Oakland A's 1994 Jersey Advice Needed

[hblakewolf]

Forum readers-
It is my understanding that the green alternate jerseys first worn by the A's in 1994 featured both a 125th Anniversary of Baseball and the round Elephant patch. This elephant patch did not feature sunglasses over the eyes, however, 1995+ saw a change that now added sunglasses to the elephant. Can an A's expert comment if this is correct? The reason I ask is because the 1994 McGwire jersey in American Memorabila's current auction notes, "The left sleeve holds an A's elephant (with sunglasses)".

Bill Henderson's MLB jersey guide also indicates that the 1994 alternate green A's jerseys should not feature the elephant with the sunglasses, as it was introduced in 1995.

Any insight is appreciated.

Howard Wolf
hblakewolf@patmedia.net

[kingjammy24]

hi howard,

i'd like to hear weimerskirch's take on this but here's my 2 bits:

in regards to the patches you're talking about, there were 2: a round patch that featured an elephant head, with crossed bats, with sunglasses and another patch that also featured an elephant head, with crossed bats. however this last patch did not have sunglasses nor was it round. as well, the elephant with sunglasses had the sun behind it. here are the two patches i'm referring to:

http://img168.imageshack.us/img168/52/patchzf1.jpg

i've never seen the elephant-without-sunglasses patch in any other version. i've never seen it as a round patch. have you? i've only ever seen it exactly as shown above. it is the non-round version shown above that was on the a's 1993 and 1994 home and road jerseys.

in 1993 and 1994 the a's replaced their traditional elephant-on-ball patch that they had worn for years, with the elephant-without-sunglasses patch shown above. however, they only did this on their home and road jerseys. on their alternate jerseys, they used the round, elephant-with-sunglasses patch. if the patch shown seems round, then the elephant must have sunglasses.

here is a photo of henderson in 1994 wearing the alt:

http://img84.imageshack.us/img84/4186/hendsj0.jpg

you can see the sunglasses as well as the tell-tale sun behind the elephant. a search on getty reveals that every image of the a's in their alt greens, with a specific date in 1994 shows a round, elephant-with-sunglasses patch.

in short, i've never seen such a thing as a round, elephant-without-sunglasses patch. as well, it seems that in this case, bill henderson is wrong.

rudy.

[hblakewolf]

Rudy-
As always, simply amazing work!

With this said, do you have any type of photo match to the 1994 A's alternate green jersey I referenced in the current AMI auction? Does the nameplate look correct?

Any additional insight is greatly appreciated.

Thanks.
Howard Wolf
hblakewolf@patmedia.net

[weimerskirch]

Rudy and Howard,

Thanks for asking for my thoughts. As I am a huge A's collector, almost all of my 30+ jersey collection is from the '72 to '76 McAuliffe era with some flannels and a couple of 1980 jerseys from Henderson and Armas. I sold all my McGwires, Cansecos and newer jerseys to focus on the 1968 to 1981 era.

With that said...Do not believe everything you see in the Bill Henderson guide. He does have errors on his A's information.

Secondly, I wish that Lampson would look at his own damn database before he issues his rag...I mean LOA with the new scoring system. If you search previous American Memorabilia Auctions you will see that they previously had a white McGwire from 1994 with the 125 year anniversary patch and the green elephant on ball. What is very concerning with Lampson's LOA is that this jersey is a size 50 with 3" extra length and one each sleeve length. The 1994 green in the current auction is 2" extra length. Also the white 1994 shown below has the "C" in McGwire down low, whereas the 1994 green jersey in the current AMI auction has the "C" up high. No rhyme or reason to Lampson's LOAs which is why they are about the worst in the industry. They are simply pathetic and they have probably costs collectors tens of thousands of dollars in cash. I have owned roughly six Mac A's jerseys over the years and many came directly from the A's and Steve Vucinich. Some were size 48s and others were 50s. All mine had 2" extra length. I have never seen a Mac A's jersey with LOA from the A's with a 3" extra length.

Mark

Lot 267: 1994 Mark McGwire Game-Worn Jersey (with MLB 125th Anniversary patch)

http://www.americanmemorabilia.com/images/PLFirst.gif (javascript:previousPage()) Go Back (javascript:previousPage()) | Read Description (http://www.americanmemorabilia.com/Auction_Item.asp?Auction_ID=22278#ReadDesc) Bids: 9
Acct No: 39860
High Bid: $1,416
Auction Closed: 9/29/2005
[/URL]
http://www.americanmemorabilia.com/images/WatchListAdd.gif (http://www.americanmemorabilia.com/Auction_Item.asp?Auction_ID=22278#ReadDesc)
Click Image to Enlarge
http://www.americanmemorabilia.com/pics/22278_dt.jpg (http://www.americanmemorabilia.com/pics/22278_lg.jpg)
1994 Mark McGwire Game-Worn Jersey (with MLB 125th Anniversary patch)

Mark McGwire took the game of baseball to a different level during his unprecedented career. The man who stole the hearts of millions in 1998 during his home run chase wore this jersey in the infamous 1994 strike season. Given that McGwire only appeared in 47 games that season, it is safe to say that he wore this jersey for the majority of the home schedule given its great use. This [size] "50" gamer shows heavy puckering on the identifiers and fraying from multiple washings. A 125th Anniversary patch is located on the right sleeve while an A's team patch is placed on the left sleeve. The tags in the tail have crinkled from use and washings as well. A Russell Athletic tag is the centerpiece of the tail tagging and three flag tags (3" extra length, 1" sleeve length and fabric) hang off the main swatch. Overall, great use from one of the game's most unforgettable talents.
Authenticators

100% Authentic/Lou Lampson [URL="http://www.americanmemorabilia.com/Auction_Item.asp?Auction_ID=22278#"](Read Details) (http://www.gameuseduniverse.com/vb_forum/)

Top (http://www.americanmemorabilia.com/Auction_Item.asp?Auction_ID=22278#Top)

[kingjammy24]

howard,

i can't find anything wrong with the 1994 green alt. mcgwire on ami. everything on it appears as it should be. my only personal issue with it is that it doesn't seem to show much, if any, use.

on another note, i noticed that bill's guide seems to contradict itself on this specific issue of which patch was on the 1994 green alt. before i continue, let's get the proper terms down. the round, elephant sunglasses patch is commonly referred to as "elephant with sunglasses". the elephant without sunglasses patch is referred to as "elephant with crossed bats". the former is a bit of a misnomer given that both elephants have crossed bats. on page 100, henderson says that the green alt had the "elephant with crossed bats in 1994, then replaced by the elephant with sunglasses 1995-1999". however, if you go to his "overview of the era" for the a's and look under the 1994 green alt entry, he lists the patch worn as "elephant w/sunglasses". the "overview of the era" is correct. the patch info on page 100 is not.

as for the 1994 home mcgwire that mark displayed above, it's a complete joke. forget the placement of the "c" for a second and also the "+3 length". (i've seen pictures from 1994 of mcgwire which show the "c" in both upper and lower positions).
the most alarming issues are the nob and sleeve patch. the nob should be 2 color (green with yellow outline) rather than 1. 1993 was the first year that the a's started using 2 color nobs. (henderson is wrong when he states the first year of 2-color nobs is 1994).
as well, it should have the "elephant with crossed bats patch" instead of the "elephant on ball" patch.
based on the tagging, patch and nob, it's a 1992 jersey. why someone felt the need to sew on the 125 patch seems to defy any logic or reason. if you want to pass off a bogus mcgwire and you've got a jersey that could pass as a 1992, why screw the whole thing up and sew on a patch from 1994? it's not like mcgwire had a historic year in 1994 or sat out the entire 1992 season or something. i don't understand it at all.

rudy.

[Eric]

Why don't you just call or email Lou- oh wait I forgot he had no contact information and the auction houses work hard to protect him from actually having to talk to the people who spend the money on the items he signs his name to.

Let's stop the dumb charade. Auction houses have to stop protecting this guy and make him act like a professional businessman.

Eric

[zfowl]

A couple messages up in the thread it is mentioned that the Bill Henderson guide has some errors when it comes to Oakland jerseys. I've had email conversations with Bill, and he has mentioned he is beginning work on a new edition of the guide.

I think Bill is a decent felow and would appreciate any documented corrections to the Oakland section or any other that will enable his book, which I think most will agree is a valuable asset, to become both more accurate and more valuable.

Zeb Fowler

[hblakewolf]

Mark/Rudy-
Thanks a ton for the posts-I appreicate the insight from well educated collectors such as you.

Mark, one additional question, however-you note that you have had A's McGwire jerseys. It is my understanding that the A's sold some of their jerseys with team LOA's. Should this 1994 green have such a team letter (did the A's have total control over their 1994 jerseys?) Also, do you have any of your McGwire jerseys available for sale?

Rudy, you brought up an interesting point about the 1994 home McGwire that AMI sold in a previous auction and had a 3" extra length tag. I looked through my files on McGwire jerseys that have sold in the past. Most have 2". Every McGwire Cardinals jersey I have seen that was obtained from the Cards has a 2" extra length, not 3".

Again, thanks for the great insight and information.

Howard Wolf
hblakewolf@patmedia.net

[weimerskirch]

HoWo,

The A's first started selling their jerseys to the public via the A's Fanfest in the winter of 1997. I could not make the first fanfest and I contacted Stevie V. with the A's. I explained that I could not attend the A's Fanfest due to my obligations as a Chief of Police and I enquired if I could purchase a rookie Giambi and a McGwire. I paid the posted price one week before the Fanfest. The price was $150 for Jason's and $500.00 for the Mac. They were both the alternate green and both 1996. They came with an LOA from the A's on their letterhead and both were signed by Steve. When the arrived the date on the LOA for the Mac was incorrect. I called Steve and he immediately sent out a new one. After that first transaction the A's stopped that type of process. Steve advised me that I was the only one who purchased a jersey in that fashion. I sold the jersey 4 years ago and bought it back recently only to sell it to a great Arizona State Grad living and working in SF. 1997 was the first year that the A's used their own LOAs and really started selling to the public. But in later years, Steve did start to, clean out the closets and sell some older jerseys (pre-1996) with an A's LOA. The key to track these sales is that Steve did date his signature so you can see when they were sold. For years now the A's do sell game used jersey at the ballpark, but I do not know if they come with an LOA, but they probably do.

Again, as I stated I have owned 5 or 6 Mac A's jerseys and all the ones that came with an A's LOAs have a 2" extra length tag and not a 3". That was one of the reasons I complained about Lampson's shoot-from-the-hip LOAs with the new 10-point grading system!!!

That was my posting not Rudy's, but I take nothing away from Rudy as he provides fabulous insight time and time again.

Currently I do not have any Macs for sale.

Thanks,

Mark