Authentic vs. Fake Baseball Cards

How do you ensure legitimacy when buying baseball cards?

http://www.sportscollectorsdaily.com

In a somewhat old, yet still relevant, article Spotting Counterfeit Cards Requires Research, Knowledge written by Rich Mueller, he describes how he personally figures out what cards are real and which ones are fake. A tedious, mind boggling, frustrating work of any baseball card collector is to check for fakes. While most might think they won't be dumb enough to buy a fake card, many do.

This problem of counterfeiting baseball cards is not new. “Counterfeit baseball cards have been around for decades” says Muller as he introduces the simple but bitter facts that are true about card collecting.

Here are Mullers words, as he tries to answer questions that regularly come up when buying baseball cards.

Q: What is the best way to tell if a card is a counterfeit or reprint?

A: A standard and often highly effective way to detect counterfeits and reprints is by directly comparing the card in question with one or more known genuine examples.

Q: What are the most counterfeit cards on the market?

A: The older cards that sell for one hundred dollars and up. Examples of cards: 1933 Goudey Babe Ruth, T206 Honus Wagner, 1948 Leaf Bob Feller and many others

Although Muller didn't answer many questions is his article that he posted back in March of 2007, he truly did give some knowledge that isn't always handed to people. I have bought reprint and counterfeit cards before. The feeling is not a good one as you have just paid hundreds of dollars more for a card that is worth five cents. What makes it even worse, most of the time you can't return the card after figuring out your loss years later.

Letter in Muller’s article is when he goes through a checklist that is essential to pay attention to in order to purchase “the real deal” cards.

• Obvious Differences: Could include text or copyright date indicating the card is a misprint.
• Dimensions of face and back: Best way is to compare multiple copies to the card that might be fake, in order to get a better census.
• Dimensions of printing: This includes size of image, borders and text. There is always a certain size for each card and the ones that don't match up are fakes.
• Weight: Card stock has a weight to it. Indescribable but can be compared by other cards from the same year.
• Appearance of card stock and surface: If the colors don’t look the same or don’t look legitimate, then the card might be altered. Some bad reprints even start to have a different type of texture to them, which is noticeable when feeling the card with your hands.

• Font and size of lettering and border lines: Each card has their own set dimensions that are the same on every authentic card.
• Opacity: Is measured by the amount of light that shines through the card. No card is see-through but the type of glare that is reflected from the card might indicate authenticity.

Hopefully Muller's checklist and his answers to others questions will help you when  purchasing cards in the future.

Future Research: What determines how companies grade cards? What explains why some gradings are higher than others?