Fun With PSA

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Posted By: Glenn

I spent one year as a PSA member. I joined because I had just purchased a Jim Thorpe Sport Kings card that I would say was EX-MT except for some dark staining on the back. I was guessing that, according to PSA's guidelines, the card should come back to me as a 6(ST), but I suspected that their description of how they use qualifiers was incorrect and that, even though it would surely receive the ST qualifier, they would knock it down on the number grade as well because of the stain. I spoke with one of their customer service reps, and she told me basically the same thing as the website -- the numerical grade given is the same as it would be if the qualifier flaw were completely ignored. This is clearly not true. After all, you never see a 10(OC), but there should be plenty of them if the characteristic for which the qualifier was given is not additionally factored into the grade the card receives. I submitted the card anyway and got neither a 6(ST) nor a 5(ST) nor anything else of the sort, but a "? AUTHENTIC". My question is about those 10's. Is there a legitimate reason for there not being such thing as a PSA 10 with a qualifier? Or am I wrong? Do they exist? Surely some of the 9(OC) cards out there have nothing to distinguish them from PSA 10's other than the centering. I realize that gem mint pre-war cards are essentially non-existent anyway, but this issue is the one thing that's always really bugged me about PSA. Let me rephrase. It's the one thing that has most confused me about PSA's grading system.