Posted By:
Al Crisafulli"Without a doubt, the best sets in existence for the most popular pre-war vintage sets are graded."
I see statements like this a lot, and I can't help but disagree.
There are maybe 10-20 names that appear at the top of various registries with some degree of regularity. Those people have astounding collections, no doubt, and those collectors are well known. One of them - Marshall Fogel - has been sharing his cards with this board for a few months now, and they're a pleasure to see.
But I can't be so bold as to make the assumption that because I can view an online registry, I have a window into an entire hobby that, for many people, is a solitary one. There are more than two hundred million people in this country, there are billions of baseball cards, and I can't imagine that the grading companies share this belief. If the market is so small that all the best cards are already graded after only 10-15 years of grading companies having a presence in the hobby, then the concept of starting a grading company and entering the market was a poor, poor business decision.
-Al