SGC Autograph Authentication Has Shut Down; Anyone Know Why?
KnightRider
Posts: 54 ✭✭
I realize I'm a little late to the game, but as of April 1, 2019, SGC announced they would no longer be authenticating autographs.
The official explanation on their website is:
This decision will allow us to focus our full attention on card grading and uniform authentication moving forward. We also have many exciting new things on the horizon and cannot wait to introduce them to you in the near future. Stay tuned and thank you for the continued trust and support you have shown to SGC over the years!
As is usually the case when something meaningful changes, the official company line focuses your attention on the future...and not on what actually just happened. Does anyone know the real reason? Were they simply just not getting enough submissions to make it worthwhile? Or were they found to be passing bad autographs? Or something in-between? I have a few low-end items authenticated by them, and was just wondering what the real epitaph is...
Comments
Their sole authenticator left the company for a job at BAS.
The rumor is that SGC will be (re)starting a collaboration with JSA, but no official word on that.
I believe there was the "official" reason, and then the real reason. They were not very good at it and it was too much of a liability. See the huge thread on the other message board about the rash of faked t206 autographs in SGC slabs. They shut down their authentication service not long after that.
George Brett, Roger Clemens and Tommy Brady.
Actually, SGC was quite good at it. As you can see, BAS hired their guy; it was, if anything, a promotion.
Apparently you didn't read all the threads about their inability to authenticate tobacco era signatures. I think that would preclude them from being "quite good"
George Brett, Roger Clemens and Tommy Brady.
Thanks for the input, MrHockey and craig44. If nothing else comes to light, it might merely be that SGC couldn't get enough autograph authentication business. Given the market power of PSA/BGS/JSA, I always assumed that SGC was a distant fourth in autograph authentication, and perhaps they finally realized their capital was best spent elsewhere.
Thanks for pointing out the fake T206 signatures. It appears that PSA was involved in passing those, too. Unfortunately, you've gotta believe that all of the authentication companies have passed a lot of fakes over the years. If they didn't see it signed, it's only a best guess, after all.
That said, authenticating T206 signatures must be doubly difficult. I mean, there are a lot of Michael Jordan fake signatures out there, but it's reasonable to believe that someone at each authentication house has had extensive experience over the years (and hopefully during Jordan's playing days, as well) to see many of his authentic signatures and how his signature changed over time. But an authenticator who's 40 years old cannot rely on such experience when authenticating an autograph that's 80 years old, especially an autograph that doesn't have plenty of known authentic exemplars. Basically, I guess I'm saying that such an area is especially ripe for fraud. There's probably some T206 players that nobody really knows how the player's signature may have changed over time.
You may wish to refer to the previous thread, which I not only read, but also repeatedly punked you in.
There was no official word given but most likely a demand issue. I raised the question if it had to do with the T 206 forgery scandal and I don't think anyone really knows the answer. If a business is a profitable business and you have to spend more on labor you will. Their market share is so small that I think it is safe to assume they wanted to focus on their core competency of grading cards. Just about two weeks ago the collector that is the most active with those auto's confirmed that most that exist had been authenticated since 2015 and all are fake so it is safe to assume that very few if any are real. Craig you certainly could draw the conclusion that if they risk paying out damages on their work and business is small that the risk reward was no longer worth it but I can't imagine they are going to actually say that in public if that was the true cause. I would bet it was a contributing factor.