Posted By:
cmokingJim, I think two plausible explanations that two reasonable people could believe in that explains the difference between SGC 86+ (or 88+, no difference in the comparative numbers really) and PSA 8+ pop numbers are:
1. Sellers know that PSA 8 buyers pay more, so there's more incentive to send the card to PSA for grading to maximize profits.
2. PSA grades more leniently than SGC, thus there are fewer SGC 88s than PSA 8s.
Maybe it is a little of both. I don't know about pricing for SGC 88 / PSA 8 cards - is it clear cut that PSA 8 T206s sell for more $ than SGC? It may be difficult to compare, but if anyone has info on that, it would be interesting.
As for the Goudeys - the last Mastro auction showed that SGC 88 / 92 cards were in very high demand...maybe more so than PSA 8s of the same cards.
On the 1933 Goudey pops:
if we counted SGC 88 only, then it is 2.2%
if we counted half of the SGC 86 - then it is 3.1%
either way, that's signficantly lower than 9% PSA.
The pricing phenomenon where SGC 88 Goudeys are the same or higher than PSA 8s is recent, and unclear if it will continue.