The wonder of game used bat cards
I know this is going to sound really silly but how did they know to save old bats in the 1920’s and 1930’s? Were there people who could see into the future and say wow, we could shave these and put tiny pieces into the tobacco cards someday.
Furthermore, how many Babe Ruth bats could really still be around to be chopped and shaved to fit baseball cards? You know the Yankees probably have some and are not going to sell them cheaply only to be destroyed. Maybe his family sold some? I can’t see that happening, then again for the money it could fetch who knows.
Check out this completed listing for a 2009 Topps Tribute Babe Ruth bat card. By the same token, are there a bunch of old uni’s in a closet somewhere that they are punching irregular shapes out of to make these ugly cards? Here is a random “game-used” jersey card example.
Maybe I am just being cynical, or I am bored and need to be reading a book right now instead of pondering things but I really don’t understand who thought to save these things. Maybe not who thought of it so much as how many were kept around and are available to be destroyed. Me personally, I would rather spend $500 bucks on a card with an autograph of a player or a signed whole jersey.
I would love to see the result of a carbon-14 dating on the wood used in some of these cards because it would be some sh*% if they came back to be like 20 or 30 year old wood.
I’m done now.
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I've thought the same thing, too. For an 80-year-old bat piece, I need more proof than some "congratulations" wording on the back and some mumbo-jumbo about "certification."
Family/estate says it is authentic, Topps doesn't question it, people make money. That is how I invision it going down and I am highly doubting the authenticity of most of these Ruth pieces in this product. People need to do basic math and realize how amazingly mass produced Topps Tribute is.
Chris (hobby box on youtube) opened 4 boxes and got 3 ruths, f'in really? Not to mention the 40+ listed on ebay already.
I wonder if the people doing the chopping even know the difference between a store model & a game used bat.
It's not like anyone else would be able to tell once it was run through the chipper.
I tend to believe that these bat pieces have a good chance of being real. The shavings that they use are so tiny in comparison to the overall size of the bat that you could probably make a couple thousand cards from one bat. Especially since most cards of this type have low serial numbers, Topps could probably issue Babe Ruth bat cards in several sets all from one bat.
I am qualified to do C-12 daing…let's raise me some money and I'll tear a card up for the sake of science.
Honestly, the whole game-used card thing makes me really wonder. Why not buy a whole bat that was used in a game instead of spending $500 on a tiny shaving that MIGHT have been used by that player. I don't know the whole thing is just odd to me.
I'd rather have an auto, even if it's a crappy one that I will complain about.