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Posted By: Nixon

Before PSA, SGC, GAI, and so on, collectors managed to safely store their cards without having them entombed. I don't need PSA to protect my cards. Before grading services, collectors managed to educate themselves to recognize the fake from the real, the trimmed from the intact. I don't need some self- proclaimed "expert" to tell me what's good and what's not. And if protection is all there is to it, why does everyone insist that grading services give their cards numbers? Let's face it: advocates of grading services fall into three categories: the first is the grading companies that make money; and the second are the sellers who make money by taking advantage of the third group -- card buyers whose gut level appreciation of a card isn't the player, the card, or the history, but the number assigned to it by that self-proclaimed expert. The folks in groups one and two I respect; they're just making as much money as they can, and that's great. It's the folks in group three who are the chumps.