Do repairs mean it's game used?

[Eric]

Hey everyone. I wanted to direct your attention to something being auctioned over on ebay. It is NOT being sold as a game used jersey however it has customizations and repairs. At first glance it has the look of a nice gamer.

It's a Dan Fouts jersey which according to the style, appears to be from 1985.



Fouts gamers very often have customizations to the collar. That can be found on this item.



There is also a coin-shaped repair.



Only problem is- the lettering on the nameplate is supposed to be yellow.



There should also be a year tag and an exclusively made for the san diego chargers tag along with a sand knit tag. It's not there. The seller said there's no evidence they were ever there.



Those things disqualify the jersey (in my eyes) from being the real thing. But it does appear a previous owner might have been trying to get away with making it look like a gamer.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...MEWA%3AIT&rd=1

(FYI- I have had a bunch of email exchanges with the seller and even told him why it's definitely not a gamer, in case he gets any questions about it.)

I offer this to show people that just because there are customizations doesn't mean something has been used.
Eric

[Eric]

If anyone has other examples of this, I think it would be quite education to share them here. Any pics?

[Eric]

FYI

Despite the problems with this jersey, it sold for $449.

Also, I think the seller got tired of me giving him information about what he was selling. He stopped responding to me some time ago.
Eric

[Nathan]

Eric,

Having played and coached football for a long time, including time in equipment rooms, there's a few things I know to look for when it comes to repairs.

First, it definitely is possible to have repairs without there being a great deal of wear. Some guys will doctor their jerseys a little bit (although, since our set lasted 7 years, it was frowned upon); these include the benchwarmers. We had at least four guys out of a 100-man roster whose jerseys would show some manner of repairs with absolutely minimal wear. My own hockey jerseys have my own repairs on them since they don't fit right normally; I cut the elbows lengthwise and the cuffs a little bit, then basically patched a similar fabric into that area to expand it to make a circular repair.

However, for a football jersey to have a repair in that circular pattern is, at best, very uncommon without their being corresponding wear. For the first part, I've seen one circular repair in my life on what I could definitely tell was a game jersey (and because I saw the enormous tear happen with my own two eyes). It didn't actually go all the way around in a circle; they basically ran it the length of the tear itself (about 300 degrees of the 360 that make up a circle) without going all the way around. There also was a rather obvious fabric warp that corresponded to it. The player whose jersey was torn (a defensive end) got past the right tackle easily, and the tackle reached back and grabbed onto the DE's lower left side of the jersey (where the side insert meets the back of the jersey) and pulled. The RT weighed at least 330 pounds, and he used enough force to drive himself into the ground; the jersey tore up around the shoulder pads when it snagged the metal clip on one of the straps. When the jersey was repaired, there was a huge warp in the area that the RT had grabbed onto; it must've created at least 3-4 inches of extra room.

With this jersey, I'd be looking for fabric warping around the upper shoulders on the back of it. The only way I can think of off the top of my head that could create that kind of hole in that location would be if a defensive player grabbed onto Fouts around the middle trapezius and pulled him from behind to the ground (without grabbing shoulder pads). That's not terribly common to see during a game, since the way a jersey will sit in relation to the back on the shoulder pads means that a defensive player would most likely catch him around the inner collar of the pads, which wouldn't create that hole (since the pads and jersey would then be moving together as a system rather than independently).

As far as whether repairs mean a jersey is game-used, yes and no. I don't know many people who would have the equipment or knowledge to create a tear and then repair it the same way as the team would. Personally, if I see a huge repair or a distinctive-looking one on a jersey, I try to see about contacting the equipment guys to inquire about it. They admittedly do a lot of work on jerseys that runs together, but usually there's a few things about the job that really stand out.

Based on your own research about style, I'd say you're right about whether it's a gamer....based on more circumstantial evidence without regard to style, I think it's a good thing you passed on it.

[trsent]

Look at this photo from Getty Images that is dated from a random game in 1985:



See the white circular spot below the #1? Interesting similarity.

[Eric]

Interesting. However, the circle in the photo is further away than the one on ebay.

Also, how does that explain the wrong tagging and the wrong color lettering on the nameplate?

E

[Eric]

Here's another shot of the same jersey from week 14 against the Steelers on monday night football. To me, the repair still looks lower here than on the ebay item.

[suave1477]

Well looking at the Getty pic and Looking at the ebay pic of the jersey the numbers are not the same size!!!

[Eric]

And here's a shot of what the nameplate is supposed to look like

[trsent]

Eric, email me your images and I'll post them so they show!