[jchcollins]

I have mentioned it before, perhaps even somewhere back in the history of this very thread - but to me the tradeoff between midgrade or lower and true high grade cards also comes back to my eventual disappointment with true high grade cards. Whether subconsciously or not, if I buy a vintage card in a PSA 7 or 8, I'm going to expect it to be virtually perfect. The problem there of course is "virtually perfect" cards are 10's, not 7's. I've fallen into that trap again at least once even as recently as this spring - that PSA 7 which was so nice looking actually had an edge ding I'm not happy with, or that SGC 88 which looked great online has dull color in real life. The truth is I would not be unhappy with either card if they had been in the 5 - 6 range and I had paid correspondingly lower for them. But when I pay for higher, I apparently get the problem of unrealistic expectation onset - even though I've known how to properly grade for decades.