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The GAI Mantle, DiMaggio & Ted Williams Hoard—Are They All Forgeries?

A hoard of thousands Mickey Mantle, Joe DiMaggio and Ted Williams signed photos have flooded the market over the last few years. All authenticated by Global Authentication Inc., with COAs signed by former GAI executive Mike Baker.

The hoard has driven down prices on these legendary Baseball Hall of Famers by 50-percent or more, and it's not rare to find one for well under $50.

The problem?

Every baseball expert we asked is emphatic that they're forgeries. And they've had that same opinion since the hoard came out of Florida in 2008.

If the experts are right—and I don't doubt that they are—not only are thousands of collectors stuck with these worthless photos. Thousands more have unfairly suffered a catastrophic drop in the value of their genuine Mantles, DiMaggios and Williams due to the flood of fakes.

And as we all know, GAI went bankrupt in 2009 after certing thousands of forgeries of Mantle, Williams, DiMaggio, Koufax, etc.

 

Why Do So Many Think They're Forgeries? Let's find out!

If you're a regular collector like me, it's hard to tell good Mantles from decent forgeries. DiMaggios and Williams are easier, but I'd never buy without an expert opinion. So I thought it would be a great education for those experienced in these autographs—experts and experienced collectors—to show us why they're so widely considered forgeries.

I've included a few of the GAI authenticated photos to start with. Feel free to upload more. Ask  questions, share your knowledge...and help make collecting these Hall of Famers safer for everyone!

Look at all this garbage!!!

Forged and mass-produced Mickey Mantle.  Ugly and laughable.

Forged Mantle, Williams and DiMaggio photo with a worthless COA from GAI.   Horrid-looking forgeries.

 

Forged and mass-produced Mantle and Williams forgeries.  Worthless COA from GAI and Mike Baker.

Forged and mass-produced forged Mickey Mantle photo.  Pathetic.

This is one of dozens forged Mickey Mantle business cards that were "authenticated" by GAI and Mike Baker.  Pure garbage.

GAI (Mike Baker) "authenticated" hundreds of Mickey Mantle forgeries on the below image.

Laughable Mantle forgery.

Here is a mass-produced set of Mantle and Williams forgeries.

GAI "authenticated" thousands of forgeries before they went bankrupt in 2009.

Tags: authenticate, authentication, baseball., dimaggio, forgeries, gai, genuine, global, hall, joe, More…mantle, mickey, of, ofame, ted, williams

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by DB on March 17, 2011 at 2:24pm

Simon is pretty good and Gloria Rothstein doesn't hurt...

 

btw here is a link to a steiner auction of Mantle going on currently.

http://auction.steinersports.com/cgi-bin/ncommerce3/CategoryDisplay...

 

I was speaking with them on a recent acquistion of a 1961 Yankee Infield and just so happen to start talking about this and one of the folks there said focus on Mantle's T as a tell tale sign...

Permalink Reply by Steve Zarelli on March 17, 2011 at 4:37pm

Wow... wow... wow...

 

Richard Simon doesn't like the top exemplar and asked me to send it back for a refund.

 

I don't know what to believe anymore.

Permalink Reply by DB on March 18, 2011 at 12:38am

Did he say why?

 

Mickey Mantle authentic signature and two forgeries

Mickey Mantle's known signature is on top; the FBI determined that the bottom two signatures are forgeries. Note the shaky line quality and variations in the starting and ending strokes.
Permalink Reply by Steve Zarelli on March 18, 2011 at 5:41am

No.  My experience is authenticators don't usually tell you "why" unless it is an obvious and poor fake.

 

Very frustrating because one doesn't even know where to look for a large pool of certain authentic exemplars. To train our eye, can we trust looking at PSA and JSA as absolutely authentic? There aren't enough UDA examples to form a large pool and they tend to all be one style.

Permalink Reply by DB on March 18, 2011 at 7:35am

It almost makes it impossible to tell which ones are real anymore.  Even the link I put up where it's primarily JSA & PSA/DNA (as if steiner says they observed one being signed, I wanna see that one!) oriented.  Although even there it appears one can be at risk especially if Simon is backtracking on one, which is an admirably thing to do.

 

What's with the new ICON - are you bucking for insert into the cesspool publication of the industry; A/Alert?  Wait a minute - Breaking News - Simon sells Fogery; UACC Ethics Chairman admits to buying forgery tries covering it up....  NEWS At 11!

Permalink Reply by Steve Zarelli on March 30, 2011 at 5:21pm

I've confirmed with Richard Simon BOTH photos of mine are forgeries. 

 

I did not send the book as I am 100% confident that it is authentic. I have really gotten a crash course in Mantle in the past few weeks. I have a way to go, but I have much more confidence now than I did a few weeks ago. Before I could spot the obvious fakes... now I am starting to see the nuances to be able to spot more deceptive fakes. A hard lesson to learn...

Permalink Reply by Steve Cyrkin, Admin on April 3, 2011 at 8:17pm

Steve,

The expert who told me all your Mantles were good a couple weeks ago was cruising the site and came across this thread again and emailed me. With all due respect to Richard, he is very confident that all three of your Mantles are fine--including the B&W also signed by Bill Dickey. He said that's from Scoreboard.

He's one of our two top baseball experts and I have complete confidence in his opinion. He hopes you or Richard haven't destroyed them thinking they're bad.

I just did a quick search and found this one in Legendary's auction archives. How does it compare to yours?

http://www.legendaryauctions.com/LotDetail.aspx?lotid=42004

Permalink Reply by Kyle M. on March 17, 2011 at 12:01pm

Old Global, New Global, Once removed?

 

What are your thoughts?

 

http://auction.aacsautographs.com/Bidding.taf?_function=detail&...

Permalink Reply by CJCollector on March 17, 2011 at 12:22pm

Kyle, that same company is selling the below garbage, too.

 

Permalink Reply by CJCollector on March 17, 2011 at 3:16pm
That piece would make any real collector vomit.  And there are people bidding on that piece of dung.
Permalink Reply by Fuddjcal on March 17, 2011 at 3:37pm

Hey look Moe, There's the Mickey with the Ham Hock Finger tip Fake.....What does Fudd say when you see Mickey Pointing the Ham Hock Finger tip.....That's right class, Run Like Rabbit with thorn in paw!

 

That one is a mess at best.

 

Great discussion

 

Permalink Reply by CJCollector on March 17, 2011 at 3:41pm

Actually, Fudd, I was referring to the below piece of dung that is on the same site as that Mantle/Mays garbage.

 

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