Two US Caramel Hornsbys in HA last night

[oldjudge]

Originally Posted by benjulmag

Would you say that applies to rare 19th century cards? Cards such as that are not collected by registry collectors, nor are they valuable because they are condition rarities. Taking nothing away from PSA, if I wanted such a card authenticated and graded, I would feel more comfortable going to SGC.

If I was grading an Anson in Uniform, or any 19th century rarity, I would use PSA. I believe that a PSA graded card, even if it is not currently a registry card, will sell for more than an SGC graded card.

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by oldjudge

If I was grading an Anson in Uniform, or any 19th century rarity, I would use PSA. I believe that a PSA graded card, even if it is not currently a registry card, will sell for more than an SGC graded card.

I think that is true in most cases, notwithstanding SGC's rebranding effort.

[benjulmag]

Originally Posted by oldjudge

If I was grading an Anson in Uniform, or any 19th century rarity, I would use PSA. I believe that a PSA graded card, even if it is not currently a registry card, will sell for more than an SGC graded card.

Putting aside resale price/investment potential for a moment and looking at it purely from a collecting perspective, would whether a rare 19th century card was graded by PSA or SGC mean anything to you in deciding whether it was real/altered and how much you were willing to pay for it?

Maybe I am behind the times, and again not intending this as a negative statement about PSA, but for me as a collector wanting to know what I am buying, I would have more confidence in a SGC than a PSA grade.

[Rhotchkiss]

+1 re SGC

PSA gets the higher dollars, but I trust SGC more, and so I am happy (indeed of often prefer) my 100+ year-old cards, many quite rare, in SGC flips. And if that means I get an equal card at 70% the price, bonus.

[calvindog]

Originally Posted by Rhotchkiss

+1 re SGC

PSA gets the higher dollars, but I trust SGC more, and so I am happy (indeed of often prefer) my 100+ year-old cards, many quite rare, in SGC flips. And if that means I get an equal card at 70% the price, bonus.

Same. I send in all of my raw cards to SGC unless they don’t grade an issue. All of my Registry set cards are bought in PSA and I buy none raw. On prewar, non-Registry cards, I try to buy just SGC as I trust them more and like the flips more — but sometimes the cards are rare and you buy what you can get. On T206 I’ll buy either PSA or SGC because while the cards may be worth less in SGC holders they’re cheaper too. And sometimes a much better looking, same graded SGC card goes for a discount to its PSA twin.

Finally, while SGC service has been great for me, I find that a call or email to PSA is handled very well of late.

[oldjudge]

Corey: In all honesty, I trust my opinion of a card more than either PSAs or SGCs (as I’m sure you do) and do not rely on either to tell me if a card is good. My reasons for slabbing a card would be protection and/or resale value and with those criteria I think PSA is the clear winner.
As for knowledge, I think SGC is worse at detecting trimming, and they both miss more other things than they should.

[benjulmag]

Originally Posted by oldjudge

Corey: In all honesty, I trust my opinion of a card more than either PSAs or SGCs (as I’m sure you do) and do not rely on either to tell me if a card is good. My reasons for slabbing a card would be protection and/or resale value and with those criteria I think PSA is the clear winner.

That's fair, and certainly in regard to CdVs, cabinet and trade cards, if I was to rely on anyone other than myself as to questions of authenticity or alteration, it would not be a grading company.

Where we differ pertains to more conventional baseball cards. Being more a memorabilia collector than a card collector and not handling that many cards, I do not regard myself as having more expertise in detecting fakes/alterations than an experienced card grader. And rightly or wrongly I perceive SGC to have more experienced and knowledgeable graders than PSA. So for those conventional-type baseball cards in this era of high values and prolific counterfeiting and alteration, I probably would feel more comfortable having SGC look at it than relying solely on my own opinion.

[oldjudge]

I understand that. My collecting interests are so limited that it is easy to “know” what I collect very well. Not that I can’t be fooled, I can be. I just think it is less likely that I will be fooled that a TPG being fooled.