The above article stating that every company has had this problem, jogged my memory concerning the variations in the 1998 Donruss Significant Signatures card set. Mainly the Koufax, Smith and Ryan cards.
"Randomly inserted in packs, this 18-card set features color photos with autographs of some of baseball's all-time great players. Only 2,000 of this sequentially-numbered set were produced. Sandy Koufax was on the original checklist but his cards were not returned in time for the pack out. Thus, officials at Donruss made the Billy Williams card an exchange card. Each collector that pulled a Billy Williams card could send it in to Donruss for a Koufax card. In addition, the signed Williams card was sent back too. Special exchange cards were created for Nolan Ryan and Ozzie Smith. The cards were randomly seeded into packs and then redeemed to Donruss for the real autograph cards. The exchange deadline for cards R1-R3 was December 31st, 1999. All three "R-Series" exchange cards (Ryan, Koufax and Smith) feature refractive, shiny fronts whereas the other cards seeded in packs are printed on basic foilboard. For pricing on these R1-R3 cards, please see the 1998 Donruss Signature Significant Signatures Refractors listing. At some point in time after the product's release, non-refractive versions of the Koufax (#'d of 2000), Ozzie (#'[d of 2000) and Ryan (#'d of 1000) cards made their way into the secondary market. Each card features a different card front image than the Refractor versions (most notably with Koufax wearing a Brooklyn cap). Representatives at Donruss-Playoff were unable to provide us with information on this matter given that the company was technically owned by Pinnacle in 1998 and then purchased out of bankruptcy in 2001 by the new Donruss-Playoff Corporation. The Catfish Hunter card was signed in either blue or blank ink. Only 1,000 serial #'d copies of Phil Rizzuto's card were produced."
At the time, the story was that an employee had made off with a 1,000 Koufax cards (Brooklyn cap) and sold the cards.
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