If having a T206 Honus Wagner in an 8 holder that a high percentage of the hobby thinks is trimmed has not hurt PSA, then having an overgraded Art Shell in a 10 holder is certainly not going to hurt PSA. I don't think PSA is going to do anything, and if it does, it will simply point to its guarantee and say that if the owner has a question he can always have the card reviewed by the graders.

So what is your answer? What do you propose? You want change, great. Lead the charge.

Peter- overgraded cards never ever get resubmitted. And undergraded cards always do, sometimes more than once. That's the grading game.

Agreed. I think the auction house which is running the suspect cards probably has more to be concerned about in terms of bad publicity but they don't seem to mind much either.

I don't think that's true at all. Many people care about the card. I certainly have sent in cards I thought were overgraded, with some success.

You sent them in to get a lower grade?

I would say the number of people looking to get a high grade card lowered is very small indeed.

No to get them to buy it back/compensate me.

Sounds interesting. Can you please expand on how that works? Like, if you buy a card graded a 6, think its overgraded cuz you see a hairline crease and send it to PSA, they agree it should be a 4, they give you the card back in a 4 holder along with $x reimbursement as compensation?

tiger8mush
 

they will not give refunds simply because you may have different standards. PSA will allow a 6 with hairline winkles or creases. i agree on cards that otherwise look mint i dont on cards with any wear or other problems

It is impossible to determine how 'accurate' TPGs are because grading is inherently subjective, especially when counting the angels on the pinhead that differentiates between grades or between half-grades. It is all subjective.

I once tried to measure my cards for technical compliance with PSA standards to cherry pick the best possible grade. All I could think to do was to measure the cards as closely as possible. I put a metric ruler on 1980 Topps cards looking for evenness of borders and lack of tilt on the card fronts. I found one card that was almost perfectly centered [less than a millimeter variation in size of white borders side to side and top to bottom] and not tilted [less than a millimeter variation from one end of the colored band on the card to the other. Razor sharp, perfect printing, clean everywhere, no discernable flaws. It got a 9 from PSA. Why a 9 and not a 10? I have no idea. And just to spread the love around, I sent in this card to SGC and got a 98, again I have no idea why 98 and not 96 or why a 98 but not a 100:

http://photos.imageevent.com/exhibit...%20Jackman.jpg

There's no logic to it and no reasonable rational explanation. On that day, at that time, the card was a 10 but not a "10+" in the view of the grader(s) who looked at it.

As for people who wish to collect based on the subjective opinions of third parties, doesn't bother me as long as they respect the rights of others to not collect that way. When they start running down collectors who prefer their cards in slightly 'loved' condition for whatever reason, then we can talk about how they are being manipulated.

I don't believe that cards go through all those hands, no way and PSA can say what they want. I have proof that this just does not hapen these days.

the thread is dead

bump the thread is dead

When they have agreed with me they just kept the card and refunded my purchase price.

You bumped it 3 times in 4 minutes. More strategic bumps lead to better results, generally speaking. Bump it all you want....not a big deal to me. I think the folks that collect 10's (Gem Mint) get exactly what they want. No harm done to me. Live and let live.....(and I just got the "Live and Let Die" theme in my head.....hopefully it will go away or I will be hearing it all day :()

Leon this will help.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JK2hKzZss5Y

Peter, I did that with a 1953 Bowman Color Duke Snider PSA 7 that had a huge water stain on it. Half the card was stained. I probably coulda got it out, but I shouldn't have had to. I bought a PSA 7 with a huge stain on it. They bought it back and regraded it a PSA 5.

Three minutes and eleven seconds well spent. Thanks Peter!!

Paul's best song post-Beatles.

Junior's Farm.

I think part of the problem is that it was not two cards that got upgraded but like 6-7 and all from the same ebay account pang21, the Shell was just the worst of the bunch but the 76 Ryan from a 9 to a 10 was just as bad imo. I can understand PSA making a mistake on a grade, it happens, but one person getting a bunch like that and on an in person service at the National makes me a little uneasy.

Paul's best song post-Beatles:

Maybe I'm amazed.

+1 a lot uneasy

And (as I understand it) it wasn't an average Joe off the street that got these bumps, it was an ex-grader who maybe had an in

I agree that one submitter getting very many bumps at the National makes me a bit suspicious, as it would any intelligent person. I am not saying anything was wrong, just that if I were management I would be looking into it just to make sure everything was on the up and up. There is rarely harm in verifying.

Basis?

I always thought it was "Maybe I'm a Mays'd?"


http://i.ebayimg.com/t/1961-Topps-57...Wpg~~60_57.JPG

http://i.ebayimg.com/t/1961-Topps-57...!SQ~~60_57.JPG

Dan are you sure those are the same card, I think I see some different markings.

Grading shouldn't be done by humans, but by computers.

A computer can scan a card, plot 10,000 points of data, plot all the tobacco stains, plot the creases, paper loss, centering ratio, and come up with a numerical grade.

Accurate 100% of the time.

Peter,

I can't say positively either way. This was originally posted on Post#130 by "vintagetoppsguy". It would help a lot if we could see the backs of both cards.

Corners look different to me, and the 9 has a prominent black speck just in from the border on the top left that does not appear to be there on the 8.

I can. :D

They are definitely the same card.

Here are the bottom right corners blown up.

PSA 8
http://i185.photobucket.com/albums/x...guy/Mays8A.jpg

PSA 9
http://i185.photobucket.com/albums/x...guy/Mays9A.jpg

Notice two things.

1.) How the bottom corners hook down on both cards.
2.) The two indentions on the right border in the same spots. You can only see so far up the right border because it's hidden by the slab on the 9, but you can see enough of it to know they are the same card.

Also look at the same corner ding on the bottom left border in the scans Dan posted above.

The top one looks like it has a slight rounding at the very tip of the corner that the bottom one doesn't have?

There was a computer grading company
 

there was a computer that graded cards, don't remember the company. I think they had more fakes in their holders than anyone. Percentage wise anyways. The computer would only grade as accurately as it was programmed. PSA needs to work on QC in my opinion. Also the individual that thinks Joe O should look at all the 10s? That is completely irrational and is not his job. You want to say Reza should, Id kind of agree on high dollar or vintage 10s, but this still is probably not feasible due to their high volume, the isn't SGC's submission totals PSA gets waaaay more cards to grade than SGC.

does anyone remember who and how long ago? I have been working on this since 2005. Never heard of this before. It's gonna cost about 500k for the machine and software.

You can't ever replace the human eye though. The machine can't tell if there is good trimming or authenticity of a card. A 25x scan of the card for graphing like a finger print for identifying the card and any alterations. You never know if the card night get stolen and cracked then submitted later. This will detect if the card has been reported stolen or not. A 10x scan for grading reasons as well as a dimension scan with the factory/know variances for the particular cards. A backlight scan for alteration detection. Once the grade is given the slab will be barcoded for information log. If the card is determined altered it will also have a 2-3 digit code below the graded area for use to know what was done and where it was found. For crossover cards there will be and area on the back of the flip stating company and previous grade.

Someday I will work in the hobby but until then............

it was a company called CTA.
Computer grading

After studying the two scans, it's my opinion they are the same card. There is a blemish on the 9 on the top edge near the top left corner that isn't on the 8, but that could either be on the slab or even on the card that could have been acquired after the crack-out.

But as David pointed out, there are a lot of identical edge imperfections. Also, the words "Willie Mays - CF" are dead matches when observing the white snow on those letters on both scans.

What most disturbing is that, in my opinion, the corners have been improved. The bottom two corners on the 9 appear to be sharper than the 8. So with that said, subjectivity of assigning accurate grades isn't the only problem with TPG.

Right edge looks like it has a rougher cut in the top card than the bottom card.

Re: Computer Grading
 

I'm sure the optical algorithims can be modified to higher accuracy. As far as detecting if a card is authentic or not, I think that's what a grader's job should be. When a card is sent to PSA, an authenticator first determines if the card is indeed real, then scans the card into the grading computer for final analysis and numerical grading. In essence, the professional grader's job is now limited to determining if a card is real or not before a computer does the actual grading.

I also think computer grading can put a stop to resubmissions over and over for grade bumps. If a computer can scan a card and determine that it has been submitted before, it can reject that submission, or at the very least, not double count the pop report.

Somehow the conspiracy theorist in me thinks that grading companies want people to submit cards over and over, and may actually prefer inaccurate grades.

the mays 9 is back
 

I think I stated all that already in what I am working on.

PSA Grading and CU Forums
 

A very, very interesting thread.

I am grateful that it remains uncensored here on net54.

So someone bought it and consigned to another seller that quickly :confused:

Are you a software developer or engineer?

I've pondered the idea of developing image processing software to look at centering, registration, corners, edges, and to look for creases, paper loss, fading, etc. It would be a monumental task, and would require custom code (or a template of some sort) for each type card.

IMHO, the Mays cards are not the same. If you look at the photo the printing flaws in the picture vary from card to card.

Just my guess but if you look the same buyer purchased the PSA 8 from Probstein123 and then when it was upgraded to a PSA 9 and relisted they win the card again from Probstein123, sure looks like a consignor bidder/shill won his own card the second time so then they decide to consign it over to PWCC and they now know the ceiling bid of the two underbidders ($701.77 and $575) from the last auction. I wonder if they tried a second chance offer on the underbidder and they declined so just relist it with another consignor. This is getting old.

First sale won by - p***e

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...ht_1070wt_1038

Second sale after the upgrade from PSA to a 9, winning bidder is - p***e

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...ht_1050wt_1038

Now listed again by PWCC......

So it's ok for a consignor to buy his cards back from an auction???? This is not considered shilling as long as they pay the premium? I always assumed I was bidding against other potential buyers in an honest auction.

Well I am an engineer but not software. That's my hangup and why it's gonna cost so much to develope.

According to the feedback given by the seller on Jun-07-12 22:25, the 8 was purchased by "kopitars_corner".