New to memorabilia, what should I look for when purchasing a signed baseball?

[74Razor]

Collecting Clayton Kershaw items and thinking about buying a signed baseball of his. Some balls I find extremely expensive, others are very low with no bids. (EBay) What should I look for when buying an item like this? One auction that is in my price range is low, but the seller says that is it because the signature is not on the 'sweet spot' of the ball. It comes in a case with COA (have not seen pics of the coa) and free shipping. However, again, it is very low price with no bids on it. The seller is 100% rating though. I hope someone can give me some good advice on what to look for before I make a bid.

Thank you.

[sussicran]

Here's the best help I can give:

1. Buy a ROMLB (Rawlings Official Major League Ball) - if you don't see this abbreviation, then assume the ball is not one. These balls retail without signatures for ~$10 a piece, so remember that when buying. This is not a necessity, but the autograph is worth substantially more if it is a ROMLB as opposed to something else.

2. Stick with the basic COAs: PSA, Steiner, JSA, MLB, Mounted Memories, and (if needed) GAI. These are the most reputable authentication companies, so you can be sure your autograph is legit. If it just says "COA"... STAY AWAY!! But again, remember: you're paying for the authenticity here; these certified balls will be worth (and therefore will cost) substantially more.

3. If needed, find reputable sports stores that have eBay accounts: i.e. Radtke Sports, out of Georgia. Sports memorabilia stores such as Radtke usually offer valid COAs and holograms and will typically include pictures from the signing.

[ChosenOne719]

to add on to sussicran as far as coa's go another one I trust is tristar

[DnMcnabb5]

When it comes to COAs as well if they don't have one, ask them how they obtained the autograph or if they have pics to prove the signing. Like if it isn't from one of the reputable COAs i ask the seller to tell me how he got it whether it was at a local autograph signing or something like that where i can look up the information to see if the guy is telling the truth. I know like me i don't buy COAs at signings because i don't expect to sell them.

[NY Sports Teams]

I apologize, this is the first I saw this thread or I would have responded sooner.

The first thing you should do is be informed. That means you should know what a legit auto looks like. Don't go on eBay looking for examples of legit graphs, many are not.

I know of a few sellers on eBay that have a 100% rating that have sold forgeries. With that said that does not necessarily mean that they knew they were forgeries when they sold them. They may have purchased it from someone and believed that they received an authentic item.

I believe if a deal looks too good to be true it's probably not worth the risk.

There have been sellers who have pictures of items being signed by a player but the item they are trying to sell is a forgery. Just because they have a photo that does not mean that the item they are selling was the one pictured of the player signing.

As was stated you want an Official Major League ball.

I totally trust Steiner, TriStar, Mounted Memories and UDA. I don't trust any companies that buy from third parties and/or do not do their own signings. I also do not trust anything that is authenticated by ANY of the authentication companies but I understand the majority of the collecting communities view. Even though I have no trust in them the best is PSA/DNA following by JSA.

As you probably know you want a ball signed on the sweet spot in blue as opposed to black ink (I've got a Soriano ball signed in black ink, it's the only one and it's an eyesore). Never a sharpie.

One thing I started to do later on while collecting was to save a flyer or a ticket stub of the signing.

...Rick


EDIT: I'll add a sentence when I think of something else.