Grading Has Clouded Our Minds...

[vintagebaseballcardguy]

I think it was in this thread somewhere (though now I can't find it) where someone said they had relaxed on centering and concentrated more on corners, registration, and the like...the qualities the card came out of the pack with. I have recently come around to this. Basically, I am not willing to pay super high grade prices for 8s and 9s on a regular basis. Therefore, I am going to have to give in on condition issues somewhere, sometimes. There are times when I luck out and find an ex+ or exmt card that has the centering and eye appeal and sharp enough corners to satisfy me. The rest of the time, I have to choose.

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[JollyElm]

And by popular demand...well, if popular demand means just a couple of PM's...here are the EARTH SHATTERING, STUNNING results...

1966easthillsclemente1.jpg

Yes, the card with perfect side-to-side centering and 'Bob Clemente' the farthest from the bottom border of the quartet is the only one to receive a dreaded OC qualifier. Yowza!! Well, smack me in the butt and call me Lucy!!! I bought it anyway and am awaiting its arrival.

People will say the straight 9 is in an old holder, so it enjoyed the benefits of lower standards. That's probably true. (Yes, it's a small, cherry-picked sample size, etc., etc. I get it.) But wow!! Both 7's are closer to the bottom than the 9 OC, and one is even in a new holder. I assume that one got the ole 'no qualifiers for me!' treatment and was lowered to a straight 7...but, if neither of them were the result of checking the 'no qualifiers' box, why aren't they both PSA 7 OC???????

And once again we're right back to my point. (I'll ignore the straight 9, because with Roberto's name nearly grazing the bottom border, the assumption is the grader just messed up. Nothing else, unless the standards were lax at the time or changed in the interim, explains it.) The PSA 9 OC is the only 'honest' card of the bunch. It is seemingly perfect in every way, shape or form, except the centering is off (although it may be tough to accept that 'fact') and that's 'explained' on the slab.

Now...
- Are the 7's truly 7's that the grader mistakenly didn't deem OC?
- Are they actually 7's that somehow fit into the parameters of centering for a 7?
- Or are they 9 OC's that were turned into straight 7's by the flick of a pen?

There are no definitive answers to these simple questions and that specific aspect of grading is ridiculously frustrating when you're buying cards online and don't have them in hand. Buying a 9, with or without qualifiers, tells you exactly what you have. Buying a 7 with no qualifiers tells you close to nothing, because it may have the attributes of a 7 or the attributes of a card two grades higher!

***On a side note, something else comes to light. If you look at the PSA 7 on the far right, his name is obviously very close to the bottom border...but if you look at the words "East Hills," they are much closer to the top border than at least two of the other cards. Since the white space between the words/names and photographs is pretty uniform across all four cards, something doesn't make sense. Logically speaking, they can't all be the same size top to bottom. Were these cards NOT a fixed size?? Does anyone know if that is the case??***

[Nick55]

That's crazy for sure! Congrats on picking up a nice looking version of that card regardless of the label.

[irv]

Great thread, JollyElm. Just reaffirms my dislike for PSA. Consistency is definitely not one of their strong points.

[Empty77]

Originally Posted by JollyElm

***On a side note, something else comes to light. If you look at the PSA 7 on the far right, his name is obviously very close to the bottom border...but if you look at the words "East Hills," they are much closer to the top border than at least two of the other cards. Since the white space between the words/names and photographs is pretty uniform across all four cards, something doesn't make sense. Logically speaking, they can't all be the same size top to bottom. Were these cards NOT a fixed size?? Does anyone know if that is the case??***

I noticed that when you posted the side-by-sides, and I think that is a big piece of the puzzle here and the difficulty of trying to make an example of them. The little regional issues like this would not have had processes or controls better than the big boys with all the experience, and presumably less good. Since the bottom border on that issue is slim even in the best of circumstances, it isn't too surprising if graders struggle with expectations. I suspect they give more leeway with total size wherever they have knowledge that the issued range was wider than might otherwise be seen with regular brands.

[jchcollins]

Originally Posted by vintagebaseballcardguy

I think it was in this thread somewhere (though now I can't find it) where someone said they had relaxed on centering and concentrated more on corners, registration, and the like...the qualities the card came out of the pack with.

I think that was Adam's (Exhibitman) sentiment, which makes good sense as that is how more 70's cards than not came out of the pack. Things had not improved so much when I started collecting in 1986.

[Empty77]

Since everyone seems to like pics, I'll try to make the point that way, and by re-comparing the original card of interest: the following three '61 Topps team cards are all fresh certs, each sold for $30, via eBay, within the past two weeks, so they are as perfect a comparison as conceivable. It suggests that the marketplace is pricing the 8OC not as a straight 6 necessarily, but even as a straight 4.

-the easiest thing to recognize first is that the 6 sold for the same as the 4 b/c the 6's centering is not great whereas the 4 looks pretty good; any better attributes the 6 has in other categories were offset by market interests.

-now, if the 8OC was equally off-center as the 6, then it should have sold for more on account of its better attributes in other categories, but that's not what happened; it sold for the exact same.

-this suggests that it is being valued as a straight 4, plausibly b/c others (i.e., the market overall) is recognizing that if it were graded without qualifiers, it would grade out a straight 4 on account of the centering being so poor.

The card market seems to work not dissimilarly to an equity market, where items are rewarded for good qualities and penalized equally in price for poor qualities. That is not a bad thing for the wallet for the buyer if what traditionally counts as "poor" doesn't bother you, then its a buying opportunity, just like beat-up stocks sometimes.

But it does mean that the "2 grade" demotion "rule-of-thumb" is not a real thing, as I explained in another post above.

[JollyElm]

Round 2.

Although they all look amazingly similar to each other, three of these cards are straight PSA 9's, but one of them is a PSA 9 OC...

1973maravichmockup2.jpg

[Empty77]

That's easy, the 9OC is the off-centered one.

[JollyElm]

And the winner (I mean loser) is card #1...

1973maravichmockup1.jpg

...but I got it very cheaply.

[Promethius88]

I think you also need to take into consideration when the cards were graded by the cert #'s. In the op, as if the 8oc and 6 are newer grades while the others are older. It's not an exact science, of course, but imo PSA is more strict on cards these days compared to several years ago.