Posted By:
Eric BrehmI agree with Jim C. that Gem Mint is a legitimate grade. It may well serve PSA's marketing purposes to use it, but it is a term collectors have used over the years to communicate with each other about the condition of cards. Yes Mint means 'no defects', and in theory a card either has defects or it doesn't, but in practice it isn't quite that clear-cut, because of the subjectivity inherent in each person's evaluation of defects. (And again, there is no such thing as a 'perfect' card.) Mint means essentially problem free; there is nothing negative worth noting. Gem Mint means "absolutely, no doubt about it, you'd have to be crazy not to think this one is Mint."
I remember buying a 1956 Topps Mickey Mantle card from Barry Sloate back in the mid-1980's, back in the days when purchases usually had to be done sight unseen, based on descriptions written in ads or given over the telephone. I asked him on the phone if the card was Mint, and he said something like, "absolutely, in fact about the only way I can describe this one is to say that it is Gem Mint." (emphasis on the word 'Gem') That let me know that this was really an exceptional card, and if I didn't like this one, I probably wouldn't be happy with any example. Sure enough it was one of the nicest cards I ever had. Set me back $100 too, as I remember.
Now the grading companies have tried to give 'precise' definitions of the attributes of a Gem Mint card (e.g. tighter centering requirements than a merely Mint card and so on), just as they have done for the other grades. Precise definitions of inherently subjective qualities are never entirely satisfactory, of course, but I think the general criteria they have laid out cover the grade range reasonably well. (Except, as I said before, I think that their centering standards are a bit too lax, for all grades.)