GAI Graded 1970 Topps Cello Packs

lahmejoon

Hi All,

I just noticed that there were five or six 1970 Topps Baseball cello packs, all GAI 7.5, that closed on ebay yesterday. They were listed by seller prewarcardcollector, who has impeccable feedback. Some of them went for just under $150, which seems pretty cheap.

Basically what I wanted to know, since I feel like I might have missed out on a deal, is whether or not these are the types of 70's cellos that several board memebers have discussed as being graded by GAI, but not authentic. I have never posted a link before, but am attempting to do so below of one of the cellos that closed yesterday.

1970 Cello GAI 7.5

Thanks in advance!

grote15

All 12-card cello packs from 1970 (and 1971 and 1972) are bogus. GAI made a huge error slabbing them several years back and stopped doing so once they realized it. That is why the only GAI graded "grocery" cellos bear serial numbers starting with 102XXX. The only authentic 1970 Topps baseball cello packs were the 33-card packs that were housed in a green cardboard box. Fritsch sells the real deal on ebay. Those 12-card packs are homemade and NOT authentic.

TheDudeAbides

Ditto that. I purchased a few, and then opened them after finding out they were fakes. Most, if not all of the cards were well centered, much more than they should've been. I even pulled a 9 on one or two.

lahmejoon

Thanks, guys. I thought that might be the case since the price seemed much lower than I would have anticipated a cello to go for.

Has there ever been any indication as to when these third party packs were made and who made them? It seems as if there are quite a few of these out there.

StarPaxMan

It started about 8 years ago with seller shaqfu1 and GAI graders Kevin Smith shaqfu1 also owned redzone they busted several cases of 1981 baseball mini cellos from grocery rack packs
and replaced the 1981 cards with 1970,71, &72 baseball and 1970 football they didn't even bother to replace the gum piece, they re-used that huge, 1981 piece of gum, which was the 1st red-flag
many innocent collectors notice when they ripped some of the packs open, i got involved made a complaint w/shaqfu1 then some people filed lawsuits in which GAI settle out court and enable them
to keep all matters private and didn't have to admit any wrong doing, and the rest as they say is history.
below is the initial email i sent, just 2 days after i started this shaqfu1 stop selling them for good, i said i can easily prove fraud in a court of law and the knew it.



tem: 5- 1972 Topps Baseball Cello Pack / Packs GAI 7.5 GAI 8 (5217560036)
This message was sent after the listing closed.
elsipep is the winner.

Hello,
after a while, i decided to open these packs.
now, i don't mind not finding any stars.
it does happen from time to time, oh well. BUT every pack had
a piece of gum that was produced only for the
1981 & 1982 topps packs. So how can a piece of gum from 1981 appear in a 1972 pack??? Can you explain this phenomenon???
Jose


Item Details


Item name: 5- 1972 Topps Baseball Cello Pack / Packs GAI 7.5 GAI 8
Item number: 5217560036
End date: Jul-15-05 20:19:00 PDT

Meatloaf

<< <i>It started about 8 years ago with seller shaqfu1 and GAI graders Kevin Smith shaqfu1 also owned redzone they busted several cases of 1981 baseball mini cellos from grocery rack packs
and replaced the 1981 cards with 1970,71, &72 baseball and 1970 football they didn't even bother to replace the gum piece, they re-used that huge, 1981 piece of gum, which was the 1st red-flag
many innocent collectors notice when they ripped some of the packs open, i got involved made a complaint w/shaqfu1 then some people filed lawsuits in which GAI settle out court and enable them
to keep all matters private and didn't have to admit any wrong doing, and the rest as they say is history.
below is the initial email i sent, just 2 days after i started this shaqfu1 stop selling them for good, i said i can easily prove fraud in a court of law and the knew it.



tem: 5- 1972 Topps Baseball Cello Pack / Packs GAI 7.5 GAI 8 (5217560036)
This message was sent after the listing closed.
elsipep is the winner.

Hello,
after a while, i decided to open these packs.
now, i don't mind not finding any stars.
it does happen from time to time, oh well. BUT every pack had
a piece of gum that was produced only for the
1981 & 1982 topps packs. So how can a piece of gum from 1981 appear in a 1972 pack??? Can you explain this phenomenon???
Jose


Item Details


Item name: 5- 1972 Topps Baseball Cello Pack / Packs GAI 7.5 GAI 8
Item number: 5217560036
End date: Jul-15-05 20:19:00 PDT >>



Wow, interesting story, thanks for sharing. Why would someone do such things for greed in this sub-culture of card collecting? Seems over the top, but I guess scammers are found everywhere. Unreal...

NickM

shaqfu is one of the biggest scammers in the sports collectibles field. In addition to counterfeit packs, he has been shown to be a part of a huge counterfeit cards fraud operation (Tuff Stuff did an investigative article back in 2005 about the fake Star cards, rare Starting Lineup cards, and other cards showing up in GEM and Capitol Grading holders and what sellers were responsible for bringing them to the market).
He is also a known patch faker (has been caught buying a serial numbered card with a plain jersey swatch and offering the same numbered card for sale with a very fancy patch swatch inserted).

Nick