A new hobby low. . .

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Posted By: petecld 

Look at:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2721104805

I guess if you can't survive grading real cards then grading reprints is the way to go.

Hmmm, will a AAA 9.0 be equal to a GAI 9?

Personally, I think this is the saddest thing I have seen in this hobby in quite some time.

NOTE: This is just my opinion and I wish nothing but good for the seller.

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Posted By: Hankron

I have no fondness for the graded card fashion, but I don't see an ethical problem here. If the card is dated and labelled correctly, the card is dated and labelled correctly ... The card itself is probably worth less than the grading fee. However, getting a 10 cent card graded isn't an issue of ethics, but of silliness.

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Posted By: leon

This is the same as SGC grading the Wagner reprints. It is pitiful but I understand business is business...regards all

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Posted By: RC_McKenzie

From the scan, it looks like the top right corner is a little fuzzy. The sad thing is, as these grading companies go BK, their opinion becomes moot. Is an SGC 100 Walter Payton rookie still going to be worth $15,000.00 in 50 years?

Who won the Lipset Zeenut Coupon lot and who won the Curtis Ireland lots? Congrats EOM

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Posted By: Anonymous

I am the individual running these clearly identified T-206 reprints. The holder is accordingly marked, the cards all have REPRINT on the reverse, my description certainly cannot be considered to be deceptive, and so what if GAI chose to encapsulate and accept the appropriate fee? SGC certainly has a large number of reproductions in their holders. They are curiousity items, nothing more nothing less. To compare the encapsulation of these by GAI and SGC to the "quality" operations of AAA is virtually obscene. Quite a difference between the snip, snip, snip, of a Spaulding catalog and the encapsulation of these "snippets" to be sold to unsophisticated collectors, with the slabbing of clearly identified reprints ALREADY extant in the marketplace.

The real grading companies are in business to place product in their holders. Providing the contents of their holder are clearly and accurately identified, I see no harm in the practice.

For the record, these are not something that I would spend money on grading. They came to me as part of a large dealer inventory that actually had some real cards in it hence my opening bid price is far lower than the grading cost.

My marketing skills must be slipping this morning as I should have come on this board proclaiming these to be the greatest collectables to have ever come along thus inflaming the purists here to such an extent that I perhaps would have recieved an offer to buy me out of these wonderful, investment quality, potential family heirlooms that are the envy of Western civilization.

It's not too late! Stop me now! Buy me out!!!

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Posted By: Jay Miller

I see no problem with this. The seller identifies the items as being reprints. If someone wants to purchase these good luck to them. I wouldn't, but that is my choice. Why try to make choices for others and inflict your views on them?

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Posted By: warshawlaw

Not with the seller, who seems entirely legit, but with GAI. If they want to grade reprints, that's their business, I guess. I'm just going to make their business not a part of my business. SGC was bad enough with the Wagner, but at least their justification was that it was a family-licensed issue and carried some legitimacy (I don't agree, BTW), not a straight broder. What's the justification here, other than needing the dough?

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Posted By: runscott

It's certainly silly for SGC, GAI or anyone else to slab reprints that are worth pennies, but ethically there's nothing wrong with it, and it doesn't fall into the same category as Roy Huff's AAA items that are intended to deceive (but only idiots)and which give novices a bad taste for our hobby and encourage destruction of irreplaceable historical items.

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Posted By: zardoz51

Sorry about that, still figuring out the hows of posting here. The danger of being a lurker and non-contributor for the past year and a half

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Posted By: Jay Miller

Scott--It's not silly for the grading companies to slab the reprints. They get paid their fee regardless of the items worth. What is silly is the people who pay to have these items slabbed. The only thing collectors need to look out for is grading companies who don't make it perfectly clear on the holder that the card is a reprint.

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Posted By: Marc S.

He is one of the few truly good guys of the hobby. Whatever your opinions on grading reprint cards are --the cards are clearly marked, seem to warrant their grade, and there is no deceptive practices going on there.

If I ever decided to purchase a graded reprint, I would go to Zardoz. He is one of the truly all-around good guys of the hobby.

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Posted By: runscott

some collectors have lost a little respect for grading companies who slab reprints, but I realize that it doesn't bother everyone.

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Posted By: Brian C Daniels

Paul, everyone likes you! Your the bestess. I hope your buddy in southern Cal sends you the funny e-mails I get from him every night. He is too funny! Buy some cards from him so he has some money to buy some from me.Lord knows he needs the coin. And how come you didn't put your famous quote on the bottom of your original post here that you do on everyone on the PSA message board?

Paul's quote: " For every person with a spark of genius,there are a hundred with ignition trouble"

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Posted By: Jay Miller

Scott---I agree with you. I think that it just wakes people up to the reality that these are businesses whose means of making money is entombing little pieces of paper in plastic. Rightly or wrongly, their decision parameter is probably--what maximizes revenue (not what hobby purists might think they should or shouldn't slab).

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Posted By: Annymous

I was recently offered in trade for a real card a group of '50s commemorative Cobbs, every one of them graded, andthe group by at least 3 different companies (the big ones). I suppose there's some difference between commemoratives and reprints (commemoratives can often have original pictures on them), but still, I asked why the guy was getting commemoritives graded. Haven't heard from him since.

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Posted By: runscott

If they can make money they'll do it. But they also need to consider the fact that they may lose potential customers if they stray too far for hobby purists. I've had long conversations with "pro-GAI" collectors who almost had me convinced until I saw this auction - definitely puts me off. I don't like the SGC-slabbed Wagner reprints either, but the idea of a set-registry containing a slabbed version of "the Monster" reprints makes me cringe.

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Posted By: Hankron

I wish to add two points. Within reasonable parameters (i.e. excluding counterfeits, copyright infringements, non-cards), I don't think it's fair to expect a big grading card company to exclude cards that are submitted to them, especially if the objection is one of aesthetics (which I think is the essential basis of the complaint of this grading. Some think its distasteful or 'beneath' the grader to grade this reprint). I'm not into Britney Spears swatch cards, but that doesn't mean I think they should be banned from grading. Just because one collects old baseball cards, doesn't make a 1914 Cracker Jack Zach Wheat essentially any less silly than a Britney Spears card. It's really hard to argue to someone who doesn't collect that a little piece of cardboard sold in a box of Cracker Jacks with candy stains still on it is inherently noble and should belong to an exclusive club that excludes the inferior. Likely, you will get a roll of the eyes or, at best, "Isn't that cute. You collect kids toys." ... So, in the scheme of things, I don't think GAI or others should act as arbiters of taste.

As Jay pointed out, if a grader accurately labels and authenticates a card, no matter whatever is the card, they've done their job. If the worst that graders of this world did was to grade something they shouldn’t but accurately label and authenticate it, the hobby would be a much better place.

Lastly, I still think much of the grading card hobby is rather silly-- and, not to offend anyone, I find the grading a 10 cent reprint reflective of this. I do not place the blame so much on the grading companies, but on the collecting public. If a legitimate grader says that their grades have an accuracy of plus or minus 10 percent, and people bid as if the grading is 100% accurate (i.e. paying 6x as much for a 10 as for a 9)-- the problem lays with the bidders and not the graders … I have no idea what the current or future bid on this reprint will be, but if a collector pays $15 for a GAI graded reprint, the issue should lay with the bidder and not the grader … I think, at its core, good grading provides a valuable service to the hobby (offering an expert, though not perfect, opinion on cards, in particular to facilitate distance buying or trading where the buyer cannot examine the card in person before buying), but I find that the graded card hobby is about 40 percent practical and about 60 fashion and flavor of the day.

I don't mean to offend any, but, paying $800 for a 1957 Topps common card for the sole reason that you can be #1 on the PSA registry, is about the stupidest thing I've ever heard of—and should, in a distorted way, illustrate why I find much (not all) of the graded card hobby to be a matter of fashion and clubbiness, and not of reasonable use of grading card companies (P.s., just because 'everybody does it', doesn’t make it any less silly).

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Posted By: Jay Miller

Scott---Don't get me wrong. I don't like slabbed anything. I only slab cards if I am going to resell them and only then if I think it will significantly add to the ultimate realization. The cards in my collection are not slabbed unless they came that way and even some of those have been liberated.

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Posted By: Jay Miller

David--Please correct the typo on the Britney Spears card--you inadvertently typed a W instead of an N.

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Posted By: petecld

I guess I didn't explain myself very well in my original post. I believe I mentioned in my post that it had nothing to do with the seller. I NEVER said anything was deceptive or desciptions were questionable - where did that come from?

This has nothing to do with any PEOPLE, I'm sure the seller is a swell guy. It's the IDEA of grading reprints that I felt was pathetic - that's it!

Yes, SGC graded Wagner reprints and I thought that was wrong as well but that at least that was a special promotion and limited to T206 Wagner knock-offs.

This GAI thing is just sad - regardless of who is selling them.

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Posted By: MW

Zardoz is a great guy but I really question what a slabbed T206 reprint says about GAI. In my opinion, it means that they're desperate or they'll grade just about anything. In either case, that can't be good. Also, take a look at the label -- it's kind of reminiscent of the way that some of the T206 packs are graded by GAI -- it's somewhat deceptive ("T206 Repr"). Would a beginning collector even know what this means? In my opinion, if GAI is going to put crap like this in a holder, they should be ABUNDANTLY CLEAR with their labeling methodology.

Next, I question what this says about this grading company's view of the hobby. Is this merely the "tip of the iceberg?" Are the floodgates about to open to a deluge of GAI graded reprints? T206s, 1933 Goudeys, Play Balls, Mayos....what's next? Perhaps not everyone agrees with me, but I think encapsulating reprints is roughly analogous to squeezing blood from turnips.

In a certain respect, grading is like taking a taxi cab ride from point A to point B (as opposed to walking). Encapsulated cards generally sell faster and for more money than those that are "raw." Grading reprints in this fashion, however, is a bit different. It is as if GAI is handing out scooters and telling collectors to "go play in traffic." Surely, this isn't a good direction for professionally graded cards and does nothing for the already questionable reputation of GAI.