[raulus]

I certainly understand why James is so aggravated by the grading racket. And I have nothing against his consistent desire to avoid it, and disparage the whole business every chance he gets.

As others have noted, the world has changed since we were kids. Back then, most cards changed hands in person, and you could inspect them until you were really confident about condition. Plus your total outlay was usually pennies, unless you were buying something really special, so the price tag associated with being wrong was small. Any deal that didn't happen in person probably only occurred between a buyer who really trusted the seller and their ability to accurately grade cards and weed out the doctored stuff.

These days, if you want to get top value when you sell, particularly if you have really nice stuff that will command top dollar, then grading is the most likely path to make it happen. You can certainly try to sell them for top dollar as top condition raw cards. While the Biebs taught us to "never say never", my experience is that will be a really heavy lift.

Naturally, if you have stuff that is really low grade and not particularly valuable, then you probably don't give up much by skipping the grading. Particularly if a buyer has a chance to inspect your cards in person before they buy. And if I understand James' collecting habits, this might be the case, so maybe it will work fine for him and/or his successors in cardboard.