Padre, Shé And The Twins 8x10

I have made some significant additions to my Machete autograph collections. Last year I picked up three 8x10 autographs; Cheech Marin, Michele Rodriguez and the Avellan twins (Electra and Elise). Not long ago I created some custom Danny Trejo cards that I planned to send TTM but I have been procrastinating, I really need to get them sent out.

Would You Buy This Card?

Last week this 2007 SP Sign of the Times Griffey/Dunn dual autograph sold for $36, which is a deal with a Griffey autograph. But if you look, both Griffey’s and Dunn’s autographs are faded.

Would you buy this card knowing that in a few years that the signatures will be illegible?

2018 Topps Star Wars Archives Signature Series, Does It Interest You?

Topps announced a couple of Star Wars releases this year; including Finest, Galaxy and a buyback product. I am looking forward to the Star Wars Finest release in October, I just love the original Finest set from 1996.

The first product of coming out will be the buyback set, 2018 Topps Star Wars Archives Signature Series. It is a 1 card per box product and is pre-selling for around $60 from dealers. The set is built with buybacks that Topps had the actors sign and they are serial numbered and while no autograph list has been announced, Topps has said the actors signing will include all three trilogies, animated shows and spin-off films.

The price isn’t too bad when you consider some of the similar products Topps has released as online exclusives but the checklist is going to make or break the product.

American Horror Story Asylum Goodies

I was kind of late to the American Horror Story party but my daughter suggested to me that I may enjoy the series, so I started watching and I am hooked and I am only in season two. The episodes are engaging, and I like that each season is a completely different storyline and while there may be some actors from one season to another they play a completely different character. Like Zachary Quinton plays a ghost attempting to keep his home in season one’s Murder House and in season two’s Asylum he plays a psychiatrist.

I picked up a couple of autographs and relic cards. The autographs are Joseph Fiennes and Naomi Grossman. They both play powerful characters in Asylum; Grossman’s Peeper appears more towards the end of the season. Quite a few of the actors added an inscription based on their character on their autograph cards. Fiennes plays Monsignor Howard so his inscriptions are religious based while Grossman plays a pinhead named Pepper who is illiterate so she signed "Pepper" as her character would have signed. 

Here is what Naomi Grossman normally looks like, a huge difference from Peeper. 

I liked this relic card especially because it isn’t the standard clothing relic, but instead a piece of a broken record. In the show, which takes place in an asylum (I know, the season name gives it away right?), Sister Jude, who runs the Briarcliff Manor Asylum, insists that the song “Dominique” by the Singing Nun play on a constant loop on a record player in the rec room. Later in the season the record gets broken and Breygent took the pieces and used them for prop cards, a very cool idea.

Iksmezrtsay Lrac Autograph?

I came across this one on Twitter and it turns out that Yaz signed the backs of all of his base 2017 Topps Clearly Authentic autograph cards so his signature appears backwards, the parallels were signed on the front. As a buyer would this affect you? Does it lower the value of the card or would you skip it all together and maybe chase one of the parallels that were signed on the front?

There are currently 3 base autographs up for auction running with BIN prices of $115-150 and in the past three months there have been 5 sales running $67.91 through $108.88 so they are selling but you wonder if more would have sold had they been signed correctly.

The The The Grinch

In the 1970s and 1980s there was nothing more exciting to a kid than hearing the CBS Special introduction music around Christmas. It meant we were about to be entertained for the next 30-60 minutes with either A Charlie Brown Christmas, a Rankin-Bass show or How The Grinch Stole Christmas. Now kids have the 25 Days of Christmas on Freeform (Formerly ABC Family) or 24 hours of A Christmas Story, but decades ago we were at the mercy of CBS and our parents. If you missed one of the specials, you were out of luck because it wasn’t going to be on again until next Christmas.

Now that I have set the preface for this post I will get to the card part.

In 2000 Ron Howard and Jim Carrey joined forces and made the Grinch live action. I was very skeptical when it came out, there was no way that a live action Grinch could capture Boris Karloff’s Grinch. I eventually came around and love the movie, one of my favorite holiday classics.

I just picked up four autographs from the set, two Christine Baranski and two Jeffrey Tambor. Tambor played Mayor Augustus Maywho and Christine Baranski played Martha May Whovier. The cards have more limited versions, these are the black ink, which are the most common. There is also blue ink and the red ink versions are the most limited. I was able to work out a deal with the seller, each card for $4 and then $4 for shipping. 

Other autographs in the set include director Ron Howard and artists who worked on the original animated special. Taylor Momsen, who played Cindy Lou Who, didn’t sign her cards but you can find her unsigned cards for a premium.  

Two More Additions To The Panini Autopen Scandal

Time to add a couple more autopen autographs to Panini’s list.

After the announcement that Dak Prescott used an autopen on stickers that Panini used for his redemptions from the 2016 Panini Prizm release some people have begun checking on other Panini sets to see if this is not a one-time occurrence and a person on the Blowout forum found that Brian Kelly, from Florida Georgia Line, used an autopen on the stickers that Panini used for the 2014 Panini Country release. Another person found that Kelly’s bandmate Tyler Hubbard also used an autopen for the stickers that were used in the same release.

The use of an autopen is not Panini’s fault, that is on the athlete/personality that are signing the cards and stickers, but what is on Panini is that on more than one occasion these autographs have passed through people’s hands and nobody did anything about it. One or two autopen autographs can understandable slip through without being noticed but in the case of Kelly and Hubbard we are talking sheets of perfectly signed autographs that are on the same location of every sticker and signed with the same pressure, same start and stop location, same little swoop and loops and same angle every time. This is a situation of seeing and not caring, a QA issue.

At this point collectors are just looking for any autograph sequence that may look similar as a way to nail Panini, though this isn’t only a Panini problem, this a Panini only problem right now.

A Little Scandal For Panini

Another scandal within the hobby, this time coming from 2016 Panini Prizm and the accusation that Dak Prescott has been using an auto-pen to sign his signature for redemptions from the set.

When I first saw this story appear on Twitter yesterday some people were saying that it was Beckett/BGS who notified Panini and wouldn’t grade the autograph on the card(s) submitted. I have not found any additional information regarding BGS being the first to find the issue but there is no question that Dak did not sign at least some of his cards.

EDIT 7/5- It was verified by Ryan Cracknell this morning (7/5) that it was BGS that did notice the issue and it was Beckett Authentication's Steve Grad who notified Panini. 

These are $350+ cards of one of the hottest rookies of 2016, Panini really mishandled this one. The back only says that they guarantee the autograph but in this case they cannot even do that. This isn’t an isolated incident of questioning an autographs authenticity and this isn’t a Panini only problem either. The only way to really counter things like this is to have a company rep witness the individual signing but that isn’t going to happen.

The Zombie Apocolypse

Last week George Kosana passed away at the age of 81 years old, he co-wrote Night Of The Living Dead with George Romero, he was one of the producers and he also played the sheriff in the movie. In honor of him and his work I am doing this post which includes two Kosana autographs.

Night of the Living Dead has been a favorite of mine for many years. George Romero is the father of modern zombies and if he had not been able to rustle up $114,000 in investments in 1968 and put together what would amount to a student film we would not have movies like Shaun of the Dead, Zombieland and World War Z and shows like Walking Dead and iZombie would be flops.

But Romero and his friends did pull things together and along with the citizens of Evans City, Pennsylvania unleashed Night Of The Living Dead and the zombie world has not looked back.

Actually beyond liking the movie I used to not be a fan of zombie stories but that has since changed. A quick factoid, many of the actors were part of the production company or friends of the production team with the extras roles being filed by the citizens of Evans City.

I have been working on a nice collection of autographs and sketch cards from the 2012 Unstoppable Cards Night Of The Living Dead but there are a couple of other options, not many, available like the 1987 Rosem 50-card set (My next target of NOLD cards) and 1988 Image 10/Fantaco 68-card checklist.

2012 Unstoppable Cards promo card of Karen Cooper, played by Kyra Schon

A couple of sketch cards showing Karen Cooper

A couple of sketches of Harry Cooper, played by Karl Hardman.

A couple of sketches of Ben, played by Duane Jones.

This second sketch card of Ben was drawn on pages from the original script. There were only two of these in the entire sketch set.

A couple of sketches of Johnny, played by Russ Streiner. He was part of the production company (One of the movie producers) and while he was one of the first characters seen in the movie his role was uncredited in the movie. His mother also played a zombie in the movie.

A sketch of the first zombie of the movie, Bill, essentially he is the Godfather of all the zombies on television and in movies now. The role was played by Bill Hinzman, who was a cameraman for the movie.

A sketch of the news reporter, played by Lee Hartman.

I have a 10 autographs from three different sets. My favorite is the Russ Streiner that has an inscription from probably the most famous line to come from the movie. Most of his cards are just his signature so this one cost a bit more than I was hoping to spend but I had to have it.

A Kyra Schon

A John Russo. He wrote the screenplay and had two parts in the movie, one as a military reporter and one as a zombie, which is pictured here.

A double dose of George Kasano. I am not sure why but he signed in both blue ink and black ink, neither seems rarer than the other so they both sell around the same price so I picked up one of each. He was another producer for the movie.

The next three are part of the 1990 Image 10/Fantaco set. Two I already had from the 2012 Unstoppable Cards set; John Russo and Russ Streiner, but the third was a big coup. The man himself George Romero.

The final two autographs come from the 2010 Breygent Classic Vintage Movie Poster Autographs; Judith O’Dea (she played Barbara) and Bill Hizman. What is cool about this one is that he add the inscription “Zombie #1”), most of these cards he just signed his name.

The latest card in my collection is a printing plate form the Movie Poster subset. As far as I know Unstoppable Cards only released one printing plate per card. The back is just a sticker that was added before the plates were packed out.

Wrestling With Some New Autographs

A follow up to the wrestling autographs kick I have been on recently. Last week I posted some Roddy Piper cards and today I will cover the rest.

First up is Dwayne Johnson, the Rock…Do you smell what the Rock is cooking?

Surprisingly the Rock does not have any official autographs in wrestling but he does have an autograph in the 2002 Inkworks Scorpion King release (#A1). He is a personable guy and does sign autographs for fans so it is pretty easy to find reasonably priced TTM/IP autographs. This card is from the 2013 Topps WWE release.

Next is the Hulkster. Hulk Hogan has a ton of official autographs over the last 5 years. What I noticed is that he doesn’t have many modern cards with TTM/IP autographs which leads me to believe he doesn’t sign to often for fans anymore. The 1991 Classic WWF release is my favorite card for old school autographs.

Now for the big guns; Rowdy Roddy Piper. This is my second Piper autograph, I actually got this one before the 2015 Sportkings Vault card that I posted about last week. I was very iffy on this card, I went back and forth checking and double checking the letters thinking it was signed “Rowdy Roddy Piper” before I realized it is personalized. Not sure what the first line is but after some deciphering I realized that he signed it “Rowdy Roddy”. This too is from the 1991 Classic WWF release.

 

A double shot of the Macho Man Randy Savage, these cards were a big coup for me. Savage was a guy I just had to love, the way he talked and acted was just so cool. Hell, I still imitate him to give my kids a laugh.

The Macho Man has no official autographs and has only since begun appearing in WWE sets again in 2014, prior to that he has WWF cards through 1995 and WCW cards through 2000. There is a conspiracy connected to his banishment from WWF/WWE between 1995 and 2014 but that is for another day.

When it comes to Savage there is no real “perfect autograph” specimen. If you look at what he signed it changes quite often with the only constant being the “M” These cards are from the 1991 Classic WWF release and a 1999 WCW sticker release. I now have 4 1991 Classic WWF autograph cards; Ricky Steamboat and these three.

If you are looking for a Macho Man autograph prices range, just do your homework. Another safe option is one of his Slim Jim 8x10 promotional photos. These were given out by Macho Man at conventions so you know they touched his hands and you can find them regularly around $50.

 

I am still on the hunt for a wrestling autograph White Whale, a Junk Yard Dog autograph. JYD died in 1998 before autographs became popular and so his only autos are TTM/IP and there are not many around and those that show up are much higher than I can pay at this point.

Oh Mark, You Devil!

I came across these Mark Hamill autographs that made me laugh, apparently when he was younger he used to personalize the autographs writing whatever was asked of him. He supposedly got in hot water over the “Largest Bong” inscription (the bottom card) so he stopped doing it.

Now when he does personalized inscriptions they are usually “May the force be with you…” type inscriptions but I did find an “Oh Shit!” card for auction with a $400 BIN. I would love to pick up any one of these but I probably would not pay anything more than $50 for one of his personalized inscription cards.