Autographed trading cards have long been a special prize found in random packs of sports cards, but signing card after card can be a tedious process for the athletes with a pen in hand. Dallas Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott has been accused of having his signature on Panini cards duplicated by a machine, which has caused some controversy in the industry.
One of the nation’s leading grading services, Beckett Grading Services, is raising some questions about the authenticity of Prescott’s signature appearing on Panini 2016 Prizm cards, with attention to detail about how the signatures appear to share a strikingly identical starting and stopping point.
“They had a very machine like feel,” authenticator Steve Grad said in a story published by ESPN. “You could see the starts and stops.”
Grad, having been in the industry as long as he has, knew something was up.
The lack of natural flow associated with organic signatures led to Grad’s conclusion that they were done by autopen, a machine that politicians have used to sign documents in bulk since the late 1950s.
“I immediately knew they were autopen,” Grad said. “I’ve never heard of a modern athlete doing this.”
As noted by ESPN’s Darren Rovell, this is not the first time Panini has had some possible issues about autographs on their cards. Earlier this year, cards of Atlanta Falcons draft pick Takkarist McKinley came under scrutiny for potentially not being signed by him.
The lesson here? Autographs on sports cards are dumb anyway.
[ESPN]
