T206 Cobb Bat On Shoulder PSA 5 - PWCC
 

This auction starts tonight: https://www.pwccmarketplace.com/items/1865051

I consigned it to PWCC in June of 17. Here’s a link to that auction: https://www.pwccmarketplace.com/items/1508860

The crease in the upper left corner is much less prominent now than when I owned it. It appears to have been pressed which PWCC alludes to in the description and Brent is up front about in the video. Should PSA have graded it a 5 or an A after the wrinkle was pressed? Thoughts?

Any 5 with a crease is over graded. Not sure how that gets a premium on top of that.

Pwcc
 

Agree 100 percent. PWCC also says that the card has some paper separation from when it was altered or pressed. Another reason it might not warrant a 5. Sharp corners though.

Also, does PWCC offer a service to press cards?

In by 10 out by 4

The question in my original post probably should have been, “Should PSA have given it a numerical grade or an A after the wrinkle was pressed?”

I guess the hobby has moved way past me. If a crease was pressed out, and PSA would or should have know if it had based on Brent's video, then it should have come back as altered and not given a grade despite looking like a beauty. While I give Brent a great deal of credit for disclosing this what I find unsettling is that he seems ok with the fact that PSA abandoned their policies and my guess is that others will too. Maybe I need to get with the times and accept this as a part of the hobby? Unless this was an error, PSA must be more tolerable of wrinkles being removed or in this case, attempting to be removed.

The other thing that is not sitting right with me is that assuming nothing else was done to the card it then it is essentially in the same shape and should have gotten a PQ designation when first consigned. If it had the same centering and corners in June that it has now so why not give it the PQ then? And taking it one step further, while it looks great in terms of appearance and seems to deserve the PQ, how can he do it to a card that he feels has been worked on? I suspect many would feel that a worked on card is tainted and should not be valued higher.

I’m with you, Chase. I thought the card should have received the N-5 designation after the crease had been pressed and it was resubmitted. From PSA’s website, “N-5: This includes, but is not limited to characteristics on the card that appear to show some form of alteration such as paper restoration, crease/wrinkle pressing or enhanced gloss.”

As for it not receiving the PQ designation when I consigned it, that was in June of 2017 and I think that was before they started using PQ. I was happy with the price the card realized (maybe multiple bidders saw the opportunity to “clean it up” by pressing the crease).

I like Brent and do quite a bit of business with PWCC as a buyer and consignor. That said, his opinion on this topic differs from mine. He conveyed to me his general view on the topic in an email and he's given me permission to post it. Here were his comments:

I have had a long time to come to peace with the topic of restoration vs. alteration, so the line for me is clear and easy to toe. It’s all about physical evidence. So a corner or crease may be pressed, wax stains can be removed, a pencil mark can be erased, glue or a stain can be removed, etc, but if the action taken to restore a card ultimately makes the card look awkward or noticeably unnatural, then it could easily be considered altered (not restored)… otherwise it’s worthy of a professional grade. Pressing down corners (for example) has always been part of the hobby for as long as people have paid money for them… just the plastic cases people stored them in often had this affect and that was intentional. Some people seem to be able to erase a pencil mark and you’d never know it was ever there; other people end up damaging the card and abrading the surface and then it’s either a condition flaw or an alteration. A simple before and after photo doesn’t really matter unless there’s evidence on the card when viewed in a vacuum that suggest alteration. It seems that the major grading companies agree that physical evidence of alteration is required to render a card 'altered'... though I feel they could do more to make their position more clear.

While I agree that in a perfect world all trading cards would be completely virgin (it’s a romantic ideality) the harsh truth is that these items are made of paper, and if we want high grade examples which look the part, mild forms of restoration should be tolerated. Otherwise all we’d ever have are 5s and 6s to invest upon. Worse, without some of these minor flaws being fixed, we’d have pack fresh cards with superficial corner flips that looks like 8s and 9s stuck in EXMT 6 holders and that would create tremendous volatility in the pricing that I feel would keep this market a silly hobby and prevent it from maturing into an alternative asset class. Minor restoration in the market is actually needed in my view; we’d be in trouble without it. Trading cards are simply too rare and this is especially true for high grade trading cards. Restoration is nothing new to collectibles markets worldwide, including comics, coins, and fine art. All have matured around this topic of restoration and it's time trading cards do the same.

Regardless of how the market ultimately gels around restoration vs. alteration, I feel transparency of condition and eye appeal is of paramount importance. We want investors knowing what they are buying as much as possible.

June of last year. PQ didn't exist then; HE did.

As to whether or not PSA should have detected it, obviously something rated the downgrade from raw to a 5. The light surface wrinkle could have been the reason. It is not in the same holder or same cert number, it was broken out instead of reviewed or reholdered. If the card was determined to pressed down to remove the crease, they would have returned it as Altered Stock or graded as Authentic-Altered based on the request of the submitter.

It is in a 5 holder so obviously it was not determined to be pressed down however it is clear that PSA opted to disregard the observation that Brent made about the fact it had been pressed down or Brent is wrong about what he is seeing and he just trashed a consignor's card.

PSA's grading standards have obviously changed over the years and maybe 15 or 20 years ago a card that had evidence of having a crease pressed out would have been given the N5 but maybe now when it is subtle, as Brent suggests, the grading companies ignore it and down grade the card as if the wrinkle is still there. Hobby evolution...

PWCC Video
 

The PWCC video is a bad Saturday night live skit. They disclose the card as being altered only to later give it one of their BS “hi end” stickers. I can’t get over how ridiculous this is.

Toby Peters@n

Just add this card to the altered/restored/ignore debate.

I've heard and read the arguments that the hobby has "matured", or should, to accept certain things and maybe that does make sense. I think it does, but again that needs to come with disclosure and education.

The problem, as I see it, is that these issues have not really been dealt with by the third party authenticators. Worse, there are too may instances of not consistently applying their own standards. This card is a clear example of that, and there are many many others that have been discussed on the board previously (anyone remember that Play Ball Dimaggio?).

The perceived "favoritism" (?) given to certain customers/consignors by all the other parties involved further complicates the issue. Some of it is borderline/outright "willful ignorance" in my view, all in the name of ever increasing prices.

That inconsistency alone adds to the "tremendous volatility" in prices and grading, none of which truly contributes to a healthy marketplace.

sure seems ridiculous to grade this a 5 with a crease. sure, there is disclosure here in the video and writeup, but the 5 allows for someone in the future to be tricked by this. don't like it. grading it for the crease would allow the card to be sold at whatever the market would bear, if someone wants to pay "5 prices" then, so be it, but to grade it a 5 is not right.

So let me understand. If a card has a crease pressed out of it, it still gets a number grade. However, if a card was kept in a screw down holder, it is altered. Doesn't make sense to me.

You guys are thinking that PSA actually determined it to be pressed out. They obviously didn't detect that. So with a miniscule surface wrinkle (only one side visible), they gave it a 5. That's SOP (maybe slightly generous) for them.

Anyone who has Joe Orlando's ear want to share this with him? I'm sure he wouldn't be amused that PWCC is making a public fool out of him.

Maybe I'm slow, but where does Brent allude to the pressing of the wrinkle?

I thought he alluded to the crease being pressed by calling it “virtually absent.” In my mind I thought he was implying that the crease was more severe at one time, but now that I type this I realize that’s up to interpretation and could just be because I know that it was more severe at one time. Nonetheless, he’s clear about it in the video.

In the video. Pretty risky if someone cracked out a nice 5 to try to press out a wrinkle. Although with those corners I suppose this was the card to try it on. Kind of ironic if they almost succeeded only to end up with the card back in a 5 holder.

So I'm back to "anyone wanna share this with Joe O?"

Send him an email. I'd be surprised if he cares.

At 1:06 on the video.

Brent states he sees the crease was pressed out at 1:06 in the video. Nobody can speak for PSA but the fact that it is in a holder implies they let it by, if we assume Brent knows what he is looking at. Sure PSA graders all know what a partially pressed out crease looks like because most advanced collectors do as well. Sounds like PSA has a sliding scale on rejecting cards based on the severity of the work.

Do pressed out wrinkles/ creases sometimes " reappear" ?

Yes

They press comics all the time and no one seems to care. Or cards that get soaked.

Has anyone brought this up with PSA?
I am very curious because I have also seen a T206 card that once had a visible crease show up in a different slab without a crease. However it’s worth noting the grade stayed the same, different cert number.

In the example I’ve seen the crease was completely void and the card looked legitimately clean.

I’d like to hear from the grading source about this subject

You should probably email them because you will not receive an answer here.

I called PSA customer service and got the reference to their website resources: https://www.psacard.com/resources/gr...andards/#cards

Under the No Grade definitions drop down you’ll see the entire list of probable cause items that would result in a N-# flip return to submitter. You can always ask for an authentic or authentic-altered flip.

Pressing creases falls under N-5 and would result in no numerical grade.

So I think that answers the question. No need for additional emails to Joe Orlando

Disclosure is the main thing to me. IF I know what I am buying then all is good. Unfortunately the TPG's are human and can only catch so much. Beware of high grade, small cards. Years ago borders were bigger. :)

They still are on the caramels. Like little, fluffy marshmallows :D

LOL...trust me, there are short borders on caramels too.