Pre-steroid era 1865 baseball card could fetch $100,000

A rare baseball card from 1865 featuring an amateur baseball team is expected to fetch at least $100,000 when it goes up for auction next month.

The 148-year-old card with a photo of the Brooklyn Atlantics on it was found by a man while searching for antiques at a Maine yard sale.

According to experts, the card — which is actually an original photograph of the team mounted on a card — is just one of two in existence and should attract a lot of serious collectors when it goes on the block Feb. 6.

The card looks more like a "Gangs of New York" promo shot than a baseball team.  The guy with the bat sure resembles Bill "The Butcher" Cutting surrounded by his Five Points gang.

Troy Thibodeau, who works at Saco River Auction Co. in Biddleford, Maine, said it's even hard to put an accurate price on it.

"There hasn't been another one that's sold," said Thibodeau.  "When there are only two known in the world, what's it worth?"

The only other known copy of the card is owned by the Library of Congress and is identified as the first dated baseball card.  It was handed out to supporters of the Atlantics to the chagrin of their opponents.

A Casey Stengel card — from a set of 30 cards that included Babe Ruth and Ty Cobb — is presumed to be the rarest card of all.

The Atlantics look like a group that was hard to beat — even without the juice.