cracked cards on psa pop reports and registry?

[novakjr]

John's post about his Clemente issues got me thinking...If a card that is cracked and re-submitted, is counted twice(or more) on the pop report. And cards that are crossed over to other companies like SGC, or just flat out cracked, are still on the pop report. Exactly how accurate is the PSA pop report? Are any of these non-existent cards in the registries right now? Are the companies in contact with each other in regards to cards that have been crossed over so they can take the serial numbers out of their systems?

Or hypothetically, in John's case.. If he still had the original PSA flip after cracking and submitting to SGC and then back to PSA. Could he technically still use the original flip(or at least numbers) and have a 4 on his registry, despite the fact that the same card is currently holdered a 3?

At some point the holder becomes an extension of the card. Basically, combining to make a new product, part old, part new. With the serial number and slabbed grade being key components of the new product. Once it leaves PSA's hands, it becomes just another number in their system that truly only exists virtually in some cases. A number that can affect population, value, and any number of of other things. With so many loopholes, why are people so willing to let an innacurate pop report dictate what a card sells for or what they're willing to pay?

[vintagetoppsguy]

Exactly how accurate is the PSA pop report?

Not very accurate. Then again, neither is SGC's.

Are the companies in contact with each other in regards to cards that have been crossed over so they can take the serial numbers out of their systems?

No, the companies do not share that information.

Or hypothetically, in John's case.. If he still had the original PSA flip after cracking and submitting to SGC and then back to PSA. Could he technically still use the original flip(or at least numbers) and have a 4 on his registry, despite the fact that the same card is currently holdered a 3?

Yes, he could list it on the registry as a 4 even though it doesn't exist. PSA has no way of knowing the card doesn't exist. About 4-5 years ago just for fun, I added the Gretzky/McNall Wagner to my T206 HOF registry. At the time the card didn't reside in any other registry so the system took it. I forgot about it and it stayed there for a long time until I sold the cards and deleted the registry.

One other thing, some people send the flips in to the grading company and I think they will remove them from the pop report then.

[Majestic]

No, the multiple third party grading companies do not exchange information.

The best way to look at the pop reports is to imagine them as a list of production runs. The number is basically how many times they graded a particular card. They graded card "X" 25 times...wether it was the same exact card 25 times or 25 different copies of the card no one knows. The only thing you do know is there is a maximum amount of 25 graded examples.

Even though all the population reports are majorly flawed and there is nothing the companies can do about that, the most important thing to remember is that the number you are looking at will always be the maximum number of copies available. There will never be 10 copies of a Pop 5 card but they most certainly may be only 5 copies of a Pop 10 card.

Ford can tell you how many Mustangs they made in 1970 but they can't tell you how many still exist.

[glchen]

If you submit a cracked slab for reholder (or review), PSA would change the slab, but keep the flip, so the pop figure would still be accurate. If you busted it out of the slab and sent the card in raw to PSA, they would not adjust the pop figures unless you had sent in the flip as well.

[DixieBaseball]

I return my flips about twice a year. My guess would be at least half or more don't return flips, so the pop reports would all be a bit on the high side of estimates. My fuzzy math for pop reports is to take the pop number and subtract 20% from that number to get probably a more real number.

On some of the more scarce to rare issues, I feel the numbers may be a bit more accurate but probably a tad high.... As the years go by and these cards reside on the registry, I still think they provide invaluable data on just how rare/scarce some issues might be....

We have discussed this before, but if you take the Pop number from PSA, SGC, and BVG and then guestimate the raw number range, you can get a pretty good feel for just how many of a certain type of each player may be out there.

[Matt]

We have discussed this before, but if you take the Pop number from PSA, SGC, and BVG and then guestimate the raw number range, you can get a pretty good feel for just how many of a certain type of each player may be out there.

And that's the key; to add the pop reports and come to the conclusion that only 7 of a card exists is a huge mistake. However if the combined pop is a 7, and another card has a combined pop of 50, you can get a good sense that the first is a tougher card.

[ChuckRoss]

I've pondered this question myself and I think that the comment about relative scarcity (i.e. 7 vs 50) is about the only worthwhile thing you can garner from these lists, and only then if the numbers are big enough to be statistically relevant. I would bet that for many cards on the population reports there are many more examples ungraded than there are on the report.