Neither of us works for the FBI so I don't think it is so safe to assume there is no evidence whatsoever, to assume we know the scope of the investigation or that we would necessarily have heard anything about the investigation, at this point, because it is still an open matter even if it is not being worked on.

So I will rephrase my statement since it was interpreted as being stated as fact. It is my opinion, not a conspiracy theory, based solely on many of the examples that BODA provided that, if it was not that they were knowingly grading bad cards that they were not trying their best to detect issues with the bad cards submitted by certain submitters. It would require someone submitting altered cards to know for sure that they are incompetent or incapable of detecting altered cards.

I can't believe PSA is THAT bad. I have to believe there was, and maybe still is, some element of looking the other way for certain submitters.

Goldin just brokered a private sale of the card for $1.7 million.

Thanks for the update Snowman .
Some good early guesses on sale price

1.7 million, not bad.

Would it have done better at auction?

Would it have done better in PSA 10 slab??
Will it be in a PSA 10 slab soon?

I would think yes as to #2, if I am correct who bought it. Anyone would if they could. And it is certainly worth much more as a PSA than an SGC.

How soon will be a PSA 10 now be for sale? By the end of the year?

Depends on who owns it.

I think spring auction, but likely.

Older grades, the complete absence of any easily located photos and two coming from Mastronet, I have a suspicion they will not be this nice and possibly have questionable border width . :cool:

I think the question is will THIS card be sold in a PSA 10?

Wilt
 

Thank you for the update, Travis. I’m glad I’m close to right on this one:) As for those of you who keep trying to put the card in a PSA holder, it’s a side issue at best. There’s no way to know if the grader would give it a 10, because they are so poor at grading. In addition, the SGC 10 is unique while there are already 3 PSA 10s. These are a couple of reality based reasons to keep it SGC. The rest is guesswork and hoping. Trent King

A card like this would not be submitted through the normal anonymous random process, I am sure. At least from the scans it certainly looks like it could merit a 10. Even if I'm wrong about the new owner, it's highly likely the person who bought it is known to PSA and would get personal attention for a crossover attempt.

Yep , The card is notable enough That PSA would award it a 10 to get it into a PSA holder .

And why not.

Was not hard to guess it would sell for over a million. :rolleyes: I think I am shocked by how much more than a million it sold for...70% more.

I suppose it being in the SGC holder might have prevented it from getting the most it could but given that Collectors now owns SGC, the market is looking at SGC differently from what I have noticed. Prices are up on a lot of SGC material from where they had been.

GL to the new owner if they flip it soon in a PSA 10. I am not remotely in that card market but I would think there is more of a chance it sells for less or does not sell due to a reserve (hidden or not) than it selling for more. This coming from a guy who is terrified to spend 5 figures on a card so there's that.

IMo What a fraud. "Private sale" the whole think just reeks.

IMO Goldin is (still) a con man

My grandmother is silently in her grave waiting for her Don West/Scoreboard inc refunds from HSN

Edited here (under penalty of lawsuit from Ken sheer moments after I was told my "info needed to be updated" and "I wasnt the only one who had been asked")

Guessing the moderator is free to disseminate our (personal) information as they see fit.

While you are busy scrubbing the internet Ken, see if you can find this quote...probably scared them off as well

""No other individual has done so much to screw over so many in this hobby. Ken Goldin was the man in charge at the now defunct Score Board, Inc. Many believe Ken Goldin pushed out countless product with autograph redemptions that he knew he wouldn't have to honor once Score Board, Inc. filed for bankruptcy. He left collector's holding now worthless redemption vouchers for the very same product he now often sells on Shop At Home for severely inflated amounts. "

So SGC already had the buyer lined up per the article. I thought Ken was no longer affiliated with PSA/SGC? Who brokered this deal?

PSA is tied in tight with eBay and Ken is part of eBay so that is a tough one to grasp since many were saying how Ken and Nat were no longer getting along. Be that as it may, I was told the buyer of the SGC 10 is from FL. SGC is in FL so maybe they contacted the person who bought it? Bigger question is why bring Ken in unless Ken is now tighter with SGC than PSA.

This is likely going to be another one of those situations where the details, which are none of our business, never come out and all of us will start presenting our theories...as I just did. :o

It makes no sense to me. If SGC put the parties together, and there was already the card shop guy involved too, why do you need someone else taking a fee? Assuming the buyer is who I think, he's very sophisticated and could certainly buy a card on his own.

Maybe Ken paid 100K to the seller to have his name associated with the transaction so the buyer from FL only had to put up 1.6?

The card shop dude has gotten his 15 mins of fame and then some. Was his role anything more than submitting the card to SGC? Sorry if it was mentioned but in the article he was the leading role and I was not understanding why he got top billing, other than the owner not wanting his name out there.

I dunno. I guess at these elite levels stuff goes on that the common man has no access to. Anyhow, a great deal I think for the original owner.

If anyone is interested found this on another site. Looks like the new one blows this one away.

What's with that top edge.

This copy would be rejected today as min size at PSA without question. And even if they were to grade it (they won't), it's a 7, maaaaybe 8 if you're lucky. Zero chance at a 9 though today. But again, this card is not passing grading today at PSA. I guarantee it. I would put my knowledge of 61 Fleer up against anyone in the hobby. I know this set, and how they are graded, like I know my own child.

While it looks trimmed, it's most likely a factory cut. This is just how Fleer cut these. Vast majority of 61 Fleer have similar slanted cuts believe it or not. And most do not measure 2.5 x 3.5. Particularly cards 1 through 6,which align on the right edge of the sheet and are ALWAYS (yes every single copy in existence) narrow.

It's not size that bothers me. It's the "bat ear" in the upper right. While not every trimmed card exhibits the dreaded curved corner I've yet to see a factory cut card with one.

That's what jumped out at me immediately.

Bottom right seems to have a similar dynamic, although a little less pronounced.

You are not supposed to look below the label!

I am not liking the cut at all either and not sure I recall seeing a legit cut on any card that looks like that. It might not be trimmed but if not it certainly appears that would be a factory miscut.

Yes, I know what you mean. But with this set in particular (and this is the only set I'm aware of where this is true), the bat-eared cuts like this are actually quite common. I've studied this set intensely. It took me years to build out the full set with all centered copies. I stared at pretty much every 1961 Fleer card that hit eBay or auction houses for many years. They're always the first thing I search, as it's my absolute favorite set in the hobby. And I've had multiple sets go through my hands. There are just way too many cards cut like this for it not to have been a factory issue. It's the most poorly cut set in the entire hobby, that I'm aware of. I think it would be nearly impossible to tell the difference between a factory-cut card and even one that was poorly trimmed, let alone "properly" trimmed (assuming the edge in question was on the top or the bottom) if looking at scans online.

Start looking closely at the cuts on some random commons and make mental notes. You'll see what I mean if you look into it.

An intact BVG 6.5 on ebay $7850
Even if I had all the money in the world to throw away I would get this before I would get the psa 10 pictured above ,
That thing looks terrible

double post

6.5? Am I not seeing paper loss on that bottom right corner? Either that or a folded-up corner. I'm seeing scratches which appear to be on the card and not the slab, and is that a partial fingerprint over the W in Wilt? This card and EX/MT should be miles apart from each other in a conversation.

I like the card--just find the grade strange.

Agree 100% - I like the full borders , the centering and clean print .
Would be very attractive as a PSA 4 or 4.5

Hmmm. I get how sloppy quality control would result in size issues or angled cuts. Not sure I can visualize how factory sloppiness would produce a bat ear, the way trimming can of course. Surely you can post some examples of this common phenomenon?

Except my centered Jerry West :P

Probably not as many as you but I've certainly handled a lot of them including a lot of high grade raw examples that I submitted for consignors (especially the one collection that had basically three of everything) and I don't recall seeing bat-eared corners. Lots of size variations, crappy cuts etc. but not curved corners.

I have had my fair share of 61 Fleers too. I have seen legit factory cuts that leave the card too small to holder and seen many that are cut on an angle or printed on an angle. Never seen a 61 Fleer or any other card with a legit factory cut (with the card sizing or not) with a bat ear appearance on any corner. I would love to see examples and since they are common, it should be no problem. Thanks in advance!

I thought we agreed that the appropriate terminology was “telltale tit”? Why are people suddenly using “bat ear”??!!

I own this card (as well as an SGC 6). You are correct, it is not an EXMT+ copy. At least not by today's grading standards at PSA. The bottom right corner is soft, but not folded-up. The scratches are on the soft inner sleeve that Beckett puts inside their slabs. They're not on the surface of the card itself. This card would grade as a 5.5 at SGC today, and anywhere between a 2 and a 5.5 at PSA depending on which grader you get on which day. But it's definitely not a 6 at PSA if cracked out and submitted today.

I don't have scans of the bad ones, but even in my heavily cherry-picked set I have a few commons with bat ear cuts or upward sloping cuts. Here are a handful of them. And again, these are the best of the best copies I've found over the years. You could browse ebay right now and easily find numerous copies with slanted bat-ear cuts.

I actually did see it. Was a beauty. But I have 3 centered Wests now.

Here are a few more from just the first page of ebay results

Note that a lot of these if you look closely aren't just slanted or diagonal cuts. They're sloped upward or downward toward the corner.

I see the same kind of bat ear on the upper right corners of the Baylor and the Shue as is present on the PSA 10 Wilt. Appreciate your posting them, Travis. I stand corrected.

If one wanted to perform a thorough search of scans on cards from the 61 Fleer BB set they would find the cut that Travis describes on many examples. He is correct!

So there IS a psa 10?

Makes the sale even more baffling

Thanks for those Travis, interesting.

Damn, I was close. Missed it by $100K