Another one for the PSA idiot files

[Archive]

Posted By: T206Collector

1. Brand Loyalty To PSA

Most of the truly hardcore PSA supporters are such because they have committeed thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, to cards encapsulated by the company. The most vocal PSA supporters -- especially the PSA 7-9 lovers -- are protecting very expensive and valuable collections/investments and stand to lose a lot of money if PSA were ever to lose favor amongst collectors.

2. PSA Makes A Larger Percentage Of Mistakes By Far Than SGC

Rather than a percentage of PSA accurates vs. inaccurates, I would like to see some SGC mistakes from those who are loyal to PSA (and if you mention Olbermann's T206 Doyle, I'll mention Gretsky's trimmed T206 Wagner). The most frequent argument as to why there aren't as many SGC mistakes is that SGC grades fewer cards than PSA. Right now there are about 60 SGC graded T206 cards vs. 230 PSA graded T206 cards on ebay. Assuming that these aren't all just people dumping overgraded PSA cards, that's a 4:1 ratio of PSA to SGC, in terms of what is out there right now -- that is not a measure of who is grading more of what today. So, if both company's made the same number of mistakes, you would expect to see SGC make about 25% of the kinds of gross errors that PSA makes. And, frankly, it's nowhere near that. Please, show me some proof if you think I am wrong.

3. My Personal Experience

Ask an SGC grader who their best customers are and they will tell you that it is those who have been turned off by PSA. Personally, I got tired of purchasing T206 cards graded PSA 5 over the internet only to find them with creases and trimming. I sent in 40 PSA graded T206 cards to be graded by SGC in their slabs -- 30 came back the same or slightly higher (tweeners, we call them, e.g., PSA 5 up to SGC 70/5.5), 9 came back with lower grades as a result of creases and other damages, and 1 came back trimmed. I welcome any pre-war collector of PSA cards to take the same challenge.