Namath's Game Worn Super Bowl Helmet? Nope.

[aeneas01]

Why should you feel bad for the auction house ??????

The only emotions you should feel is one of disbelief and relief .

Disbelief that these auction houses can be this stupid ....

Relief that you helped save someone over $50K....

Once again someone on this forum DID their homework for them !!!!!!

I cannot believe the auction house was irresponsible enough to promote such a supposedly great item , with out doing the necessary research .

So they deserve the embarrassment brought upon themselves due to their lack of attention to ALL the details......

Others have said the same thing , blinded by the might dollar !

i believe that honest mistakes can and do happen - in all walks of life. imho heritage did not simply and blindly list a rare helmet without so much as lifting a finger or taking a close look at it - they were furnished with what appeared to be sound written and verbal documentation, a sworn deposition and an autograph from namath that clearly implied that the helmet in question was his sb3 lid - they also reviewed scores of photos that showed namath wearing an almost identical helmet during the super bowl. given this, their mistake is more than understandable imho.

further, imho heritage is not alone in this thing. this helmet has been in the public domain for close to a month now and has received much attention from other auction related organizations - yet no one challenged it. quite to the contrary, everyone seemed to be quite dazzled by it. the helmet was even discussed here at the forum and taken at face value.

looking at the photos i posted it now seems more than obvious that the helmet wasn't namath's sb3 lid - now that we all know what to look for. but before these photos were posted, especially the additional photos heritage promptly furnished upon my request, was it so obvious? i would say apparently not given that at no time had anyone challenged the helmet's authenticity.

as i mentioned previously, i furnished chris ivy (director of sports collectibles - heritage auctions) with my findings late last night via email and reported to the forum that it would be interesting to see how he and heritage would respond. well now we know - chris immediately removed the item from heritage's website (although one can apparently locate evidence of the original listing) - it is no longer prominently featured on heritage's home page nor do searches link to it. no double-talk, no brush offs, no dragging feet - heritage was informed of a problem and acted immediately.

and, finally, heritage has a wonderful feature which is twofold - it allows heritage to quickly add items to their auction as they become available, for the mutual benefit of auction house and buyer, with the understanding that information can change and be updated. the feature also allows prospective buyers to voice concerns about an item, report errors and offer suggestions. in my case i utilized this feature by contacting heritage about problems with the helmet. heritage responded by promptly removing the item.



in a perfect world every auction house would have indisputable evidence that every item it they put up for auction was exactly as described - no excuses, no errors. but we don't live in a perfect world. fortunately for collectors there is at least one high profile memorabilia auction house, heritage, which tries to do the next best thing. i wish the same could be said for the other usual suspects.

[WOODFERN]

It Just Goes To Show You That Even These Reputable Auction Houses Make Mistakes. They Don`t Do Their Homework On These Pieces. Why They Don`t Take The Time To At Least Find A Photo Match Is Amazing, Especially With A Piece Like This.

[otismalibu]

fwiw, i'm not getting a kick out out of this - i actually feel rather bad given that chris ivy at heritage is a very nice guy. as a matter of fact, everyone i have ever spoken to at heritage has always been nothing but extremely nice, courteous and very helpful. it's just an unfortunate incident that heritage, much to their credit, appears to have corrected promptly once it was brought to their attention.

But really, if an item is supposed to be from a specific game, what should be the first step for the auction house to take?

Maybe glance at a game tape or some still photos? Nah.

I guess we have to commend them for not drilling a second hole.

[skipcareyisfat]

Ivy and the Heritage gang may be nice but they embarrassed themselves by ignoring evidence that's accessible to anyone with or without a reference library. (They say Lampson's quite a pleasant fellow too, btw.) Like too many houses, they expect us to take their catalogs as fact. I guess they haven't caught on to Google and the whole public collector forum thing either.

[mvandor]

With your eye for detail aeneas I can only wonder what you do for a living. Split genes? Design space shuttles?

Your thoroughness is a credit to the hobby and an invaluable service to us here at GUU. Thank you again!