True Population of Substantial Cards
 

Hello everyone - I've bought a few things here and there from members but generally abstained from the message boards so officially "hi".

I generally collect some of the more popular vintage cards (T206 Cobb, 33 Ruth/Gehrig, etc.) and have long been wondering about the true population numbers. I know it's pretty unlikely that a 1933 Goudey common is cracked out and re-submitted but it's definitely at least somewhat common for the big guys like Ruth, Cobb, 51/52 Mantles, Gehrig, DiMaggio, Williams, Wagner, Young, etc....

Unfortunately not everyone returns the old labels when cracking so the true population numbers of these cards is not accurate and is definitely lower than what the official PSA/SGC reports show. How much lower is something I've been trying to figure out. Speaking with a few other collectors/dealers so far the general consensus seems to be in the 25-30% range (meaning 25-30% fewer cards in existence than the pop reports show for the BIG cards). Just curious as to what other members here think with all your years of experience in the hobby. Thanks for your replies!

Opinion
 

I think that there are still a significant number of ungraded major cards out there that would counterbalance any duplicates of submission with old labels. Many older collectors who aren’t planning on selling are holding on to “raw” cards that haven’t changed hands for decades . Hence I think almost any population number is UNDER reported and sometimes significantly so. Just my opinion…..

Thanks - I completely agree with you on that. Maybe I should have worded things better to just include "graded population". It's really difficult to put a guess on what's out there raw but for certain there's a healthy number still floating around.

It's likely far closer to the reported numbers than you think, mainly for one obvious reason: Cost to grade ANY of the cards you're referencing.

It's gonna get well into the 4 figure range for any mid grade of any of those cards, with precisely no guarantee that those cards grade better than what they were.

Just my thought process on that

The "crack and resubmit" was much more prevelant 5+ years ago (more like 10+ years ago) when grading fees were a mere fraction of what they are today.

Just my $.02

Grading also seems to be tougher. Unless you have a great specimen, or one that can be "soaked in water" (ahem) cracking won't help

I wasn't thinking specifically about today but even cards that were graded 20 years ago and cracked 15. They still show in pop report. Thanks all for responses.

When I was looking at T206 pop reports what I saw for common backs was that HOF cards or more popular cards populations were about double that of a similar common. That is probably off for the very top cards in a set, which may get graded far more often.

The collecting/investing in vintage cards is an "imperfect" market...all information is not known and assumptions/guesses have to be made.

Unlike some modern collecting where artificial "rarities" are created. In this situation numbered cards create more of a perfect market situation where the # available copies is presumed to be known.

Maybe this is part of the reason modern shiny numbered crap is so popular????

What explains such a quantum jump in fees? Is it because they are based on the value of these cards, which have gone up so much? Doesn't make a lot of sense to me, since it shouldn't cost them any more to grade now than it did then. I guess it's because they can?

First and foremost, it's what the market will bear. And if 311 Mantles were still trading for $1 apiece, then grading wouldn't likely be a thing at today's grading costs.

But certainly their costs have risen over time, and particularly in the last few years, everything from employees to space and utilities to their insurance costs.

Speaking of insurance costs, PSA would probably add their guarantee to the list of their costs that has increased, simply because card values have risen. Naturally, not everyone believes that the guarantee is real, but it sure seemed real when they wrote me a big check earlier this year for a doctored card that they assigned a numeric grade. For a card that is valuable, such a screwup could wipe out their profits from grading a whole bunch of other cards.

I would guess that a (very, very) large percentage of the cards that have been cracked out and resubmitted have never had their old labels sent in by the owners to be 'processed' (for lack of a better word) and the Cert Numbers removed from the pop reports.

With 'regular' value cards that have pops in the hundreds or thousands, there isn't much motivation to send the labels back in to the TPG. Removing a single PSA 6 from the pop of 685 PSA 6s doesn't have any impact, so why even bother.

And with 'high' value cards, I would imagine many/most people who resubmit them would like to hold onto the old labels just to have a full history of a card's journey, whether or not they want that info for when they eventually sell it.

Thanks that's EXACTLY what I was asking about. I just have a feeling pop reports for SGC/PSA are pretty far off (on the low side) from reality for the major cards. You're totally correct that it doesn't make a difference for a 1977 Brett whether there's really 1000 of a certain grade or only 800. But for a T206 Cobb variation with a pop of only 16 in a certain grade it's huge if the real number is 8-10 or something.

The same card realistically has a chance to be originally graded out as an SGC. Years later when PSA was selling for way more they cracked and submitted to PSA where even at a bit lower grade they were going to make more. Then later on the buyer who owned it says "no way that's a 3" and sent it back to SGC for a new grade. Potentially 3 pop reports for 1 card.

And that's not to mention the cards that are sent in multiple times in a row trying to get the correct grade. Or the cards purchased in lower grades by card doctors and then cracked out and altered (:mad:).

There's a lot of pieces at play with this grading system and (for the most part) it wouldn't be a problem if the old labels were sent back in to the TPG's for removal from their reports. Just how many people consistently do that (if at all) is the question.

Hank -

Please don't consider me rude, or trying offend, when I respond with the single syllable : duh

I know that you knew that you were correct.

Doug

I was afraid of that, Doug, and I appreciate your gentleness with me. You could have said: "Duh-uh!!!!!"

I agree with this also. I'd guess that for the top names, the pop reports are probably 5-10% higher than they should be due to crack/resubmit/crossovers. However, this would be counterbalances by roughly 10-15% of the same cards that are still raw in people's collections that have never been submitted before. Re-submitting now is much more expensive than in the past, so the risk/reward calculation is much different. Sure you can get a much higher price if your card grades higher, but there is also the chance that the grade could go down, and then you'd be much worse off.

I agree that I think it's more likely that alot of ungraded star cards are out there than collectors cracking open grades to resubmit. It would be cool if someone came up with a global population registry which combined graded and raw cards.

I guess I'm in one of those moods today...

Even though I replied earlier, I saw the title and the first thing I thought of was the huge Nolan Ryan card displays from the set that was all Ryan. Like 18x24 ish versions of a few cards from the set.
They are substantial just not in the intended way. :D

Agree with this comment. It was certainly more prevalent years ago.

Because it was basically a duopoly(now a monopoly) and they can charge what they want. If it’s a valuable card it can’t be sold unless it is graded. I remember years ago taking cards to SGC and having them graded on the spot for under $20. Today the same cards would cost four figures to grade.

I believe your opinion is correct. I actually think the number of graded cards is probably only a small fraction of the total in existence. Many old time collectors simply see no reason to advertise their cards to the world.

:)

Perhaps as you go up the ladder in grade, the higher the already slabbed percentage.

Well, to begin with, the TPGs (PSA) know how greedy people are and if they can make a buck (or thousands), they're going to do it (as we've all seen).

Yup, it's because they can.

When they created the grading system, they probably figured it'd make them a bit of cash, but I'm going to bet they didn't realize just how much they could charge until they did.

As indicated in this thread, there's probably a lot less resubmitting due to the cost of doing so. Also, there's probably a lot of collectors that has that FU attitude about card grading and don't see it as something they need to validate their collections.

Nobody to blame for all this but the hobbyist, and TPGs taking advantage of the hobbyist's greed to create their own greed.

This! And PSA richly deserves the FU attitude all things considered.

;)

+1
I was thinking the same things and approximate percentages.