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They first authenticated a Thomas Sayers autograph for Heritage, then pulled their authentication after they got caught with no exemplars, but still believed the piece to be real. How? Must have been provenance. Believing the provenance is dangerous business. It is nice to have only after an autograph has been investigated, compared and authenticated in the first place. It can't take the place of exemplars.
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I remember the Sayers incident, now lets revisit it because it does have many similarities to the PSA/DNA bogus authentication seen here. Heritage was auctioning this alledged 1859 Tom Sayers letter accepting a fight with American rival John C. Heenan:
Sayers signature is rare and no known authentic examples are kown yet Heritage's item description listed the item as including a full LOA from PSA/DNA and a full LOA from JSA:
Complaints from knowledgeable boxing collectors started to come in and the item description changed. Now the TPA's believe the item is authentic but are unable to issue paperwork due to lack of exemplars.
If there are no exemplars to compare to then how can they believe it is authentic?
Somewhere in there a friend of the hobby supplied us with a copy of Sayers' passport which was signed by him in 1860.
Note that Sayers was known to be illiterate and could only manage to sign his mark, an "X" which was witnessed by John Gideon.
Now looking at this objectively, if Sayers could only manage to sign an "x" in 1860 is it likely that he could sign his full name the year prior in 1859? And is it possible that not only did he sign his full name in 1859 but he also penned an entire acceptance letter to fight John C. Heenan? Now, not just a signature of Thomas Sayers but some of the most fabulous content that one could imagine?
Folks, do TPA's authenticate autographs for certain people/auction houses without having any consistent exemplars or supporting evidence?
Do they truly use their "Autograph Authentication Process" pictured in my previous post or is that a false claim/marketing tool?
Is the Tom Sayers eerily similar to the situation with the Marciano signed gloves?
Are some auction houses shown a favortism by this publicly traded company? Is their relationship with certain auction houses a cozy one?
Signed by Thomas Sayers or $10,755 elaborate hoax?