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Babe Ruth Ball on Ebay--Real?????

I am interested in a Baabe Ruth ball now on ebay with ID of "poppy08" and a start price of $3500. IIt comes with a Max Drew LOA but no mention of PSA or JSA. Does anyone think this is really genuine? If it is the real thing, it is one heck of an autograph.

Thanks for any insight to all of you Babe Ruth experts out there.

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Permalink Reply by Null on October 21, 2013 at 9:07am

Don't even have to see a link/photo to tell you NO.

Do NOT buy anything with a Drew Max LOA.

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Permalink Reply by Luke 15 on October 21, 2013 at 9:17am

I thought he had a good name-- being on Pawn Stars and all. Someone else told me he is court certified and PSA and JSA are not but I have no clear what that means. There are too many Babe Ruth "experts" out there-- WHo is THE NUMBER 1 expert?If it is real, and I know that is a big if, it could be worth some serious money....

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Permalink Reply by Null on October 21, 2013 at 9:25am

"I thought he had a good name-- being on Pawn Stars and all."

This is the problem, most people see "Handwriting Expert" and "He was on Pawn Stars" and assume he's great, when really I've yet to see a Ruth/Mantle certed by him that is real. A simple search of "Drew Max" on this site you will find TONS of forgeries "certed" by him.

Stick with PSA/DNA or JSA with sports items, or post photos and ask opinions on here.

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Permalink Reply by Luke 15 on October 21, 2013 at 9:33am

ok- I did not know you could put a picture up.. I will do that now.. thanks.

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Permalink Reply by Rick Meyer on October 21, 2013 at 9:33am

All that Board Certified and forensic document examiner is nothing but fancy terms to fool the beginner.

Drew Max sucks at authenticating. Nobody with an authentic Ruth would send it to this clown. He gets nothing but forgeries sent to him because forgers know he will pass the crap.

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Permalink Reply by Luke 15 on October 21, 2013 at 9:42am

Hey Rick- I just posted the photo-- can you see it? What do you think?

Thanks.

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Permalink Reply by Luke 15 on October 21, 2013 at 9:43am

And does anyone know why Max is not on the show any more????????

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Permalink Reply by Randy on October 21, 2013 at 11:52am

Probably because the word got out that he authenticates a lot of forgeries and the show was losing credibility with the public.

Also, the show was getting stuck with a lot of bad autographs they couldn't sell to anyone who knew anything about autographs.

They brought in Steve Grad of PSA/DNA because he has an established reputation as a legitimate authenticator and the show needed that for the reasons mentioned above.

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Permalink Reply by Randy on October 21, 2013 at 12:15pm

The only way to get big money for any autograph today is for it to be certified by one of the respected 3rd party authenticators such as JSA or PSA/DNA.

There are other very credible authenticators such as Kevin Keating, Mike Guiterrez, Richard Simon, Greg Tucker, and many others but the big money comes from LOAs from PSA/DNA and JSA.

Whether they are better than the authenticators mentioned above is a perception that the deep pocket collectors have when purchasing items for $50K and up.

One Ruth single sold for over $150,000 authenticated and graded Mint 9 by PSA/DNA. The one you pictured looks similar in condition so if it were real why would the seller take $3500 for it.

Coach's Corner has similar looking balls every month with LOAs from court certified handwriting experts and they usually sell for a thousand dollars or so because someone wants to believe they are getting a $150,000 item for a thousand bucks. No one who knows anything about autographs ever bid on them.

Once an item is rejected by the respected authenticators, it works its way down the line until someone eventually issues an LOA and instead of being used for batting practice, an uninformed collector will buy it for something more than the cost of a new baseball.

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Permalink Reply by Randy on October 21, 2013 at 5:20pm

I need to make a correction to my last post. The finest Ruth single sold in 2005 for $150,000 and it was graded PSA/DNA 9.5. The same ball sold again in 2012 for $388,000 in a Heritage auction more than doubling in value in 7 years. Obviously, it is the highest graded Ruth single ever to come to market.