i think it was altered before it was sent to mears for evaluation. as such mears described it in their loo as a 1976 jersey, not a 1975. dave grob mentioned in his piece that the reds' 1975 and 1976 road jerseys were basically the same, so it was the patch that ultimately drove the 1976 description. at least that's my understanding...
but i'm with you, why change a 1975 rose shirt into a 1976 rose shirt? especially given rose won the 1975 world series mvp as you mentioned. i'm no jersey guy, but it seems that it could have even been argued that the shirt was quite possibly worn by rose during the '75 series, when he won his ws mvp. that would be more valuable than a '76 rose shirt, no?
who knows, maybe the person who altered the shirt did so because he got wind of a collector looking for 1976 bicentennial items, perhaps specifically from the reds, willing to pony up a sturdy price. seems like someone was asking around the forum for bicentennial reds bats not too long ago....
whatever the case, this looks pretty darn bad, pretty darn embarrassing... btw i wonder if the person who altered the shirt got the idea of the black magic marker set number from these reds' shirts that have sold at auction:


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