The final straw(s)

[thetruthisoutthere]

Originally Posted by brooklynbaseball

It's been close to 30 years and over six figures in "investments" in this cesspool of a hobby. I have not "seen it all", but I have seen enough to convince me that there is no joy left in it. I and my family have been attacked by a forger who I exposed, I have been the victim of fraud (luckily I found the piece of shit) and I have been the purchaser of goods that were not authentic. I have used ebay, and a few different auction houses to sell off my duplicate goods, but now ebay does not seem to care about the plethora of obvious fakes that pollute their listings. And as I write this, I am in the midst of dealing with an auction house that is trying to charge me over fifteen dollars to ship a single postcard, that is valued at less than $100, after collecting a 20% commission for allowing me to bid on their item. I used to enjoy the thrill of the auction process, the nervous feeling in my gut as the clock was winding down, the anticipation of returning home to find the delivery of my newest treasure. Now however, the blatant greed of this "industry" has soured me to the point that I rarely look at my collection anymore. What makes it even worse, I have two sons, and I had always looked forward to gifting each of them with an equal share of my signed collection, now I feel as if I would be subjecting them to a nightmare of greed and fraud. I am a proud NYer, it takes a lot to make me "give up", but the white flag is going up, I've had it...

I know exactly how you feel, Sir.

I don't think anyone has tracked and followed the forgery industry more than I, and every day it becomes increasingly frustrating watching the scammers and the Florida Ring continue to mass-produce forgeries of Mantle, DiMaggio, Williams, Mays, Koufax, etc.

Ebay, for one, has become an enabler. When the EMR team (which was doing a helluva job) was jettisoned, that was when Mr. Florida went into Mass-Produce Mode.

There's a ring of approximately two dozen (they could be just one or two people) Florida sellers that are literally making a killing selling forgeries day-in and day-out.

These are people with no conscience.

There are days (and Steve Zarelli will confirm this) when I just want to quit exposing sellers of forgeries....I quit for a few days, and then I pick up where I left off.

My collection isn't huge at all, but the memorabilia and autographs I do own, I enjoy, and I'll be damned if I will allow them to push me out of the hobby.

And I will add one more comment....

The so-called Forensic Authenticators who have helped tremendously in perpetrating this mess......I don't want them to rot in hell....I want them to suffer indefinitely in hell.