A discussion about Presentation Footballs

[NEFAN]

So I put a game presentation ball on eBay that I had. When I got this ball, it looked like this:


Knowing someone in the Pat's organization, I find out where it was painted. I contacted them and they said they would fix it for free. After they got it they contacted me and told me the ball didn't hold air they would replace it with another game ball they had. I sid, "absolutely not, I want the same ball back" The thing I noticed was they used up to date logos for the Fins and Pats. I put it on eBay and a potential bidder pointed out that the ball laces did not match.


Naturally I removed it from eBay immediately because I have to agree. It got me thinking, though, these places that do the painting probably know nothing about memorabilia authenticity. I wonder if they are careful to make sure the ball they paint is the actual ball handed to the player.

Thoughts??

[cohibasmoker]

So I put a game presentation ball on eBay that I had. When I got this ball, it looked like this:


Knowing someone in the Pat's organization, I find out where it was painted. I contacted them and they said they would fix it for free. After they got it they contacted me and told me the ball didn't hold air they would replace it with another game ball they had. I sid, "absolutely not, I want the same ball back" The thing I noticed was they used up to date logos for the Fins and Pats. I put it on eBay and a potential bidder pointed out that the ball laces did not match.


Naturally I removed it from eBay immediately because I have to agree. It got me thinking, though, these places that do the painting probably know nothing about memorabilia authenticity. I wonder if they are careful to make sure the ball they paint is the actual ball handed to the player.

Thoughts??

I think it could vary from team to team and there may be reasons why a team issues a actual gameball or not. Some quarterbacks are very selective about the footballs they use. Manning is one of them and when he was with the Colts, they never used actual game-used footballs because he used the same football from game to game. Another thought is, with the teams selling their equipment, there may be financial considerations involved.

I have noticed that some teams (including the Patriots) use different footballs. To prove my point, in 2006, the NFL went to the new style Duke footballs. Tagliabue branded footballs were only in the pre-season. During the regular season, the league used Goddell branded footballs. I've seen presentation footballs presented to players, from regular season games with Tagliabue branded on them. I've had gameballs from a specific game and/or date and the date code on the football does NOT match up to the year of the specific game.

In closing, I guess each team has their own way of doing things so I check the football branding, graphics and the date codes.

Jim

flaa1a@comcast.net