BVG accuracy on lower-mid vintage...?

[mintacular]

I think Beckett grading vintage has NO CLUE what they are doing, they are VERY inconsistent. They will take a well centered sharp card with a mega crease for example and they add all the numbers and crunch them and come up with a "4" whereas PSA would take said crease and the max is 2.5+ or 3 no matter what the other qualities are, as it should be. As a result Beckett vintage grades are a total hodgepodge blender method of grading whereas PSA/SGC has baselines like "if this issue exists you won't go higher than X" and from there you can judge eye appeal issues accordingly.....

[jchcollins]

Originally Posted by mintacular

I think Beckett grading vintage has NO CLUE what they are doing, they are VERY inconsistent. They will take a well centered sharp card with a mega crease for example and they add all the numbers and crunch them and come up with a "4" whereas PSA would take said crease and the max is 2.5+ or 3 no matter what the other qualities are, as it should be. As a result Beckett vintage grades are a total hodgepodge blender method of grading whereas PSA/SGC has baselines like "if this issue exists you won't go higher than X" and from there you can judge eye appeal issues accordingly.....

You have a point to a degree, but in Beckett's "number crunching" of subgrades, the biggest negative factor usually weighs very heavily. I've also seen PSA grade a card that was otherwise NM a 3 because of a wrinkle that was like a quarter of a centimeter long which you might be able to see after a minute of twisting in bright light. That isn't right either. As far as inconsistency goes, I think PSA could see and raise BVG. Look at a vintage 5 that was graded 15 or 20 years ago vs. one graded last week in a lighthouse holder. Their consistency is all over the place as well. Honestly I don't have enough Beckett graded cards to judge, but my belief is that neither PSA or Beckett has been as consistent since the 1990's as SGC.

Oh, and have we mentioned...PSA has recently encapsulated a blue ton of altered cards in numbered slabs.

[toledo_mudhen]

Originally Posted by mintacular

I think Beckett grading vintage has NO CLUE what they are doing, they are VERY inconsistent. They will take a well centered sharp card with a mega crease for example and they add all the numbers and crunch them and come up with a "4" whereas PSA would take said crease and the max is 2.5+ or 3 no matter what the other qualities are, as it should be. As a result Beckett vintage grades are a total hodgepodge blender method of grading whereas PSA/SGC has baselines like "if this issue exists you won't go higher than X" and from there you can judge eye appeal issues accordingly.....

I stopped buying Beckett Graded Cards (Vintage) long ago as my personal crossover rate on them has been miserable (maybe 20%)

[Rascal1010]

My personal experience with BVG on vintage cards is they are generally a grade higher than PSA on Mid-grade cards. Not on all cards, but as a rule of thumb that is about where they land, and that is roughly what they are going to sell for. The best example of this would be a BVG 1971 Rod Carew graded a 9 by BVG that I took as part of a trade about a year ago. I roughly figured it at PSA 8 price in the trade, it sold for roughly PSA 8.5 price at auction. I considered myself very lucky, I did not however feel lucky enough to submit the card to PSA for regrading, as I do not think it would have come back in a 9 holder from PSA.

On Pre-war cards I have had in BVG holders, they are all over the place on grading. I think a lot of this has to do with when they were graded. You will run into this issue of when they were graded with all of the big 3, reinforces the adage "buy the card not the holder"! At the end of the dat I probably have the least confidence buying/trading BVG cards than I do SGC or PSA slabbed cards. Even GAI "1st Graded" examples seem to be more accurately graded than most BVG cards that I have owned, and I have definitely had a much better success rate crossing these to PSA holders to market than I have had with BVG cards.

Just my 2 cents, but your Mantle is a beautiful VG-EX card.

[Leon]

Personally, except for a bit of overgrading on a few cards, I think BVG is the best grading company in vintage today. But then again, I only collect vintage. There is no doubt in my mind they can spot alterations better than the others as well as fakes, at least with what I have seen recently. The biggest issue with them is they don't market their vintage grading. But that isn't the graders fault. My grader of choice is still SGC for a variety of reasons. Probably the best is to hold value.