Esiason jersey on Grey Flannel

[solarlottry]

I have been in the exact same position as "boomstick" with regards to multiple 49er shirts over the years. Without doing exhaustive research there is the distinct possibility that a collector can pass up a perfectly good, and in some cases rare, jersey because it is different than what was worn previously.

My worst case of passing and eventually losing out on a gamer, was a beautiful 1994 Steve Young preseason gamer with legit team letter that I bought and returned due to the lack of a Wilson W on the sleeve. I checked Getty, AP images etc and just could not find a match so I sent it back for a refund. About a week later I find a perfect match on Getty, except the image is misdated by a year or so. The shirt had already been resold and eventually ended up on the Panini cutting block. A friend who has access to Panini mentioned that he saw the exact shirt at their HQ being cut up. Needless to say I am still ticked off at the entire situation even though it occurred over 2 years ago.

Since the loss of the Steve Young gamer I try to do as much research as possible prior to buying and/or sending items back.

Recently I purchased a Ricky Watters rookie gamer with a strange story behind it. Once I received and examined the jersey the nameplate jumped out at me. It was made out of an entirely different material than the jersey and without a good reference library of jerseys and images, I may have called it un- authentic. I was able to match the nameplate material to similar material on both my 1991 John Taylor and my 1993 Romo gamer. Thus a great shirt that I may have rejected is now part of my collection.

I think we all have to be quite careful when we label or accuse someone of selling or possessing a fake or un-authentic jersey. From my two examples as well as the Boomer shirt talked about above, it is clear that there can be multiple gamers of a player that do not conform to the usual characteristics.

Solid research is critical when buying, selling, returning or posting one's opinion about what is real and what is not. I, for one, do not want to make the same mistake I made regarding the 94 Steve Young, and lose a irreplaceable gamer!

Always buying 49ers gamers and ALL/ANY 1994 49ers GU items!
Paul
garciajones@yahoo.com

[dplettn]

My worst case of passing and eventually losing out on a gamer, was a beautiful 1994 Steve Young preseason gamer with legit team letter that I bought and returned due to the lack of a Wilson W on the sleeve. I checked Getty, AP images etc and just could not find a match so I sent it back for a refund. About a week later I find a perfect match on Getty, except the image is misdated by a year or so. The shirt had already been resold and eventually ended up on the Panini cutting block. A friend who has access to Panini mentioned that he saw the exact shirt at their HQ being cut up. Needless to say I am still ticked off at the entire situation even though it occurred over 2 years ago.

Since the loss of the Steve Young gamer I try to do as much research as possible prior to buying and/or sending items back.

Recently I purchased a Ricky Watters rookie gamer with a strange story behind it. Once I received and examined the jersey the nameplate jumped out at me. It was made out of an entirely different material than the jersey and without a good reference library of jerseys and images, I may have called it un- authentic. I was able to match the nameplate material to similar material on both my 1991 John Taylor and my 1993 Romo gamer. Thus a great shirt that I may have rejected is now part of my collection.

I think we all have to be quite careful when we label or accuse someone of selling or possessing a fake or un-authentic jersey. From my two examples as well as the Boomer shirt talked about above, it is clear that there can be multiple gamers of a player that do not conform to the usual characteristics.

Solid research is critical when buying, selling, returning or posting one's opinion about what is real and what is not. I, for one, do not want to make the same mistake I made regarding the 94 Steve Young, and lose a irreplaceable gamer!

Always buying 49ers gamers and ALL/ANY 1994 49ers GU items!
Paul
garciajones@yahoo.com

I very nearly made a similar mistake Paul, ironically on a different Boomer jersey for which Joe has recently been helpful to me in helping to determine when a different misdated Getty style match image actually came from.

In my case, there was literally handwritting mixed with traditional printing on portionals of the alteration tagging, and one of the alteration tags was entirely hand-written. And, it was very hard to find a photo or style match from the '90 year that the seller (the original purchaser's son) thought the jersey was from except for one (misdated) Getty image.

I am tremendously lucky that I ran across a more common player's heavily used jersey (and at a very reputable dealer) from the same manufacturer and style with the same type of handwritten style on the alteration tags. That allowed me to find great comfort with what previously I thought was a clear warning sign. Since then, Joe (Boomstick) has been helpful in identify the correct year and games where at least a style and stripe match are possible. And, I was able to further find comfort on what I'd originally perceived as a lessor oddity from the company that supplied the Bengals' jerseys at that time.

At the end of the day, I'm so glad I didn't fail to research my original suspicions because ultimately, my first (doubtful) assessment was totally wrong.

Paul, you have been collecting far longer than me... Joe has too. But the conclusion or "takeaway" you guys are coming to here (in Joe's case with very respectful humility in retrospect) are ones I very much agree to: Don't be hasty in making judgment either way. Unless you have all the information, nobody can be certain they are are reaching the correct assessment on an item's legitimacy.