More Ripken Minor League Garbage... ($61.00 bid)

ripkenintheminors · October 28, 2009 3:18PM

I'm going to go out on a limb and say this is not legit:

1981 TCMA Promotional Card

AgnusDei · October 28, 2009 4:58PM

An elephant could fit out on that limb. Comfortably.

Ironmanfan · October 28, 2009 9:47PM

I remember when the phrase "Promo Card" was Hobby Gold 20 years ago.....

Who the heck is PCA???

ripkenintheminors · October 28, 2009 11:56PM

Since I have access to Mike Aronstein I sent him an e-mail asking his thoughts. His response:

Not even a good scam.

ripkenintheminors · October 29, 2009 12:03AM

I went ahead and sent a message to the seller asking him to do the hobby a favor and remove the card from circulation.

ripkenintheminors · October 29, 2009 12:11AM

<< I remember when the phrase "Promo Card" was Hobby Gold 20 years ago.....

Who the heck is PCA??? >>

PCA Grading

itzagoner · October 29, 2009 12:19AM

i'm going to go out on a limb and say Daryl has a brother named Daryl.

Ironmanfan · October 29, 2009 1:00AM

Chris...

Are you going to post this on your site?

TheHun · October 29, 2009 2:02AM

the word "promo" is short for promotional.

I would think the promoters would want their name somewhere on the card.

That should be a red flag.

so unless our hero Cal Jr. made them (to shamelessly promote himself) - I think it's fake.

ripkenintheminors · October 29, 2009 6:25AM

<< Chris...

Are you going to post this on your site? >>

I probably need to. Might as well chronicle all known fakes being passed off as legit.

ripkenintheminors · October 29, 2009 6:31AM

I think I upset the guy. He sent me a response to my request to pull the card and updated his listing.

ripkenintheminors · October 29, 2009 6:48AM

Life happened so I could not send an adequate message to the seller before leaving town. I followed through with a message letting him know about the site and that Mike himself said they were a scam. The seller immediately pulled the auction. Kudos to the guy for doing his part.

Ironmanfan · October 29, 2009 7:16AM

Chris:

Nice job on yours and the sellers part! When you get the chance you should put them on your site just in case they ever come back into the hobby (something tells me there are more than two of these cards floating around).

ripkenintheminors · October 30, 2009 4:24AM

<< Chris:

Nice job on yours and the sellers part! When you get the chance you should put them on your site just in case they ever come back into the hobby (something tells me there are more than two of these cards floating around). >>

I did some follow up with Aronstein in regards to the card. I had hoped to get a high resolution scan of the "promo" cards but no luck so far. Aronstein confirmed that they never did anything with the Rochester image of Cal other than producing the TCMA card and they did not do a promo. He did say, however, that he is not right now if TCMA owned the right to the image or if the photographer retained the rights to the image.

With that being said I am now looking for the photographer who took the pictures.

Ironmanfan · October 30, 2009 4:47AM

I can help you with the contact info on the photographer if you wish

ripkenintheminors · October 30, 2009 5:02AM

<< I can help you with the contact info on the photographer if you wish >>

That would be fantastic.

Ironmanfan · October 30, 2009 5:32AM

<< 

<< I can help you with the contact info on the photographer if you wish >>

That would be fantastic. >>

PM sent

ripkenintheminors · November 2, 2009 12:59AM

Looks like the "promotional" minor league garbage is a bigger issue than I expected. Now a third has been listed. Kudos to PCA. The latest copy has a different front and back than the first two.

ripkenintheminors · November 2, 2009 2:53AM

Looks like I have opened a can of worms. I heard back from the group that graded the promo cards. Without quoting their message I will pass on the key points from their perspective. To set this up I told them that Aronstein himself confirmed that there was never a promo card of Cal issued in 1981. Here's what they think:

1. The cards are promo cards which does not make them counterfeits.
2. Yes it uses Cal's TCMA picture but not the same way and the front and back designs are different.
3. Can a person say that a card is counterfeit just because it uses the same image as the 1981 TCMA?

ripkenintheminors · November 2, 2009 3:00AM

NickM · November 2, 2009 7:49AM

Why do I have a feeling that the guy who runs PCA is also the printer of these cards?

Nick

schr1st · November 2, 2009 7:59AM

Wouldn't surprise me.

<< Why do I have a feeling that the guy who runs PCA is also the printer of these cards?

Nick >>

ripkenintheminors · November 2, 2009 10:43AM

This is the part of the show where I would love to know if someone tried to get them through PSA/SGC/BGS. This is likely to generate some attention for his company, but probably not the attention he would like. He was willing to respond earlier and maybe he can help answer some questions. Time will tell, though.

ripkenintheminors · November 3, 2009 3:38AM

This auction was brought to my attention over at FCB.

ripkenintheminors · November 3, 2009 3:42AM

<< This auction was brought to my attention over at FCB. >>

For the record, this is the same guy who pulled the auction on the two Ripken cards.

In case you are wondering, the people grading the cards say that taking an image and creating a new card does not constitute said card being counterfeit, even if they are dating/slabbing/presenting them as pre-Ripken minor league rookies.

jeffcbay · November 3, 2009 3:47AM

It looks like both of the Ripken fakes were actually bought by "s***r (2991)". Is that you? Did you buy them so you can see them in person? Might be worth the $9.99 to see them in person.

ripkenintheminors · November 3, 2009 3:48AM

<< It looks like both of the Ripken fakes were actually bought by "s***r (2991)". Is that you? Did you buy them so you can see them in person? Might be worth the $9.99 to see them in person. >>

I was lead to believe that the bids were pulled and the auctons closed. I just noticed that myself. I did not make a push to purchase one.

jeffcbay · November 3, 2009 4:05AM

At least they didn't sell for more than what any other non-licensed card would sell for. Seems like the guy making the fake cards is the same guy slabbing them.

ripkenintheminors · November 3, 2009 2:05PM

I apparently missed one. Unless I missed another copy this may be the first to sell. Unless someone is using multiple IDs these have locations of PA, KY and FL.

Ebay 120485675488

BugOnTheRug · November 3, 2009 3:40PM

So where are the rest of the promo cards for the other team members? Oh, I forgot, just Cal got a promo card..........

storm888 · November 3, 2009 4:16PM

"...the people grading the cards say that taking an image and creating a new card does not constitute said card being counterfeit, even if they are dating/slabbing/presenting them as pre-Ripken minor league rookies..."

////////////////////////////////

I believe they are simply "counterfeit."

......

A Derivative Work

AUPT · November 3, 2009 10:48PM

You can't "counterfeit" something that never existed in the first place. I'd categorize these as "fantasies."

ripkenintheminors · November 4, 2009 1:04AM

Went ahead and did a recap of the cards on my site. The article is posted below. What a week for the Rochester cards.

November 2, 2009

Up until the week of October 25, 2009, there were no known counterfeits involving the 1981 TCMA Rochester Red Wings card of Cal Ripken, Jr. This all changed when a seller from Grand Rivers, Kentucky, listed a pair of “1981 Rochester Red Wings Cal Ripken Promo Rookie card(s)” (Ebay150384365141, 370282103629). The cards were slabbed by PCA Grading (http://www.pcagrading.com) and were graded Gem Mint 10. The cards featured Cal’s image from his 1981 TCMA trading card with no text on the front of the card. The back of the card was a white back with the words, “Cal Ripken Jr. 1981 Rochester Red Wings Promotional Card.”

Michael Aronstein is the legendary collector who established TCMA and produced Cal’s 1981 Rochester Red Wings card. When asked about the authenticity of the promo cards he stated that the cards were “not even a good scam.” RITM followed up with Michael and asked the following questions:

Did TCMA produce any promotional cards of Cal Ripken, Jr., in a minor league uniform?
Was the image of Cal from the 1981 TCMA card ever used for another TCMA card?
Did TCMA ever grant permission for anyone else to use Cal's 1981 Rochester picture for any other use?

Michael responded, “NO, NO, NO”

After presenting the information to the seller, both listings were removed. However, a third copy (Ebay 120485675488) from a seller in Panama City, Florida, appeared the following week. A fourth copy (Ebay 110452805918) of the card appeared from a seller in Pocono Summit, Pennsylvania the same week. Both copies were graded Gem Mint 10 by PCA. However, Pennsylvania copy included the words “Cal Ripken Jr. 1981 Rochester Red Wings” on the front of the card with a blank back, making it different from the other three copies.

Given this information, three of Cal’s four minor league cards have had some form of counterfeit variation (1980 WBTV Charlotte O’s, 1981 TCMA Rochester Red Wings, 1981 WTF Rochester Red Wings). Please use caution when purchasing any of Cal’s minor league cards. For more information about spotting counterfeits of other varieties of Cal’s minor league cards, please visit our “Spotting Counterfeits” page at http://www.ripkenintheminors.com/spottingcounterfeits.htm

MattinglyStash · November 4, 2009 2:03AM

This same thing has been going on with a Mattingly card for a while now. Uses the photo from his Arby's minor league card. I've tracked a few. Sometimes sold in a lot with a legit 1984 Topps RC. Sometimes sold on it's own. Now he has added a "book" value to it and the price this time is higher than normal.

Mattingly Issue

storm888 · November 4, 2009 2:08AM

<< You can't "counterfeit" something that never existed in the first place. I'd categorize these as "fantasies." >>

//////////////////////////////////////////

That is true; and not just semantics. That's why I put
"counterfeit" in quotes.

The Feds have taken to calling such items "forgeries," due to the
more common use of "counterfeit" to denote "a copy of an original."

...............

Counterfeit.....

Created for deception, intended to be accepted by others as genuine.

Intended to deceive or carry appearance of being genuine; unauthentic.

Imitating something superior.

An imitation that is made with the intent to deceptively
represent its content or origins; forgery.

Forgery is similar to the crime of fraud; the crime of deceiving
another, including through the use of objects obtained through
forgery.

.............

"Fantasies" carries a benign concept that really does not apply
to what is being done with the subject cards.

The seller's notion of what constitutes a "counterfeit" is
a fairly clear allusion to his incorrect theory that the
cards are simply harmless derivative works.

If we look at intent and result, we see fraud.

The intent is to make folks think the items are contemporary
of a falsely-claimed time period; fraud.

The result is that folks are manipulated to form a false belief
about the items; fraud.

ripkenintheminors · November 4, 2009 2:22AM

Troublesome. If you do a completed auctions search of the word GEM with one of the sellers you will see a flood of auctions ranging in the $20+ mark for these "promo" or "high school" cards, all slabbed by PCA of course.

ripkenintheminors · November 4, 2009 12:18PM

A person is getting hosed regardless of what they pay but it looks like someone is dropping big coin tonight for ebay 120485675488. It is at $61 with around 4 hours left. What is sad is that me and the seller swapped messages all day about this card. At the end of the day he still refused to acknowledge in the listing that the card was not printed in 1981. I wonder if I should just win the auction.

On another note I heard back from PCA and they said they "do not want any more problems" and "will not grade anymore". This was after seeing my article on the site. I asked him if he would answer some questions and clear teh air about these cards. We'll see.

Tabe · November 4, 2009 4:17PM

<< 

<< I remember when the phrase "Promo Card" was Hobby Gold 20 years ago.....

Who the heck is PCA??? >>

PCA Grading >>

Give 'em credit, their pricing and shipping are really cheap!

Tabe

ripkenintheminors · November 5, 2009 2:40AM

$61.00 final bid. Yikes. Hopefully the buyer takes a minute to research the card.

BugOnTheRug · November 6, 2009 5:48PM

Chris,

You may have to go out on another limb, and don a police uniform too. This just popped up on my ebay email search......

I'm assuming this one hasn't been covered before. If so, sorry for the false alarm.

link

ripkenintheminors · November 13, 2009 10:15AM

<< Chris,

You may have to go out on another limb, and don a police uniform too. This just popped up on my ebay email search......

I'm assuming this one hasn't been covered before. If so, sorry for the false alarm.

link >>

I have seen them but do not feel the urgency in the same way as the PCA slabbed stuff. For what it's worth I have also seen metal variations of the 1981 TCMA. Although there may be someone thinking they are getting a 1981 Ripken with the link you provided I feel things of that nature are understood as being a collector issue. I don't have a problem with people printing stuff of Cal in the interest of giving collectors something to add to their collections as long as they are up front about what they are selling. My biggest concern with the PCA stuff is that you not only have a card saying it is a promo from 1981, but it is slabbed. Someone who would immediately dismiss the card without the slab might be inclined to bid on them. I think another PCA slabbed copy recently dropped for around $50. It's interesting that no copies of the "promo" card have appeared outside a PCA slab.

More Ripken Minor League Garbage... ($61.00 bid)

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