DAILY NEWS to write an Article on MEARS

[CollectGU]

that seems to indicate they mis-autheitcated both the Rod Carew glove AND the Billy Martin glove in the Vintage Authentics auction.. The following response from from MEARS was interesting because it seems like back tracking, CYA type of reponse. They authenticated them, but they didn't authenticate them...It is intersteing to note that Vintage did not have the MEARS cert up on the Martin glove before this and now it's there...

Response to Mr. Michael O'Keefe, NY Daily News

February 20 2006 at 7:56 PM Dave Grob Dave Grob (Login davegrob1)We have been asked by Mr. Michael O'Keefe of the NY Daily News to comment on two gloves currently listed in the Vintage Authentics Auction.

Here is the e-mail we received that was addressed to Dave Bushing:
-----Original Message-----
From: O'Keeffe, Michael <MOKeeffe@edit.nydailynews.com>
To: dbushing1@aol.com
Sent: Mon, 20 Feb 2006 16:12:07 -0500

Dave,

I did not hear back from you regarding the Rod Carew glove. I also understand MEARS wrote a COA on the Billy Martin glove that is in the Vintage Authentics auction. I am told by Wilson that the descriptions for both gloves are inaccurate. We will be writing a story on this and would like to ask you some questions about these gloves, and we?d like to hear your side to this story. Please call me at ***-***-**** or reply by e-mail.

Sincerely

Michael O?Keeffe
New York Daily News
----------------------------

This was my response back to Mr. O'Keeffee at 8:58 PM EST tonight.

Mr. O'Keeffe,

Dave Bushing forwarded me your e-mail in reference to gloves that MEARS was asked to offer opinions on for the current Vintage Authentics Auction. I would ask that you base any statements with respect to accuracy's or inaccuracies off of the actual letters and opinions provided by MEARS and not on the auction descriptions, which we do not control. These opinions are available for both gloves for your viewing as well as those who might care to bid on them.

I think you will find that the information provided by MEARS is factual in that both items are described for what they are and we have noted that some form of provenance accompanies the items. We have not substantiated any attribution of the items with respect to the provenance. With respect to the Carew glove, Mr. Bushing posted a statement to our board specifically addressing some of the same issues you may concerned with. I would offer that it might be worth your time to read this prior to writing your article. The web site is www.mearsonline.com. You will find the post under the Bulletin Board feature to the left of the page. If you then click on General Topics, you will find Mr. Bushing's post on this subject dated 15 February, 2006.

I think that after you have read the information we have provided with respect to these two lots, in would be inaccurate and materially false to say or suggest that MEARS has authenticated these items to be in fact either Rod Carew's last glove or Billy Martin's 1953 World Series Glove as that information is not contained in the opinions we have offered.

Respectfully Yours,

Dave Grob
Policy Director
MEARS





Respond to this message var tcdacmd="cc=SPT; dt";Copyright © 2005 www.mearsonline.com

[Eric]

Even though it is a cut and paste from a statement from the MEARS website, I have removed the listing of Mr. O'Keeffe's cell phone number.

Eric
moderator

[CollectGU]

Eric,

Thanks..I didn't even notice that when i pasted it.......

[ChrisCavalier]

Hello Everyone-

According to Dave Grob's post, it appears Mr. O'Keeffe is quoted as saying "I am told by Wilson that the descriptions for both gloves are inaccurate." Please remember that a primary objective of this forum is to provide information so collectors can make informed decisions about game used items. However, while it is important and helpful for people to have access to various forms of information, please remember that it is ultimately each person's responsibility to interpret all the information they have available and make their own conclusions as to the validity of an item. Mr. O'Keeffe's comments, as well as all others presented in this thread, are offered in an attempt to assist members in making their own determinations. As always, the final responsibility lies with each collector to evaluate all the information available to make their own decisions.

That being said, I do have a question regarding the following two statements from Mr. Grob as per his posting:

I would ask that you base any statements with respect to accuracy's or inaccuracies off of the actual letters and opinions provided by MEARS and not on the auction descriptions, which we do not control...

I think that after you have read the information we have provided with respect to these two lots, in would be inaccurate and materially false to say or suggest that MEARS has authenticated these items to be in fact either Rod Carew's last glove or Billy Martin's 1953 World Series Glove as that information is not contained in the opinions we have offered.

Respectfully Yours,

Dave Grob
Policy Director
MEARS

My question is this, in the case of the Carew glove it is listed as "Lot 339: Rod Carew 1985 Autographed & Last Game Used First Basemans Glove". However, even though the MEARS worksheet gives the item a final grade of "Auth" (obviously for "Authentic"), is MEARS suggesting that IF (and I stress "IF") this glove is confirmed (by Wilson among others) not to be from 1985, then it is the fault of the auction house for representing the item they way they did?

Given Mr. Grob's statement that "I would ask that you base any statements with respect to accuracy's or inaccuracies off of the actual letters and opinions provided by MEARS and not on the auction descriptions, which we do not control...", I don't know how to interpret that to mean anything other than, if the item is incorrectly labelled, the auction house is responsible for titling the item the way they did and that this title is not supported by the authentication provided by MEARS. This is an important distinction that I would like to understand completely so if anyone else has another way to interpret these statements please let me know. Notably, I am not saying my interpretation is correct and I am asking for assistance to help me correct any misunderstandings I may have from reading these statements. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Lastly, I want to remind everyone that if you are interested in bidding on either of these items you should continue to do your own research to determine the potential validity of any comments made by anyone in this thread or anywhere else.

Sincerely,
Christopher Cavalier

[ghostkid]

Has this NY Daily News Article been published yet? I'd love to read it. Is the newspaper reputable, or is it one of those tabloid journalism papers?

Kevin Kasper

[ChrisCavalier]

Is the newspaper reputable, or is it one of those tabloid journalism papers?

Kevin Kasper

Hello Kevin-

I grew up in New York and actually used to read the sports section of that paper almost every day. While you could read other publications for other types of news (the Wall Street Journal, etc.), I preferred the Daily News' sports section over other daily publications at that time. Back in those days, before the true advent of information technology, I believe the NY Daily News was considered a reputable source for everyday news although I only read it for the sports and I read other publications for other news.

Maybe there is someone else on the forum who currently lives in the New York area that can confirm their present reputation. Does anyone else have an opinion in this regard?

Sincerely,
Chris

[byergo]

Is this out yet?

[Eric]

It's has not been printed as of yet. Usually the article about the hobby end up in the Sunday Sports section.

I would also like to say that the Daily News sports has the best reporting of any of the New York papers. Their beat writers are rock solid.
E

[EndzoneSports]

... My question is this, in the case of the Carew glove it is listed as "Lot 339: Rod Carew 1985 Autographed & Last Game Used First Basemans Glove". However, even though the MEARS worksheet gives the item a final grade of "Auth" (obviously for "Authentic"), is MEARS suggesting that IF (and I stress "IF") this glove is confirmed (by Wilson among others) not to be from 1985, then it is the fault of the auction house for representing the item they way they did?

Given Mr. Grob's statement that "I would ask that you base any statements with respect to accuracy's or inaccuracies off of the actual letters and opinions provided by MEARS and not on the auction descriptions, which we do not control...", I don't know how to interpret that to mean anything other than, if the item is incorrectly labelled, the auction house is responsible for titling the item the way they did and that this title is not supported by the authentication provided by MEARS. This is an important distinction that I would like to understand completely so if anyone else has another way to interpret these statements please let me know. Notably, I am not saying my interpretation is correct and I am asking for assistance to help me correct any misunderstandings I may have from reading these statements. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Lastly, I want to remind everyone that if you are interested in bidding on either of these items you should continue to do your own research to determine the potential validity of any comments made by anyone in this thread or anywhere else.

Sincerely,
Christopher Cavalier

Christopher-

Here's my 2c on the topic (and some will argue that's about twice what my opinion's worth) and this comes from a somewhat schizophrenic point of view as someone who is as the same time, as a collector generally object to 3rd-party authentication, while also having in the past rendered said professional opinions as someone considered a so-called "expert" in my limited area of interest.

I think I have a feel for what Dave G. was getting at. As a hypothetical example (and since I know nothing of baseball gloves, forgive me for translating into a more familiar language)... Let's say that a collector submits a jersey to me for authentication that he claims as John Elway's very first game-used Denver Broncos jersey from 1983. Though his claim is credible, it is unsubstantiated. While such a claim may be taken into account, the jersey would still be examined and an opinion rendered on its own merits. With all other factors account for, if deemed authentic, said opinion might be stated as, In our opinion, this is an authentic game-used rookie-era Denver Broncos jersey worn by quarterback John Elway circa, 1983-'85." With our Letter of Opinion (LOO) in hand Joe Collector now consigns his jersey to Mammoth Memorabilia's next auction. Mammoth, may choose to put more faith in the consignor's claim of this being John Elway's "1st" jersey, especially when bolstered by the fact that they now have an authenticator who has supported that this is a "rookie" jersey (even though the LOO specifically states that this is a "rookie-era jersey). My initial take on Dave's comments were that the authenticators cannot be held responsible for how another party might choose to hype its' item in the process of promoting a sale. With this much I agree as I've seen a lot of liberties taken with auction titles that tend to exaggerate the true nature of the item (and I'm not just talking about on eBay).

Having said that, and relating back to this situation as I understand it (and I'm speaking in principal here as I have absolutely no knowledge of this specific situation), if in the same hypothetical scenario, it is subsequently revealed that Russell Athletic did not begin making the style of jersey until 1986 that I authenticated as a 1983-'85 era piece, then this was an error in my authentication process, plain and simple. I really can't stand on the fact that the submitter/seller mis-represented this as a "Elway's 1st worn rookie jersey" as rationale for my error. As previously stated, while information from a submitter, may be taken into account, the item must still stand on its own. Items stated in our LOOs are going to be facts gather from the examination based upon known standards, not information provided by the submitter. While possible that these "known standards" will evolve over time as new information becomes available, it is also possible that compared to these standards, some opinion may later prove to be incorrect. In such cases, then the authenticator should be held accountable.

In closing, I can't emphasize how very much I agree with your closing statement. No matter the source; no matter the authenticator; no matter the opinion... The bottom line is that at the end of the day, it is YOU the buyer who will have to be comfortable enough to sleep at night with your purchase decision. Do whatever homework is required to ensure that you can do so restfully before making the decision to buy.


Best regards,

[aaron1050]

I'm disappointed by Dave Grob's statement--he's usually a stand-up guy. While it is accurate to say the MEARS work sheet does not offer an "opinion" as to whether or not this was the actual last glove used by Carew, it is absolutely not accurate to say that MEARS did not authenticate the glove from being from 1985.

Their grade of "authentic" means that the glove must have been manufactured prior to or during 1985, and that Carew's claim that this was his "last glove used" may be true.

But if the glove is from 1998, then MEARS should have known the glove could not have been used in 1985, and therefore cannot be authentic. This is what MEARS gets paid for, afterall. MEARS If they authenticate an item, at minimum they're supposed to be able to identify the item itself (whether it's a jersey, glove, bat, etc.) before they even go on to the next step of determining whether or not the item was in fact game used by a player, or if it can be traced to so specific a time as to be the "last glove used" by that player.

Shoddy workmanship on the part of MEARS. This is an elementary mistake. They identified a glove manufactured in 1998 as having been manufactured prior to or during 1985. And, again, rather than own up to it, Dave issued a statement denying wrong-doing.

At least VA pulled the item, even if they did so on the advice of the manufacturer, and not the authenticator.