M101-4 vs. M101-5
 

Over the past several months I've bought a few Cleveland players from the M101 set and am a bit confused if there's any difference between M101-4 and M101-5 when the card numbers and players are the same between the two sets. For example, what makes the following cards M101-4 instead of M101-5?

http://www.net54baseball.com/picture...ictureid=10218
http://www.net54baseball.com/picture...ictureid=10220http://www.net54baseball.com/picture...ictureid=10219

And the answer is...
 

The position on the Roth card is identified as "R.F." in M101-4, and "C.F." in the M101-5 set. There are no differences between issues for the Graney card, so feel free to identify it as being from either set...that's what collectors do when it comes to the similiarly numbered Ruth from these sets (I imagine there a great percentage more graded Ruth M101-5 cards than there are graded M101-4 cards, because the M101-5's were produced earlier than the M101-4, thus making the card even more "rookie-esque".

My information is from the great Old Cardboard article about these sets by Tim Newcomb and Todd Schultz.

Brian

Good Answer!
 

Brian is correct, at least when you have blank-backed m101-4 and m101-5. There are a few of the 30 cards that appear with the same player and number that can be distinguished by a position, team or spelling change like Roth.

If there is an ad back you can use that to tell the two sets apart also, at least much of the time. Graney, for example, can be either m101-5 or m101-4 if it has a blank, Standard Biscuit or Morehouse Baking back. Anything else and it belongs to one or the other set.