You just outlined exactly what I do if a card on my want-list happens to reside in a slab. It gets broken out the minute I receive it.

It makes absolutely no sense to me, the exponentially ridiculous prices people pay for a card with corners that might have a microscopic difference in wear. Aside from the high likelihood of it being altered... who the hell cares anyway? The lower graded card often has a clearer image or better focus. It's just someone else's (often flawed) opinion.

I'll take the "7" and a new SUV over the likely altered "10" (with no new car) any day of the week. And I will free the "7" from it's corporate looking bar-coded case as soon as it arrives.

I agree looking for the Holy Grail Of a Card near perfect is assine it is all Opinions of a third party grading system that some of them dont know their ass from a hole in aground and Opinions are like Ass holes Everyone has one

Ron Petersen

I don't understand the high grade game at all when a 0.5 difference in a grade can mean a $10K+ difference in price with some cards. But I do like the look of my prewar cards in SGC holders a lot. I have PSA cards too, but I have those because I needed the card and it happened to be in a PSA slab. My cards are all low grade and have no chance of being altered to get a 0.5 grade bump for more money.

I don't like the fraud and altering of cards for a higher grade or when a seller knowingly sells an altered card with half assed disclaimers that a grading company reviewed the card and still graded it the same way. That's just crap and says a lot about the ethics of the seller.

Andy Hunt00n

But you DO like it enough to accept it.

Another PSA review blessing a BODA outed card.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/224481122793?nordt=true

https://www.blowoutforums.com/showthread.php?t=1423729

WE control the horizontal. WE control the vertical.

This is how you end-run BODA, just whitewash the whole damn thing.

None of this is surprising.

PSA's very first grade was corrupted. They've shown a strong disdain for fixing mistakes and correcting the process ever since.

And PWCC? The ones who overlook/encourage shill bidding and then come in here with sanctimonious promises to fix Ebay?

PSA and PWCC ignoring the fraudulent pedigree of this card, or any other, is about as surprising as the sun coming up and only slightly less frequent or regular.

why people pay crazy money
 

this same card could have been bought for
50% of the sale price two years ago
https://www.ebay.com/itm/40273928285...oAAOSw7fJgSBB~

no stocks , bit coin or other general open to the public investments could reap the same margins , and who among you would buy a Jordan Rookie UNSLABBED ?

I'd buy an unslabbed Jordan I can examine in-hand. These days, it's probably safer than buying a slabbed one online.

I know it will have very little. (None) effect. But I will take the time to email PSA and say that this behavior is not acceptable. Their corporate mission is to prevent altered cards from being sold in the market (LOL). If they are going to condone this behavior then they have failed. And if they have failed to continue to take money from people for a service they know they cannot or will not provide, that sounds like fraud. A class action suit would get their attention alot faster than another FBI investigation. And cards like this make it easy for jurors to understand. ( Although with prices going up it would be hard to prove damages)
Jmho
Jonathan Sterling

Isn't it well past time we all finally admit that PSA is part of the problem?

What are the chances the investigation can end in a RICO type charge? And how could we influence that?

And did taking the company private make it easier to hide their part in things?

My Prediction Nothing Will Happen.....

At least earlier you had the feeling some of the BODA-outed cards were returned to the consignor, taken out of circulation, bought back and sent to law enforcement, whatever. Not any more, apparently. Reaffirm and relist. Keep the party going. Brian, I sure hope there are going to be consequences at some point.

Every time the opinion sellers sell an opinion an angel gets it's wings, laughs out loud...

It's a Wonderful Scam

I am probably a minority, but I would buy and have bought a major card unslabbed. In fact, I pay extra for an unslabbed card. There is always some small element of risk in cracking it out, and it's annoying, so unless it's a very rare or unique item, I bid 5% for a less slabbed card than I will the same card unslabbed.

So I make my perfunctory semi-annual visit to Net54 just to see what's going on and it is truly astounding that the "hobby" has devolved to such a deplorable state of affairs with voluminous unconscionable business practices with no corrective action in sight and yet cards are still escalating in price. How mind-boggling.

As your nom de 54 says so well, Dan, it's no longer really a hobby. When it was, originality mattered, because people were mostly in it for love of the cards, and altering a card without disclosure violated every norm by creating artificially improved cards and skewing the natural stratification of cards according to how well they had survived. New cards out of packs all more or less looked the same, so nobody really cared about whether under a loupe they were mint or gem mint. With the overwhelming shift of focus to value, cards are commodities and originality matters much less. That's all it is.

Well then how do you explain why a PSA 9 sells for infinitely more than a PSA "A"? Those collectors with deep pockets and blind reliance on TPGs must care somewhat about "originality" in order to be driving up the prices of these perceived high grade cards. If originality matters much less these days, why not just buy the "A" graded card for 1/100th the price?

The FLIP matters. People buying the 9 largely don't care IMO if the card is altered, but a 9 flip is infinitely better than an A flip. The flip is the commodity, to quote myself.

If originality matters as much as it used to, why have card prices soared despite clear and massive revelations of trimmed and recolored cards in TPG holders with grades? To the point where any buyer not well-versed in alterations and not doing major due diligence cannot reasonably assume an expensive card is original.

But you know this. Was this a rhetorical question perhaps?

Yeah.... 50% semantics, 40% exasperation, 10% sarcasm. :cool:

And again.
Damn this one is bad.
Wut up with PSA?
Eye appeal sticker indeed, Brentsy.

https://www.blowoutforums.com/showthread.php?t=1461716

Over the Past Couple Of Years The Blowout Guys Doing this have been doing great work.

I think it’s time for a Book to be Written About All This........

It’s sadly Fascinating......it just needs a really catchy title ?????

Any ideas

"Bad Medicine: How Card Doctors Ruined the Hobby"

"Stuff Trumps All"

LOL

The many sordid tales of cutting up cards...

"Low Moral Character"
My journey as a Fraud

As I sat in my jail cell contemplating a way I was going to explain to my kids how I thought so little of myself and them that these were the decisions I made that landed me here. I wondered why I thought my arrogance and ego were enough to fool everybody...

The opinion sellers are just as bad

maybe ?
 

..." never get cheated "

..

I'll Go With...
 

Dr. Fraud: My Life as a Cutup

Silence the Armchair Detectives

When Purdue Pharma and other pharmaceutical companies came under fire for the opioid crisis they went out and hired the best lawyers they could, lawyers who previously worked for the government and the DEA fighting the opioid problem. This is exactly the tactic PWCC used. They shut up one of their most vocal critics with a paycheck. Sad.

How about, "Failing Grades: The PSA Story" ?

In my opinion, a feature length video documentary that can be viewed on a major streaming outlet (ie Netflix or Amazon Prime, etc.) would make a greater impact than a book.

Agree

In lieu of that how about a video of Nat Turner?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v9Cbq8W98MY&t=1s

35 minute mark or so, scandal discussion. Warning you may be disappointed.

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.


What a lying sack of.... to say that grading standards haven't changed and it's all newbies sending in cards complaining about grades is complete BS. It's on every forum, experienced submitters are getting the shaft. Especially on high dollar cards.

"Won't Get Fooled Again" would actually be a perfect title, whether it's a Book, Movie, TV Documentary or otherwise. :cool:

Except that we (collectively) do get fooled again and again.

Deny, minimize, deflect. Why not, it works.

+1 ... standards have changed unless it's a T206 Wags....

And back to the subject a little bit. How can anyone in the world think that PWCC having their bidders be private is anything but a cover for shills? Hopefully the FBI will make all the fraudsters pay, whomever they are.

.
.

Every non-ebay auction house has their bidders private too. Maybe Brentsy is just becoming state of the art.

It's also an effort to thwart BODA. One less piece of information to help them ferret things out.

Of course if I were PWCC I"d argue that REA, Heritage and Goldin aren't obligated to reveal their bidders.

OK beat me to it. It's actually policy at many auctions (mine included) to not reveal bidders or sellers. It's a privacy issue, if you reveal bidders then everyone from collectors to dealers to criminals who want to break in and steal things can target them. It's just a bad look to be selling in one manner for years, and then as the noose starts to tighten you start changing the way you do business to become increasingly opaque.

What's the rationale for not revealing consignors, e.g. card doctors? (Not you I know you don't knowingly take cards from them, I mean in general.)

That is so easy to fix though. Give your friend the card to consign. I would say there is close to a 100% chance that is happening.

.

Dang it. And to think I have to go home to my PSA 6 Carter RC that I paid $40 or so for...;)

Not sure these scumbags have friends outside their own circle. :eek::cool:

Really a similar rationale. You're calling attention to someone who may have a lot of money, a lot of cards or both. Anonymity is actually the norm in the auction world. Unless the owner adds some cachet to the sale you can go all the way up to Christies and Sothebys and anonymity is the general rule.

Conservation rules. A fine conserved asset.

https://www.blowoutforums.com/showthread.php?t=1470269

It's sure done the hobby a lot of good, letting card doctors and their enablers run amok without repercussions.