Hi Jeff - these are great questions. I actually saw the Brett bat you mentioned on ebay. Let me answer your questions in the order you posted them:

( 1 ) Why do we see bats in the market that do not exist on factory records? There are several explanations for this, as follows: ( a ) the bat you see and the order it was from was not recorded in the records - provenance and use attributes would be important to ascertain that a player actually used that bat. For instance, if the Brett bat was 32", there's a high likelihood that Brett never ordered the bat and it was not omitted from his records, ( b ) the bat was ordered by another player, ( c ) the bat was ordered by the team - or another team ( team indexed bat ), ( d ) the bat is a promotional bat that was never recorded in factory records. There also may be other possibilites such as the bat may be a store model bat which may have slipped out of the factory.

( 2 ) Did someone forget to record the order? Yes - as mentioned above, this is a possibility, but use, provenance, length and weight would in comparison to other orders be important to determine if it really was the player's bat that he used.

( 3 ) Are other player's ordering teammate's bats because he believes the "star" player gets bats with superiod wood? In many instances, players have ordered bats that they have given to other players to use and players have also ordered bats of different players as evidenced by reviewing the Louisville Slugger records. You are correct in saying that many collector's assume that only the player himself can order his own bats. A great example of this is Bobby Richardson - you know why you see very few of his bats in the market? The reason is that early in his career, he would order Nellie Fox signature model bats ( Fox didn't even play on the same team ) as opposed to his own signature model bat. The Louisville Slugger records are full of examples of this, especially in the 30's and 40's as model numbers were just being created and many player's ordered bats of the stars that they used and liked.

I personally prefer my bats to ( 1 ) match factory records and ( 2 ) have use attributes and characteristics that tie the bat to the player. I will pay more for that and I always get more when I go to sell the bat. Ken - I diagree with you a little, in the context that I sleep better knowing that my bat has the player's number on the knob, matches records, has the use on the correct side of the barrel, the tar matches up to known examples and photos, etc.

Great post - let me know if you have any other questions. Jim