you could spend $1,000 if you were starting a T206 collection.

Buy one big-time Hall of Famer:

For the first time in this series, we get to talk about Ty Cobb.  A low grade Red Portrait or Bat On Shoulder can be had for around $1,000 if you wanted to make a big splash.  Alternatively, a nice looking Cy Young or Walter Johnson Portrait in around GD/VG condition seems like a great way to start a collection.  A VG-EX Tris Speaker or Christy Mathewson would fit the bill as well.

Buy a stack of Hall of Famers:

This is probably the route I would go.  If you spend $200 or less on each card, you should be able to get somewhere around ten cards for $1,000 if you stick with the lower and mid tiers of Hall of Famers.  I’d try and get some combination of 7-10 cards of these guys:

  • Home Run Baker
  • Chief Bender
  • Mordecai Brown
  • Jack Chesbro
  • Fred Clarke
  • Eddie Collins
  • Jimmy Collins
  • Sam Crawford
  • George Davis
  • Elmer Flick
  • Addie Joss
  • Willie Keeler
  • Iron Man McGinnity
  • John McGraw
  • Rube Waddell
  • Bobby Wallace
  • Ed Walsh
  • Zach Wheat
  • Vic Willis

Start with a large group of commons:

Kicking off your collection with a big stack of commons definitely has some appeal.  Depending on what your goals are, this might be a great way to build some momentum.  This approach has the added benefit of helping you get comfortable with how authentic T206s should look and feel.  There’s really no substitute for holding a stack of cards in your hands and being able to examine them up close.

Start with a mixture of Hall of Famers and commons:

In other words, just be patient and be opportunistic when a good buying opportunity presents itself.

You could also start to dabble in back collecting:

I didn’t bring up backs in the previous articles because the vast majority of T206 collectors do not start out as back collectors.  In fact, only a small percentage of collectors end up collecting backs, and it typically is a preference that is developed over time.  In general, I advise that if you don’t have a strong desire to collect the different backs, I would just focus on the fronts when you are getting started.  You’ll always be able change course in the future if you decide to.

However, if you do feel a strong attraction to the different T206 backs, a $1000 budget allows you to get a few different backs and still have some money left over for a few Hall of Famers with common backs.  If you decide to sprinkle some backs in your collection, I would recommend starting out with these backs, which offer a great combination of bang-for-the-buck and great eye appeal:

  • American Beauty 350 With Frame
  • Cycle 350
  • El Principe de Gales
  • Polar Bear
  • Sovereign 150
  • Sovereign 460
  • Tolstoi

Whatever approach you choose, just take your time and do your best to educate yourself on the market and you’ll do fine.  In the last few months it seems that the prices for Hall of Famers has risen a bit.  If that continues, you’ll have to adjust to the changing market and budget a bit more for them than I have suggested in the last few articles.

One of my favorite things about the T206 set is how liquid it is.  If you ever want or need to sell some of your cards, it’s very easy to do, and the demand is always there.  Because of this, there really isn’t much risk involved in starting a T206 collection.  As long as you educate yourself and make sure you’re paying fair prices, you will likely be able to sell your cards for pretty close to what you paid for them in the event you decide to go in a different direction.  Hopefully the articles on this site will go a long way towards helping you feel comfortable as you begin your T206 collecting journey.  If you have any questions, feel free to leave a comment and I will respond to any and all.  Good luck, and have fun!