Frank Thomas 1990 Topps NNOF Error... What's the story?!

MansGame · May 3, 2013

Via Beckett.com - The Frank Thomas card (#414A) was printed without his name on the front, as well as portions of the black borders being omitted, creating a scarce variation. Several additional cards in the set were subsequently discovered missing portions of the black borders or missing some of the black printing in the backgrounds of the photos that occured in the same printing that created the Thomas error. These cards are rarely seen and the Thomas card, for a newer issue, has experienced unprecedented growth as far as value.

Just curious, how rare do some of you guys think (or know) these are? How many board members own one? Do some of you buy old wax and try to pull one if you see packs for sale?

Also, looks like a lot of knock offs on eBay... how do you know if it's the real deal?

I'm sure the Frank Thomas player collectors could help here... would love to see pictures if anyone here owns one.

kerryfan5 · May 3, 2013

Sweet card. I grew up collecting during this era. That card was gold back then. Now it's more like platinum.

MansGame · May 3, 2013

kerryfan5 said:
Sweet card. I grew up collecting during this era. That card was gold back then. Now it's more like platinum.

Yea, no kidding! I remember when it was out as well... I mostly collected in the 90s. I clearly never owned one but don't remember it being that iconic but I do remember it being expensive. God, I feel like I had a shot at it back then for a good price but passed... as you said, it's like platinum now it seems like.

jbhofmann · May 3, 2013

No logo iconic card...

saucywombat · May 3, 2013

I have most of these. Here is a picture of all of the 1990 Topps "Blackless" cards together as they appeared on the sheet. Great thread on the PSA board about these, easy to find with google of 1990 Topps blackless.

Mark McGwire Museum · May 3, 2013

jbhofmann said:
No logo iconic card...

That's a fake, as it has the solid black lines around all the borders. The easiest spot to notice if it's real or not is around the blue name box.

I owned one for a couple weeks and ended up flipping it on eBay after sending it to BGS.

MansGame · May 3, 2013

[MENTION=4124]saucywombat[/MENTION] - You own the Thomas? Nice! How much do these go for anyways? What are the chances of pulling one if you came across a box or packs at a flee market or something?

saucywombat · May 3, 2013

Beckett Article from a few years ago

jbhofmann · May 3, 2013

Mark McGwire Museum said:
That's a fake, as it has the solid black lines around all the borders. The easiest spot to notice if it's real or not is around the blue name box.

I owned one for a couple weeks and ended up flipping it on eBay after sending it to BGS.

didnt know....just googled and threw an image up...thanks for the lesson though

MansGame · May 3, 2013

saucywombat said:
Beckett Article from a few years ago

Wow, cool... sounds like finding a Thomas is not easy at all!

saucywombat · May 3, 2013

MansGame said:
@saucywombat - You own the Thomas? Nice! How much do these go for anyways? What are the chances of pulling one if you came across a box or packs at a flee market or something?

If you are looking to obtain one, buying one on Ebay is the way to go. Needle in a haystack does not begin to give an idea of how hard it would be to find product that contained these errors. I know of one person who has pulled the card from packs this century. As far as is known, they are only found in wax packs (possibly only "grocery" style distribution), with an original East Coast distribution (+Michigan), error was early in the press run in 1990.

Picking up flea market commons might be a worthwhile endeavor - as the other related errors are overlooked or unknown to most. These other cards would easily brign $75 a piece on Ebay. Rarest of the rare as far as modern baseball cards are concerned.

Thomas is at least going for $500 right now. I have one graded PSA 6.5, I would expect that it would sell in the $750-$1000 range on Ebay right now. There has been a big uptick in interest the last 3-4 years. I bought mine in 2009 for much less.

MansGame · May 3, 2013

saucywombat said:
If you are looking to obtain one, buying one on Ebay is the way to go. Needle in a haystack does not begin to give an idea of how hard it would be to find product that contained these errors. I know of one person who has pulled the card from packs this century. As far as is known, they are only found in wax packs (possibly only "grocery" style distribution), with an original East Coast distribution (+Michigan), error was early in the press run in 1990.

Picking up flea market commons might be a worthwhile endeavor - as the other related errors are overlooked or unknown to most. These other cards would easily brign $75 a piece on Ebay. Rarest of the rare as far as modern baseball cards are concerned.

Thomas is at least going for $500 right now. I have one graded PSA 6.5, I would expect that it would sell in the $750-$1000 range on Ebay right now. There has been a big uptick in interest the last 3-4 years. I bought mine in 2009 for much less.

Yea, I wouldn't give any hope to buying commons or looking in bins now a days lol... I was thinking if you could find a box or a case or something, what are the chances... I'm sure slim to non at this point lol.

I want one but not that bad... just an iconic card IMO and would love to own one at some point, along with most other iconic cards in baseball card history.

BunchOBull · May 3, 2013

My copies:

The Hart was a gift from Dave.

Link to Thread Dave mentioned:

Collectors Universe Forums - 1990 Topps Frank Thomas NNOF revisited...introduction to my theory

MansGame · May 3, 2013

^NICEEEEEEEEEEE

MansGame · May 3, 2013

[MENTION=2840]BunchOBull[/MENTION] - How in the world did you get your hands on a PSA 9? Is there a 9.5 or 10 out there? I bet that's worth a pretty pennie

BunchOBull · May 3, 2013

There have been a few other articles too, a quick blurb in the now defunct Tuff Stuff, and then a blurb in a Frank Thomas article I was lucky to be included in.

ThoseBackPages · May 3, 2013

someone link the PSA MessageBoard link, im too lazy to find it

BunchOBull · May 3, 2013

MansGame said:
@BunchOBull - How in the world did you get your hands on a PSA 9? Is there a 9.5 or 10 out there? I bet that's worth a pretty pennie

A questionable PSA 10 (looked more like an 8.5 to me) sold at auction last year for more than $25k. It was part of the Gem Mint Dimitri Young collection before he sold it all off. There are no BGS 9.5s. I feel like I may be able to get my 9 into a better holder one day. It was an very early PSA graded card and is sharp, less the top to bottom centering issues that comes standard with this card. I was lucky and paid a record low for my 9 ($875) at the bottom of the market after the spike from the discoveries. Now it would easily be a $3-5K card.

BunchOBull · May 3, 2013

ThoseBackPages said:
someone link the PSA MessageBoard link, im too lazy to find it

I linked it up top E.

MansGame · May 3, 2013

Very cool article... so the guy thinks there are at least 200 copies out there and also says he thinks they were only pulled from wax packs (versus what?). Very cool. Doesn't sound like there is a PSA 10 out there, so looks like you have the holy grail?

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