Undergraded Cards
 

Here's a fun post. In a salute to the "new" grading standards that we have all experienced as buyers and sellers, please post the card that you think is the most severely undergraded, and give your opinion of how many points under the norm it received. I'm not asking you to create your own grading standards; just go with what has already been established for the reputable grading companies over the long term, compare your graded card to those standards, and subtract the difference between what your card received and what the standards say it should have received in points.

I'll start with a card that should be hard to beat in terms of undergrading. As you can see, this '34 Goudey Hank Greenberg rookie card only got a 1.5. However, with no creasing, wrinkles, erasures, or paper loss, according to the PSA standards, I think it should have gotten a 5.5. So in my opinion my "under" points on this card would be a whopping 4 points. Now let's see your most undergraded card, and please stick to vintage.

Wow!
 

Beautiful Greenberg!

I wish they had graded Satch as high as 2.5. I totally understand the tape but the card is pack freash and has amazing eye appeal. Colors pop off the card!

Oh Well! I love it either way!

Attachment 498607

Attachment 498608

Greenberg seems overly punished for the toning. Paige looks correct to me

Great Card Mike

Is there a wrinkle across his face and nose?

https://photos.imageevent.com/joejo2...n_20200904.jpg

This auto is a 10 if you ask me.


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My E106 Chase is probably my best candidate, a 2 that looks like a 5 and doesn't have any issues to explain the 2 that I have been able to find.

Joe, Kamm’s signature is exquisite. Beautiful card!

There is something going on there.

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It looks very nice. What is that mark on the back above the O in AMERICAN CARAMEL CO? Is it a scratch?

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Yes and Uncle Jimmy's collection too!

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I don't think so. It looks too straight of a line to me, like maybe a small horizontal print line there?

It's a thought that the card was downgraded due to toning, but I never have even considered that idea. In hand, this card looks much brighter and much less toned than the scans show. So if the downgrade was due to toning, it's quite harsh, as you say, because there just isn't that much toning on it. The borders also appear much brighter in hand.

Still mystified by this one (of one).

The beauty of the signature doesn't play in an auto grade. The reason it got an 8, I would say, are the gaps in the tail of the W and the m.
And that's one reason many collectors don't care about the auto grade, or will ask PSA to just put AUTO AUTH if the auto doesn't receive a 10.

Beautiful cards that don’t deserve the lowball grade. Would be nice if the graders could put a note about why they arrived at such a grade.

Great OG post idea! Please help me… why did Teddy get no love here? I just can’t find the flaws enough to grade this a 4. But I don’t have the eye that many of you do…

Good grade? Or did the grader just have a bad day??

I’ll take Ted if you’re ever interested! The t206 drum is really confusing. Hidden paper loss?

Normally a 4 would be a great looking card with a slight crease, even under magnification tilted under a light source. But your image is way too small to tell anything. You need to repost it at a hosting website and then link the URL, rather than upload the file to the board.

Looks like a pinhole which I believe is automatically a 1.

Attachment 498680

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Used to be. More recently, pinholes are getting PSA 2s when spotted, PSA 7s when missed.

LOL....
I specialize in low grade cards!!
This one should have been a 2!

https://luckeycards.com/pe94crawfordorange.jpg

Nice card Leon.

If these cards are low grade then what I collect should grade out with negative numbers because my stuff is a wreck compared o these gems.



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Great cards and great threads.

I am not sure if any of mine is that far off. Mine look to be within my thought of grades

Really??
 

Can you post a recently graded example with anything higher than a 1? That policy is/was so arbitrary as cards with significant corner wear or paper loss arguably are missing more cardboard than those with a pin or staple hole and many (like the pictured example and the previously posted Drum back have far superior eye appeal!)

Yeah, graders have a bad day when they miss a defect, not when they find one.

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Soon as PSA starts giving out PH qualifiers, this is an immediate crackout

Wow @ that auto. Inkwell for days

Multiple horizontal creases

That's an incredible looking 2!

I don't know about that. What are you seeing that I am not seeing?

I can't say for sure that they are wrinkles but that's what they look like and what I think Greg probably sees.

Attachment 498732

When I see a nice looking 1.5, I immediately look for the crease / wrinkle. Almost always the reason, in my experience. I think that I see one horizontally across Greenberg's face, matching with others observations. I love 1.5's like this, great looking card for a nice discount!

That, and the stuff between American and Leagues look to me to be standard card patina - not marks or scratches.

I know a few years ago I probably saw 5 different cards with pinholes get PSA 2s. I went back on Net54's search and couldn't locate images. I will check blowout next, and if not, keep an eye out for them in the future.

Here was the PSA 7 case I joked about. Too bad the images have aged out.
https://www.net54baseball.com/showth...light=pinholes

I feel this is at least one grade too low.

Reverse grading is also fun. I don't know if you can see the crease that goes through this card, from Yogi's hands through Hank's chest and then under Mick's chin. Even without the crease, that is a lot of corner wear for a 4.

Probably light scratches there, except for the straight horizontal line across his face, which I think is a tiny print line.

As a variation hound, this PSA 4 card has bothered me forever. It looked like the best one I had (centering aside, obviously, which is a tiny bit better than it looks, because the plastic border is blocking a bit of the white), so it was the first one sent in for grading. The PSA 6 is included for comparison purposes...

Attachment 498761

I still can't for the life of me understand how it got tossed into the VG pit!! That usually indicates a crease or wrinkle, but there is none. The only anomaly I can detect is a very tiny straight line 'indent' in the gloss (visible by tilting it in the light) that was undoubtedly just a part of the printing. Corners are epically sharp, back is fine, so I guess it's time to stop using my blacklight to illuminate my Hendrix posters and put it to work seeing if there's something somewhere that my human eye is unable to detect.

Look at the left-to-right centering. I think that's what probably limited the grade because otherwise, I think it looks as good as or even better than the 6.

It's so hard to tell from a picture what is really going on, but it looks like there is another line going from Hank's right ear to the top of his lip. And there is a "W" on his right cheek.

This one might be a grade or so low.....

https://luckeycards.com/t206cobb.jpg

Yes, I see multiple wrinkles as well. There might be another at the top border that runs down and through the D is his hat.

Wow - that card looks amazing & looks better than some 3’s I have seen…


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The very light tape stain on the back kept this at a PSA 2. I have seen PSA 5’s that don’t look near as nice.
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Yeah, absolutely. That's certainly true, but this was submitted with qualifiers allowed, so I was expecting/hoping for a 7+ OC. But a four?? That drops it from 'no creases/wrinkles' to 'with creases/wrinkles,' I believe, since there aren't any issues present that would drop it that far without creases/wrinkles being present.

Maybe they thought that the printing discoloration on the bottom left (faded orange field) was some kind of surface wear rather than just a printing defect.

Definitely a nice 2.

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Razor sharp corners.

It's virtually identical to the PSA 6 in coloring, etc., and no surface wear. They were printed that way. It's gotta be something hidden in the blacklight.

Some great looking cards being posted. This Aaron while correctly graded per PSA standards (very tiny wrinkle at the very top of card) it certainly looks under graded.

https://www.collectorfocus.com/image...-aaron-psa-4.5

I love threads like this. I don't have any pre-war items that fit the bill, so here's some vintage. Some wax on the 58 Brooks. I'd put this 57 Kaline up against a lot of 8's and 9's that I've seen from that set. My 71 Kaline shows the drastic change in standards on post-war issues with challenging borders (71 Topps, 62 Topps, 55 Bowman). 10 years ago, I bet that's at least a 6, maybe a 7.

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T206 Cobbs
 

Here is my contribution to this thread. One which is way undergraded and the other well it is a Green, so I'll take it, but comparisons to the red? The Red was sent for review and I was told it is 2.5 because of the corners, still shaking my head....

I guess you could argue that my red Cobb has a correct technical grade due to residue on the back, but I don’t think it would look out of place in at least a 1.5 holder… Likewise with my E95 Plank, back staining and a tiny defect on the front left border account for the grade, but I’ve seen 4s that don’t look nearly as good…

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57T Kaline looks great. I don't think the 71T is a 5 because of the borders. If the Brooks got knocked all the way down to 2 because of the back stains that's brutal.

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I hadn't considered other issues on the 71T Kaline, so I got it out and took a much closer look. I don't see any other issues other than the borders, BUT upon closer inspection the top left and bottom left corners do show heavier touches than the scan would indicate. Based on that, a 5 seems tough, but that's where PSA is currently.

Re: 58 Brooks - I'm not sure on the technical rules of wax on the reverse of cards. But the top right and bottom right corners are dinged pretty well. Given that, it's a 5 at best. Without the wax, it's one of the best looking 5's. As is, it's one of the best looking 2's.

Here is a Broad Leaf card that looks to be completely devoid of wrinkles, creases, or paper loss. The only issues I can find are a bit of staining and some excess printing of some kind along the front border area. Otherwise, it looks like a 5 to me.

Undergraded cards
 

Hi all- I lack your tech expertise to upload here, so I'll just comment that
the most consistent thing I'm seeing from both PSA/SGC is brutal treatment
of cards that have even the most faint creasing. I own a 71 Topps basketball
Oscar Robertson that got a 4 from PSA (new label). I buy the card not the
holder, so I'm happy own it- but it's grotesquely undergraded. Turns out
that, if you hold it against a window at high noon and train the Hubble
telescope on it just right, you can make out a wrinkle that is the size of an
ant. Great...

I wish slabbers would adopt the "call overturn" language from NCAA football
(or is it NFL?). Unless a flaw is "clear and convincing", it doesn't count
against! And, just like with those replay idiots in the booth, if it takes 3
minutes and 6 camera angles to maybe find a problem, it is NOT "clear and
convincing"- no flaw:!! :)

I feel better.

Trent King

Nice BL, Rob. They may have dinged it for tobacco stains and pencil writing? Top right?

To me, grading is for Topps era cards. Here's one I got yesterday in Sterling. Not a bad card for a 3.

Thank you. I got it from a fine member here a couple of years ago. Regarding that mark in the upper right border area, I'm not sure if it's due to ghosting or imprinting after factory production, but I am certain it isn't a pencil, marker, or pen mark. That much I'm sure of. The grade is a real head scratcher, so anyone else can feel free to chime in with their own opinion as well. Should tobacco stains be enough to downgrade it to a "fair" condition? Well if so, then what about all of those multi-stained Polar Bear examples on the market that have graded much better? And it isn't just PSA being PSA either. I bought the card in an SGC 2 holder and decided to cross it over, so the 1.5 is what I wound up with.

And by the way, that Tinker card is stunning! No way should it be only a 3.

Psa
 

PSA seems brutally tough on cards where their review process detects a little glue residue from scrapbook removal. If you can feel the residue with your fingers on the back of a card, you are likely to get a PSA 1 or 2, even if the card has no creases. I've had 3 cards where I've cracked them back out and I could feel some residue I hadn't noticed before. I had a couple of PSA 2's that I thought were likely to get a PSA 6.

I no longer own this card, but I bought it as an SGC 5, busted it (when this picture was taken...) and then sent it to them again and they gave it a 6.5.

Definite NM qualities in terms of eye-appeal; what confused the grade I think was a tiny but definitely there scratch / light cut in the surface of the upper right corner. I don't think you can even see it here. Needless to say, I benefited from the 1.5 bump when I sold it at the height of the bubble. I chalked the discrepancy up to SGC's internal turmoil at the time, and what must have been a lot of newbie graders to train.

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Coming soon to an auction near you.

Not sure how I missed this thread the first time. Some of you posted some great examples of cards appearing 2 grades nicer than their assessed grade...Leon's Cobb, the 57 Kaline and the 54 Aaron 4 are a few that come to mind.

My frustration with the inconsistency in grade and appearance is when no matter how much I look at the cards prior to grading and after grading I cannot figure out why it graded as it did. The assumption is that I missed something which I just cannot believe is the case every time.

Scott, the 49 Paige is a great looking example but I think it is graded right. The two top corners and there is a tiny wrinkle on the right edge just above Paige's shoulder.