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Cutting cards from an uncut sheet????
The 2 hour interview thread got me thinking about uncut sheets.
I'm sure this is going to get some heated opinions but besides the travesty of destroying a rare uncut sheet, what are everyone's thoughts on cutting cards from an uncut sheet? I can see an argument that a card cut from an uncut sheet is still a legit card. My gut tells me that cutting an uncut sheet is just wrong. But As I went through the different scenarios in my head, I came up with both objections and rationale.
Let's hear your thoughts. |
I think anyone who hasn't seen Evan Mathis's collection of uncut sheets should be very concerned about their 1950s-1970s graded collection...or excited there's going to be more high end examples leaking to the market now and in coming years.
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Marshall Fogel's PSA 10 1952 Mantle would like to vote twice in this poll.
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To me, the issue is that once an item leaves the manufacturer and gets into the market, that's what the item is. A card cut at the factory and distributed in that form by the manufacturer, is and always will be a card. An uncut sheet that leaves the factory that way, is and always will be an uncut sheet. When it is cut up later, it becomes an altered uncut sheet.
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What if it’s cut not by the original manufacturer but the original manufacturers equipment is used? What if it were cut using original manufacturer equipment by the employee that did the cutting only 50yrs later? If Topps cuts a grouping of last years sheets tomorrow does that need to be disclosed to the buyer? |
It's just silly the rationale people are attempting to use to legitimize hacking up uncut sheets to replicate cards that were meant to be cut at the factory decades ago. The value in a card that has survived in top shape despite being released in packs 100 years ago and survived in high grade is what the grading industry was built on. However, incompetence by the grading companies in not detecting alterations does not make altering cards okay.
If the card was released in cut down format (Topps/Bowman/T206 etc trading card), it's not okay to cut it from a sheet and pass it off as original (even in a grading slab with a number grade). If it was only released as sheets and intended to be cut by the customer (Hostess/Post/Jello/strips), then those were intended to be cut by the customer and can be cut now. SGC offered a sheet cutting service with grading, just a few years ago, but they either didn't get many takers because they were putting "sheet-cut" on the flips or because people would rather do it in the privacy of their own houses to scam. |
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I'm not trying to create any rationalization. Personally, I don't think sheets should be cut up. But as I thought through the objections objectively, I could see arguments both ways. So I tried to list out what my specific objections were. Was I opposed to the timing, the equipment, etc.? I like how you've put it, "The value in a card that has survived in top shape despite being released in packs 100 years ago..." Do by cutting a sheet, somebody is cheating those of us who are buying cards from packs as they were originally issued. I didn't know that SGC used to offer a sheet cutting service. I like the concept though because it's noting such cards as "Sheet Cut" in the same way that PSA qualifies later photos created from the original negatives as Type 2. That allows the buyer to make an informed choice. Do I want the original pack issued or the same card that was cut from a sheet later. But with the money to made, it wouldn't surprise me if a card manufacturer started buying up sheets to cut them and ew-issue them in a new mystery box. I mean, they cut up bats, autos and game used jerseys. Cutting up sheets that were originally intended to be cut up doesn't seem far-fetched. |
I will go the other way. I have cut up a LOT of sheets over the years. I used a professional matting cutter that cut every card to the exact size. I never had anything graded and when I sold the cards I told everyone I cut them from a sheet. I mainly cut up junk era error sheets but would have no problem cutting up pretty much any sheet with very fer exceptions.
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I found this odd since Woody Gelman (worked for topps and sold tons of overstock through his Card Collectors Company) sold tons of seldom seen Topps items |
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And if Topps cuts a previous sheet later, and releases it, the law requires they put the current year of release on the copyright, so as to not deceive. |
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One of my Griffey Desert Shields has a wax stain. Someone told me he had PSA 6 with wax stain; he cracked his, rubbed it with pantihose, and resubmitted. It returned as a PSA 8. Would I like a PSA 8? Yes. Would I consider it cheating if I cleaned it with pantihose? No. I think my personal feelings are kind of based on art and art restoration and cleaning. Those paintings don't lose value with cleaning. No one who visits the Sistine Chapel will complain that the ceiling colors are altered because it's been cleaned. No one complains about SF's Telegraph Hill, Coit Tower murals, that they've been cleaned and restored due to salt water damage. Obviously, the outside big money that has moved into our collecting hobby has brought these ideas of acceptance with them. If a buyer doesn't care, is it still immoral? And a lack of any collecting governing body, to say what is acceptable and what is unacceptable, has also created this problem. A lawyer who takes Snowman to court for cleaning cards, and brings prosecutions' witnesses that restoration isn't acceptable, would also meet a line of defendants witnesses who are cleaners and buyers who don't care about cleaning and restoration. I'm thinking it would end in a hung jury. Sent from my SM-S926U using Tapatalk |
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Not saying you are wrong…..but it sure does sound like a gigantic pile of bullshit. |
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Sent from my SM-S926U using Tapatalk |
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Sent from my SM-S926U using Tapatalk |
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My thoughts in red.
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I'm thinking that would require registering a new copyright for the recently cut card from an old sheet. I don't think they do that for the buybacks stamped with various logos. They might not even indicate a copyright or trademark for those logos (Could totally be wrong there, I haven't looked at the couple I have in a long time. ) |
I can think of instances where the manufacturer "reprinted" cards.
Or, made cards that were outside of general production, but were not readily identifiable as different. When Topps had the "send us money and wrappers and a list of what cards you don't have and we'll send them to you" promotion. They had so much demand for stars and rookies they printed special sheets to provide those cards. as far as I know the cards from those sheets are not identifiable unless you have an uncut strip or block. Upper deck claimed a production figure for a hockey set, and later made more of them. Only found out because the first batch was packed on its own and the second batch was packed with other cards. (they also later faked yugioh cards which they were the licensed printer/distributor for. And apparently mostly got away with it. ) The "new" cards may be identifiable, I don't have enough from that set to know for sure. |
Sgc sheet cut
That SHEET Cut scenario was done for me. I was in the porcess of cutting up hundreds of proof and progressive proof sheets from the original Topps auction in 1989 for a client. The "SHEET CUT" was used for the cards they slabbed for the proofs. as Covid hit, the process came to a screeching halt and has never started up again. They will no longer slab these cards. Jeff W
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:) But undisclosed card altering? Not at all. :( |
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https://link.springer.com/article/10.1557/PROC-267-429 alter verb (CHANGE) to change something, usually slightly, or to cause the characteristics of something to change: Therefore, a change in the fiber structure of the paper literally alters it. |
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The fact that water is used in the process to create paper and setup the structure of the fibers, doesn't prove using water isn't alteration. In fact, it proves the major effect water has on them in breaking down the bonds. You truly are incredible. You are either really dumb, or seriously grasping at straws to defend your shady practices. Just take a hike you scamming piece of garbage. I'm done with you. If the best you can do in response to scientific proof of alteration is "that peer reviewed study is nonsense," then rational discussion with you is useless. Welcome to the first spot on my ignore list. |
The answer and reasoning are simple. The below are thee different wordings of the same idea:
** If stating the fact that a card was cut from a sheet at a later date alters the market value, you have to state that it was cut from a sheet at a later date. ** The only reason why someone would omit the fact is because they feel it would lower the market value: Which is exactly why you have to state it. ** If one sincerely believes and asserts that stating the card was cut later from a sheet does not affect its identity and market value, then why would one try to find a justification for not stating that it was cut later from a sheet? In short, there is no honest justification for knowingly not stating at sale that a card was cut later from a sheet. |
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Cutting cards from an uncut sheet????
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PSA is also grading secondary market cut proofs (e.g. 1973 candy lids proofs listed on eBay). They just grade them authentic. I had many conversations with SGC since my 1977 Topps Baltimore Reggie Jackson 3-color proof purchase. Got nowhere. Will try the PSA route next. I think it’s important both of these already graded Reggie proofs are in a grader’s DB that can be looked-up at any point. Still fathom why SGC didn’t enter these 2 proofs into their DB when graded prior to the 2019 REA auction. This is why I would even think about getting the cards re-holdered plus it’s also good to know the cards can be re-cased in-case anything happens to the slab (e.g. a crack which happens to me a lot in my SGC graded cards) . https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/202...57223df036.jpg |
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The posted article was behind a paywall, requiring either a login from an institution, or paying 39.95 for it. The introduction, which I could read was good. Not all of the cardstock we deal with in prewar is cellulose, T206s have very little wood fiber. Most papers used also have stuff to help the fibers adhere to each other outside of the bonds from that article. And coatings to make the printing better or easier. All that can be affected by water, although the effect may not be a huge immediate problem. Long term, I'm less certain. Conservators of posters and other things do wet them to help them unfold and lay flat without damage. It's entirely possible they're trading very likely immediate damage for potential lower level damage in the future. |
In 1987 Topps sold uncut sheets to a dealer with the knowledge that the dealer was cutting them up into singles. The reason was because Topps quality control was garbage. The hobby was asking for better condition cards and the dealer delivered to his customers. Are these cards now altered?
PSA graded sheet cut cards for more than a decade. They have graded 5,111 1984 Topps Nestle cards. Only 13 have been given an authentic grade despite the fact that these were only sold as uncut sheets. The PSA 8 t206 Honus Wagner is just another sheet cut card, cut poorly and recut by Mastro. It was known in the hobby prior to the Southerby's Auction the card was sheet cut. Which card is worth more? A poorly cut Wagner in a PSA A holder or a peferctly cut Wagner in a PSA A holder? We all know that Mastro cutting the Wagner made it more valuable regardless of whether it received a number grade or not. |
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If you apply your same logic more broadly, then you'll end up having to demand that all collectors wear white gloves at all times while handling their cards because to do otherwise would result in card "alterations". Thus, making them "fraudsters" if they fail to disclose having touched their cards with their bare hands when selling. Don't believe me? Here, check out this article from Goucher College on how to handle paper artifacts and how the oils from your skin damage paper fibers (much more so than water, I should add). [I can point to articles written by experts too!] https://faculty.goucher.edu/eng330/b..._old_books.htm Here's an excerpt: Quote:
If water "alters" cards, then all sellers from humid climates must include a disclosure in all of their listings unless they want to be guilty of committing "fraud" by your absurd definition. Surely, you are aware that storing paper in plastics can deteriorate (alter) the paper as well, right? Plastics outgas over time, causing damage to the paper fibers, breaking them down and causing them to deteriorate. A quick search with Google AI yields the following: Quote:
If you want to have a discussion about card alterations, then you have to establish a useful definition of what it means for a card to be "altered" in the first place. And that definition has to be within the context of the hobby and how something affects its value, not in some quantum physics context regarding the entanglement of atoms or some other random bullshit definition that doesn't apply (you're good at those). Also, that definition has to be applied consistently and must hold up to scrutiny. Otherwise, it's useless and gets us nowhere. For example, you can't say it's not an alteration to remove wax from the back of a 1986 Fleer basketball card but it is if you remove wax from a 1972 Topps baseball card. And you can't say that it's OK to soak a 1948 Leaf card in water to remove it from a scrapbook but it's not OK to soak a 1948 Leaf card in water in an effort to flatten it out because it's warped after being stored in a humid climate for 50 years. And if spilling some tea on a card isn't considered an alteration, then neither is rinsing off that tea with some water. At the end of the day, if you did something to a card that cannot be detected and which leaves the card in a state that is indistinguishable from a similar card that has not had that thing done to it, then you have not "altered" the card in any meaningful sense with respect to how something affects its value in the market. If a card can be cracked out and resubmitted 100 times and it passes grading all 100 times, then its market value has not been affected by whatever it is that you did to it. Regardless of whether that thing was handling it with oily fingers, wiping off fingerprints from oily fingers, storing it in plastic for decades, plucking off a stray piece of fuzz from the edge, removing wax from the surface, flattening out a bent/lifted corner with your thumb, breathing on it, licking your finger to wipe off a smudge, dropping a piece of rice on the card and then promptly removing it, soaking it in water and letting it dry flat, etc. Everything we do to a card "alters" it per your definition. So that definition doesn't work. You need to try again. You're losing your jury. But I'm sure you're used to that. |
Seems like a lot of words used to justify alterations be accepted in a hobby which specifically looks down on alterations. If you repair a car in a bad accident to be "as good as new," does that mean it was never in a crash and you can advertise it as such? Or can you just roll back the number on the odometer to erase 100,000 miles if the car visually looks good? At the end of the day, if the person purchasing the card would want to know about an alteration and you do your job so well that they can't detect the alteration, that is and always will be fraud if it is not disclosed. Your efforts to try and find common ground will be impossible, because every argument you make tries to justify hiding a fact that the buyer (and collecting community) believes is material.
I also think your argument that touching a card without gloves "alters" the card actually cuts against your central premise. The point of assessing condition is to see what the current state of the card is after a myriad of "challenges" the card has (or could have) faced over its lifetime. From printing defects, centering, gum and wax stains, and packaging at the supplier, to dings to the corners from shipping/stocking, to who is opening and how much care they have treated the card with when they open the pack and store the card. The older the card, the more impressive a higher grade example. This is what gives the card and grade its scarcity. If a card got to skip all of these challenges and was simply created after the fact to be pristine, it is the equivalent of a lab made diamond and the hobby values it as such, unless a fraudster omits the material information in a transaction. |
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In many of your opinions, anything done to a card is "altered." So, a gum stain or wax stain from the factory is altering the original, unstained card. It's poor logic. I'm with snowman on this.
Also, who knows how many sheets have been cut and are already in the market? Did the factory intend for the sheets to be uncut? Of course not. I don't have enough money to own an uncut sheet nor the desire. But I see no issue with making them into cards, which was the original intent of the manufacturer. It's called "baseball cards," not baseball sheets. |
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I've got news for you. Most people who clean their cards do so simply because they want them to look nicer or they want to remove something that is stuck to the card, typically some sort of major eye sore like tape or scrapbook paper. Most of the cards I've cleaned or soaked aren't even listed for sale, and the most valuable ones likely never will be. In fact, the majority of the cards I've soaked in water wouldn't even be worth the cost of grading. I soaked them simply because I wanted them in my sets and my OCD hates warped cards. When I soak a card in water, I do it for myself because that's how I prefer them. It has nothing to do with tricking some third party despite your absurd accusations. |
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Have you ever soaked or taken other steps to remove a crease? |
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It makes sense because, by the definition of the word, they are both different from the original maker's intent. Thus, altered.
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Regardless. This is not a discussion about alteration. It's about what alteration is acceptable, and should be disclosed. Even if you want to play that semantics game that a gum stain caused by the manufacturer is an alteration (which it isn't), a gum stain should absolutely be disclosed. Any damage caused to the card would by your dogmatic view of alterations constitute an alteration. All damage should be disclosed. And hiding it from a buyer is fraudulent. Again. I'll say it slowly. There is nothing wrong with altering a baseball card. There is something wrong with altering a card and selling it as unaltered. |
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