ny daily news

[shelly]

Thought this was really interesting.


August 10, 2012 8:35 PM

PSA stays mum about Honus Wagner T206 in public, but not in private
BY Michael O'Keeffe

When a federal grand jury in Chicago indicted sports memorabilia executives Bill Mastro and Doug Allen on fraud charges last month, the first question many collectors and dealers asked was “What does this mean for PSA?”

PSA is Professional Sports Authenticators, the Southern California grading service that declared the world’s most famous and expensive baseball card – a Honus Wagner T206 once owned by NHL star Wayne Gretzky -- an eight on a scale of 1-10 in 1991.

The indictment claims that Mastro trimmed the card, which would make it significantly less valuable. Mastro’s lawyer has said that he expects the case against his client will be resolved without a trial, suggesting that Mastro is not only cooperating with the authorities, but will eventually acknowledge that he did indeed alter the card.

As we wrote in “The Card,” our book about the T206 Wagner and corruption in the hobby, a member of the PSA team that graded the card acknowledged that he knew the card was trimmed. Visitors to the National Sports Collectors Convention in Baltimore last week say an FBI agent spent a lot of time at the company’s booth at the Baltimore Convention Center questioning PSA president Joe Orlando.

PSA has not publicly commented on the allegations in the indictment or in our book and newspaper articles. Orlando and David Hall, the president of Collectors Universe, PSA’s parent company, have not responded to requests for interviews.

But a mole who attended PSA’s invitation-only lunch at the National says the indictment and the allegations about the card were the main topic of discussion. Also, our spy tells us, the chicken Marsala was quite good.

Our mole says about 150 collectors and dealers attended the lunch, held Friday at the convention center. Hall, he says, got up and said he had to address the “800-pound gorilla in the room” – the indictment.

“He asked for a show of hands and said, ‘Anyone here see the Wagner?’ A bunch of hands go up. Then he asked, ‘Has anyone seen it outside its holder?’ And he is the only one with his hand up.

“He takes out a magnifying glass and says ‘I have examined every aspect of that card. The only question we had was if it should be a PSA 7 or a PSA 8. We never considered that it had been altered,” our spy says.

Hall, according to our source, told his audience that they should question Mastro’s motives; Mastro might have agreed to say the card is trimmed as part of a deal with prosecutors. “He was suggesting you can’t believe Mastro, because now he will do anything to save himself,” our spy says.

Hall, according to our mole, also said Bill Hughes, the member of the grading team who told us he knew the card had been trimmed, has denied making those comments. Hall, our spy says, claims Hughes says it is an “out and out lie” that he knew the card had been trimmed.

Hall, our source added, also said PSA stood by its grade and would compensate the owner if it is proved that the card had been trimmed. But he didn’t say if the company would pay $300, the fee it charges to grade cards worth $10,000 or more, or the $2.8 million current owner Ken Kendrick paid for it in 2007.

For the record, we stand by our work, too.

Our spy also tells us that Hall said PSA has paid out $13 million to people who have cards that have been misgraded. “My thought was, you’ve screwed up a lot if you’ve paid out $13 million,” he says.

Hall, our spy adds, did not take any questions.

“Here’s David Hall,” our mole concludes. “The ship is sinking and he’s saying, ‘Look at the beautiful sunset and not at the water we are taking on.’”



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[drc]

Not to be critical, but the article basically says "we know nothing new."