One of These Is Not Like the Other

So you have a bunch of money burning a hole in your pocket, which one of these two cards would you choose to buy? The one on the right? Eeeeeeh! Wrong answer! Unfortunately, some poor schmuck on eBay paid over $300 for it. In fact, there were multiple bidders at the top willing that pay that much.

The example on the left is courtesy of Joe Montana collector Don. The card on the right is not reprinted. The holographic stickers on the front are real. The authenticity sticker on the back is real, in fact the serial numbers are less than 15 apart (hard to tell exactly due to image quality) on these two examples which tells you it's from the same product and not removed from some miscellaneous card. It's hard to make out the serial number, but it appears to be 9/10 (it wasn't stated in the auction).

So in case you haven't noticed yet, the autographs are fake. I checked every 2008 Topps Rookie Progression autograph card I could find and every autograph had blue ink. The fake on the right has black ink. So you're asking yourself WTF... My best guess is the autographs were faded or damaged in some way (e.g., water damaged, smudged) that significantly reduced the value causing someone to erase three HOF quarterback autographs.

If we take a closer look at the top of the Elway sticker, ink is visible where it was hastily rubbed off and collected at the edge of the sticker. I guess we'll never know why unless the culprit steps forward. The only silver lining is had this been the real McCoy, it would have sold for x2-3 times the price, which tells me enough people realized it wasn't real, but unfortunately it was a costly mistake for someone.