PSA has a new president

[Peter_Spaeth]

Originally Posted by Rhotchkiss

Thanks for the link Peter. I can already tell this will be a shitshow - the poor judgement it took to go on blowout and take on BODA is likely a harbinger of things to come. That dude was dead meat the minute he posted.

I wasn't impressed with his answers to my questions, to the extent he even answered. Oh well.

[taul166]

It was probably only a matter of time before another shoe dropped after Joe Orlando departed. Wouldn't be surprised if there are more personnel changes in key positions. Didn't they hire several other VP level folks under the Orlando regime. Some of those folks may be next to be moved to other positions that are not part of any sort of inner circle, or they might become become frustrated and leave because their input is not valued or solicited.

[MattyC]

Third party grading, led by PSA, has been a shitshow from the get-go. The emperor is seen without clothes the second one considers how you send in a card, it gets grade X. Crack and send it back in, it gets grade Y. Review it, it gets grade Z. A grade from them is just one opinion on one day. A snapshot in time. On another day, with another grader, get another opinion. End of the day, it's just strikes and balls being called by different umps on different days. Heck, sometimes the same ump can't even be consistent within the same game. That's grading.

Which makes the only thing crazier the guys who put that sticker and slab on such a pedestal instead of using their own two God-given eyes to determine what looks best to them. Every time some PSA 9 with, let's call it sub-optimal eye appeal, sets some price record at an AH, it boggles my mind.

I hear they are now photographing every card and running at least high value submissions through some kind of recognition software so that cards cannot be cracked and resubbed to get a better grade. That will certainly help curtail doctoring, which is a good thing at least. But for those undergraded cards out there, it also freezes them in undeserving grades.

I always found it a silly and wrong case of over correction, that in some misguided attempt to compensate for overgraded cards in past eras, PSA decided to be overly harsh now and put 8s in 7 holders, etc. I used to think it was to foster regrades and reviews as a revenue stream, as well as control population (an aspect covered in some informative videos online). Whatever the motivation, the result is a tremendous degree of inconsistency in slabbed cards out there. You so often see two cards in the same PSA grade, and one just blows away the other. Again, just reveals how chaotic and silly it all is— the serious amounts of money thrown at PSA slabs notwithstanding.

[BobC]

Originally Posted by MattyC

Which makes the only thing crazier the guys who put that sticker and slab on such a pedestal instead of using their own two God-given eyes to determine what looks best to them. Every time some PSA 9 with, let's call it sub-optimal eye appeal, sets some price record at an AH, it boggles my mind.

Don't disagree with anything you said, but in regards to your above quote, to those collectors simply concerned about their ranking on the Registry, the only thing they really do care about is the flip and the grade on the card. So since only PSA graded cards get added to the PSA Registry, the grade that PSA puts on a card is all important to them. I'd bet anything that if you had someone working on a Registry set, and two examples of a particular card they still needed came up for sale in an auction where one was in a much older PSA flip and very generously graded as a 5, while the other card was in a much, much newer flip, and while centered and visibly presented as much nicer than the card graded as a 5, only got graded as a 4, that Registry collector will pick the higher graded card every time. Even if the lower graded 4 card actually looks and presents significantly better than the card graded as a 5. In the case of the Registry, the grade will always override the actual condition and presentation of the card. And they'll pay more for that higher grade as well.