JSA, PSA: Fake Sonny Listons piling up?

[travrosty]

no problem, the beginning of the L is much more closer to the top of the capital S than it is to the y, which is bad.

Another thing to look for is the baseline of each of the first and last names. in real Liston signatures, the baseline will usually go up from left to right in the first name Sonny, and then start lower again for the last name, and go up again at a slant.

If you draw a straight line at the base of the letters in Sonny, and extend that line until it hits the word Liston, it will usually hit the word Liston in the backside of the capital L from anywhere from about 50% up to 100% up to the top of the capital L.

In this fake, you can see the baseline of the word Sonny hits the word Liston very low, about 15% of the way up. (just eyeballing it). the baseline almost extends unimpeded all the way through the word Liston. You can almost draw a straight line from the bottom of the word Sonny all the way through the bottom of the word Liston and it almost lines up. Very little difference in baseline, as opposed to usually a great difference in baseline in authentic examples.

note: these are rules of thumbs, there can always exist an odd one that breaks the rule somewhat, like the authentic example at the left of the collage, the baseline hits about 30% of the way up, but the rest of the autograph is what we would expect. One characteristic doesn't necessarily sink an autograph, but several do, this has more than several defects.

strike 2

red flag