Shoeless Joe Jackson Auto- Fake?

[BobC]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

Bob I get the point but it feels circular to me. It sold for a lot of money therefore it's worth a lot of money. The same thing happens when prices are driven up fraudulently, it increases the price of the next one because it alters perception of value. So what? Suppose tomorrow there was a well-publicized revelation that the ink was from 1980, or someone admitted to forging it. It wouldn't be worth shit. It's not like the Wagner which has value independent of whether it's trimmed or not because of its unique notoriety.

Peter,

Agree with you, but in this case it is a unique item so I don't think we have to worry about the shill bidding angle to manipulate the price. We're not going to see 5 more signed copies of the exact same picture suddenly turning up in various auctions over the next few months. (At least I pray we don't.)

You're also correct about the hit to it's value if it suddenly turned out it could be proven the signature was not legit after all. But this item already underwent a lot of scrutiny and exposure when it ended up on the Strange Inheritance cable show and then was initially sold at auction back in 2015. I have to believe that if anyone from either side of the argument had found any factual new evidence since that initial sale that could definitively prove their point, one way or another, that the signature was fake or real, that they would have jumped at the opportunity to come forward and show the other side up. In this particular instance we have multiple "experts" on either side of the argument. And if there's one thing an "expert" enjoys, it is to be proven right over someone else so people will continue to look at and come to them, as the "expert".

So I don't think there is suddenly going to be any new evidence coming forward, and therefore, this recent sale at $1.4M is going to be viewed and considered as a legit sale and value by the hobby community. Now does it mean the item is actually worth the price paid for it....who knows. We'll just have to wait and see if at some point in the near future the new owner puts it back up for sale by auction, and see how much it goes for then versus what was just paid for it. But for now, circular argument or not, I think the hobby is going to have to accept that there is a new item that just got added to the short list of baseball collectibles worth over $1M. You don't have to believe the autograph is legitimate, but just know that the item is worth a lot!