Aside from the fact that I believe that grading in general is a complete scam, I stumbled across an item today that makes me even more angry because it is graded to begin with. This 2007 Red Ink Rookie Premiere Peterson/Johnson quad auto is fake. I know this for a fact. The pen thickness is all wrong, as are the strokes on Peterson’s signature, the 28 from his signature doesn’t match, and the general flow of the name is incorrect. What is so horrific about this is that it is graded authentic by everyone’s favorite grading service, and this time, there is no excuse because the auto is graded too.
Most of the time, grading companies excuse themseves from responsibility by saying the card was only submitted for normal grading, and that they don’t review the autos unless the person pays extra. Well, not this time, as you can clearly see that there is an auto grade label on the front of this slab. You can say all you want about how important grading is to the sale of specific cards, which I will support, but legitimizing fakes like this card by having it graded shows that not all is peachy keen over in texas.
This isnt the first example of fake autos being graded authentic either, as I have highlighted the grading fails pertaining to this set countless times on this site over the last two years. Because of situations similar to this, I often advise people to not buy rookie premiere autos from any year unless they are within the first couple weeks of release. The bottom line is that fake rookie premieres are so prevalent, especially from 2007, that they vastly outnumber the real ones like this card.
For 2010 Topps did us all a solid by serially numbering all rookie premiere autographs, something I like to tout as one of the major accomplishments of my crusade against the fake ones from previous years, but cards like this one make everything more complicated. Just because a card is deemed authentic by any number of grading services, doesn’t meant that all is what it seems.
Even though it is BS, BGS doesn’t grade the authenticity of the auto, only the quality of the auto. If you want a BGS graded card authenticated you have to pay for JSA to look at it also.
I love how it says “what will this be worth 10 years from now?” ! Answer: Nothing. What the hell kind of kindergarten training do the idiots grading go through? How the hell do you not know what authentic NFL player signatures should look like? There are plenty of authentic ones that come through, that’s for sure, so there really is no excuse for the ignorance.
Want to see something really stupid? Check out the new ‘fake’ auto cards that are even advertised as being fake in the auction itself. They put ‘sticker’ autos on them and say it looks like a real signed card. Search Larry Fitzgerald auto* and there are a couple. Lord knows we need more of this shady crap filling up the marketplace.
Aren’t the stickers supposed to be on the back of the cards for auto’s, this is a total joke.
Funny how the slab pronounces Beckett “The World’s Most Trusted Source in Collecting”. Way to sneak one past the goalie there, grandslam04. Wait, there is no goalie, only money to be made. Beckett, you’re no more trustworthy than a used car salesman pulling this kind of crap.
Let me get this straight, if I send my extensive collection of George Washington, Babe Ruth and Easter Bunny autos for Beckett to grade the quality of, they will slab them for me? Perfect. eBay here I come!