Crossover grading

[Dpeck100]

Originally Posted by benjulmag

David, I have no plans to try this case. I have no horse in this race other than my concern about the hobby and my desire to initiate discussion about things I see going on that I don't think are kosher.

This issue is merely a subset of a myriad of other issues discussed on this Board. As someone who goes back to the 1960's and sees what it going on with blatantly altered cards receiving grades, ridiculous price differentials between half grades for differences that exist only because some 30-year old grader with little hobby experience says exists, and even if it does is based on some totally subjective determination of grading, I feel the need to speak out and try to stimulate provocative discussion that could be an impetus for change.

I respect the views of all people who in a civil manner disagree with what I say, and in a number of instances upon further reflection I have shifted my views. That is what I like about this Board. But I have real concerns much of what we are seeing is a house of cards (pun intended) ready to fall, and I think it is constructive to raise awareness of these issues.

There may be some bias on PSA's part but proving it using cross over data will be impossible. I understand your concern but when the discussion moves to anti trust lawsuits is where it goes from productive to something other than that.

I think what you are missing is that many cards that are submitted to third party grading firms change grades on a second or third trip so this same argument can be used to defend against your thesis.

In 2011 I got a real eye opener when it came to grading. There was a mid 50's Topps card that was a PSA 8 in a Rick Probstein auction that went for $40 something dollars. A month or two later the same exact card showed back up in a Rick Probstein auction and was now a PSA 10 and went for $4,000+. I was honestly outraged. How could this happen? I emailed Joe Orlando with my concern thinking he would be shocked too and really want to know and he wrote back asking if I would like to talk about it. We spoke the next day and he smartened me up real quick and explained that there were lots of players in the market that buy what they think are under graded cards and send them in for review, crack and resub, and also that the graders aren't perfect and are only human and that one may see something another doesn't or value it differently when rendering a grade. It became very clear to me then that third party grading isn't a perfect science.

A lot of cards that are in PSA 10 holders were once in a PSA 9 holder. Two of the cards I have spent the most on were bumped from a 9 to a 10. Once more showing that within the same company they have graders that might not agree on the grade. If they can't agree within a company, on how earth can one determine what the exact grade of the cross over should be? Just because SGC says it is X doesn't mean it is X in the eyes of another grader.

One of these cards was submitted and received a PSA 9. It was cracked and once more received a PSA 9. The consignor auctioned it off through PWCC and won their card back via the snipe shill bid that I discuss on other forums as the preferred method of shilling. It was then sent back to PSA for review and was finally awarded the 10 and then I paid the person nearly five times as much for it. When things like this happen you can argue against third party grading as a whole but proving in court in any capacity that PSA has set out to damage it's competition by not crossing over cards all of the time at equal grades is impossible.

The market share differences are so large that they legitimately do not see either SGC or BGS as a real threat. There is no doubt that the spread in prices has caused PSA to gain more submissions but this is a kind of like a chicken or the egg argument. Which came first? The reality is the market share divergence started in the mid 2000's and saw BGS lose 30%+ of the market to PSA. The battle was won over ten years ago so the market we see today is just a reflection of that. There are more collectors who want a PSA graded card and so lots of cards that have been graded prior attempt to get moved to PSA.

I think a better question to ask is why are these people trying to cross over cards? The answer in most cases is money. In my case early on it was uniformity but at this point it would honestly be about the economics of it. If there were more examples of cards being cracked out and submitted raw and receiving either equal or higher grades you would see an increase in the demand for SGC graded cards but this isn't happening. If it was this would perhaps validate some of your concerns but there just isn't the evidence.

A comment just in the past hour showed a cross over submission. A few equal grades but mostly lower. Had the submitter asked for straight cross overs many would have been returned in card savers and PSA would have kept his money but instead he was realistic and they came back in holders.