1952 Bowman Mantle PSA 9 brings $540K at Goldin Auction, but....

[metroac]

Attached are three scans of '52 Bowman Mantles. None of them belong to me. The PSA 9 just sold at Goldin's for $540,000. Does anyone but me think this might have been trimmed? Compare it to the PSA 7 and the PSA 10. Would you pay $540K for this card (even if you could, that is)?

[Peter_Spaeth]

It certainly appears short. But these days, who notices or cares?

[NiceDocter]

Looks like a little circular damage or print flaw on his left cheek on the 10. Or is that on the holder? Even Bo Derek isnt really a 10 you know....

[NiceDocter]

Looks like a little circular damage or print flaw on his left cheek on the 10. Or is that on the holder? Even Bo Derek isnt really a 10 you know....

[thatkidfromjerrymaguire]

Wow, those are some pretty cards.

Honestly, any time I see a baseball card that is 70 years old and in a condition better than a 6 or 7, it makes me a little suspicious. I mean, these were kids toys packed in waxy paper with pieces of gum...meant to be traded, flipped, and carried in your pocket.

But who knows. I'm sure there were some OCD kids in the 50s that liked to keep their cards pristine and put them in a storage box as soon as they unwrapped them. As an avid collector of 1952 Bowmans I can certainly attest that there can be some variance in size (i.e. not all cards have exact measurements, exact border thickness, etc.). So it's almost impossible to tell if one is professionally micro-trimmed or not.

As for your question about spending 500,00+ on a high grade mantle if I had the money, I don't think I would. I currently focus on EX cards (approximately a 5 grade). If I did have millions I could spend on cards, I like to think I might upgrade my taste to NM (about a 7 grade). I feel like buying any grade higher (8,9,10) you are basically spending money on almost unperceivable, highly subjective set of criteria. You are putting a lot of faith that future, well funded collectors will continue to put such a high premium on those same standards in the future.

[JollyElm]

I'm having a helluva time getting this to show up larger, as there is something off with my imgur account, so I'm stuck using this little one.

The main 'problem' here is the PSA 10 slab seems to have been stretched a bit vertically. In other words, when the two pictures I used (grabbed the PSA 9 and 10 from the OP) were size-matched side to side (black box), the PSA 10 image was a bit taller than the 9. It seems the scan used was 100% side-to-side, but probably 102% (something like that) top-to-bottom. Hope that makes sense. That stretching made the white side areas appear thinner. So I 'un-squooshed' it to return it to (theoretically) 100% side-to-side AND top-to-bottom, and here is what the comparison looks like...



This may lead to the larger version:
https://imgur.com/a/igasSA2

(I obviously have no horse in this race, as I can't even afford a child's drawing of a '52 Bowman Mantle.) It would appear that the stretching of the image vertically is what caused it to very much look like a trim job side-to-side, but when 'corrected' it seems a heckuva lot closer to fine. However, top-to-bottom could be (depending on what sort of variances naturally occurred in the heights of these cards during the cutting process) a different story.

[bobsbbcards]

I'm liking my PSA 8 more and more.

[Volod]

The price on my '52 B Mantle in 1982 was somewhat less than that auction final bid. I did some hand wringing and maneuvering to keep my shrew from finding out, before sending an M.O. out to Kit Young for the decent looking EX condition star...for a then exorbitant eighty five big ones.

[Hxcmilkshake]

Top edge looks trimmed on the 9, both corners look like they have dog ears

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