BUYER BEWARE: Authenticators grade Ruth sigs

Three days before the world was supposed to end, December 28, five authenticators studied autographed items attributed to Babe Ruth on eBay, the giant Internet auction house. Their mission: Determine, by looking at scanned images, which autographs seem authentic and which ones look forged. Of the dozen or so purportedly autographed items offered that day, most of our judges said three-fourths of the items were forged. The remarkable conclusion from their findings, though, was that as pathetic a percentage as that represents, our panelists found that the two or three good items were a surprisingly large number. The meager results were a good day for good Ruths on eBay. The greatest caveat is that most of the items believed to be forged carried the vaunted COA, Certificate of Authenticity. In addition, every item bearing a 50-word letter of authenticity from Donald Frangipani was determined, in their opinion, to be bad. Frangipani has maintained, without noting specific items, that his reputation has suffered from others forging his letters; that his certification is only his opinion, not a letter of authenticity; and that he is not infallible. .Before we breakdown our findings, we hasten to add that four of our judges were veteran sports memorabilia dealers who over the years have seen countless Ruth-signed items, good and bad. They are, in alphabetical order, Richard Albersheim, Kevin Keating and Richard Simon; Dave Bushing, guru of vintage sports gear, was best capabile of judging the signatures based on the age of the equipment against the lifetime of the legend. The fifth authenticator, Drew Max, is a licensed forensic document examiner who more recently entered the sports market after a career in the law enforcement arena.

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