Interesting on ebay: Locker Room Mem says 9 of 10 David Wright GAI autos 'were not genuine'

[Number9]

Interesting:


http://cgi.ebay.com/BEWARE-of-Un-Aut...QQcmdZViewItem

[Eric]

It's like in the book Operation Bullpen when they put (6 I think) autographed photos in front of Mark McGwire and he identified one as being genuine. That autographed was obtained by his agent, it wasn't even an piece being sold by a dealer

[David]

Scientifically speaking, Locker Room & Wright should look at 10 authentic Wright autographs (perhaps signed at private signings, shows, etc) and see how many they think are fake and genuine. Without this, we can only guess what is their accuracy rate in judging David Wright autographs. One might assume a player can authenticate his signature 10 out of 10 times, but that's an assumption.

[mvandor]

C'mon guys, while I do feel from my personal experience that GAI is VERY liberal in authenticating, moreso than JSA or PSA, this is an ebay listing where a seller is trying to scare buyers into believing only HE has authentic Wright signed items. NOT a very objective source, no?

[allstarsplus]

C'mon guys, while I do feel from my personal experience that GAI is VERY liberal in authenticating, moreso than JSA or PSA, this is an ebay listing where a seller is trying to scare buyers into believing only HE has authentic Wright signed items. NOT a very objective source, no?

All valid points, but obviously Locker Room is trying to protect their investment. Their comparison system looked valid based on the balls they wanted to present.

It is interesting that David at least has a consistent style of signing the "g" in Wright almost like McGwire had later in his career with his "g". Anyone buying a non-LRMEMO David Wright ball should at least compare sigs in the same fashion and there are probably some good sigs out there.

I don't know if 1 out of 10 is accurate, but David seems to sign at the ballpark so probably some of those make it on to eBay.

Caveat emptor, buy it for $50 and take your chances or $199 on LR's site.
http://www.lrmemo.com/product_p/dw-omlb-hs.htm

Andrew

[otismalibu]

Saw this, for what it's worth...

http://www.thebrillreport.net/2007/0...aws_fire_.html

[mvandor]

Good catch Otis, I just caught that and was gonna report it but you beat me to it. Seems the heat on GAI is really being turned up. As I indicated, my experience is GAI is the most liberal, in part because they have a financial incentive to be. Bummed to read about LT/GAI issues as I have an LT jersey authenticated by GAI that might be suspect now.

[David]

I had heard that GAI was the most conservative in authenticating. At least that used to be the case. By conservative meaning, if the sig doesn't match the norm don't authenticate it. I heard that Mike Gutierrez left GAI as they were too conservative.

GAI gives COAs at many in person signings, including autograph shows. It would be interesting if one of these Wright autographs was from a show. I don't know that he has ever done a show or signing for anyone other than Locker Room. In person signing companies like Tri Star, Steiner, etc are reliable as all the autographs from in person signings including shows. They aren't authenticators, other than reporting what they see (seeing the guy sign the ball).

It should also be noted that Barry Bonds called an item fake that had his hologram and COA.

One of my favorite art world stories is about Salvador Dali. At a dinner party, a collector approached Dali with a signed print and asked if it was authentic. In front of the people Dali said it was not authentic. Later, Dali pulled the collector aside and said he had indeed made and signed the print. However, he hadn't yet been paid by the gallery. Once he was paid in full, Dali said, then the print would be authentic.

[David]

I should note that I don't want it to come across that I'm disparaging Locker Room or David Wright, as I know little about them. In general, a player's hologram on a ball (any player) is considered strong proof of an autograph's authenticity. If Locker Room is Wright's exclusive agent and the balls come with Wright's hologram, there's no reason that I see to believe their autographs aren't genuine ... I just also know that GAI has traditionally been considered a reputable autograph authenticator, and sometimes gives in person signings, so would expect good proof to know they got 90 percent of Wright's autograph's wrong. A Locker Room advert on eBay isn't an independent study of GAI.

[David]

One last thing I would want to know is how did Locker Room pick these ten GAI autographs. 10 after all isn't a random number, and translates easily into 90 percent, 80 percent, 50 percent, "9 out of 10," "8 out of 10," etc-- which are nice sound bite numbers. After all these numbers were made for an ad and presumably they didn't want numbers like 7 out of 15 or 79.753 percent.

Did they randomly pick 10 eBay Wright GAI autographs and examine them? Were there 100 GAI Wright autographs, and LR picked and chose 10 of these autographs? Say 9 out of the 100 looked bad and Locker Room picked those 9 (plus 1 good one for aesthetic purposes) and said 9 out of 10 were bad? If that's the case 90 percent would be way deceptive, as the true number would be GAI correctly authenticates over 90 percent. Obviously, LR wouldn't publicize and ad saying "David Wright says GAI gets over 90 percent over his autographs correct."

My problem is, unless verified by an independent source, you should start by being skeptical of study percentages and claims presented in an ad (of all places). Have you ever heard of a University Med School study first being released in a newspaper ad? By their very definition, advertisements are propaganda used to put the advertiser in the best light-- which means any numbers and claims contained were picked, chosen and presented to put the advertiser in the best light. Even when the numbers are essentially correct, the advertiser still grooms and frames them to look their best, and omits any counterpoints.