Wow Rare Air 52 Mantle SGC 5 REA

[Peter_Spaeth]

It's interesting how people are drawn to different things. I see image quality and registration first, corners second, and centering (unless really bad) third. I might not even notice a slight tilt until a later look. If I had to guess why this is, it's because so many of the cards I pulled from packs as a kid were not all that well centered and I am just used to it.

[MattyC]

Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth

It's interesting how people are drawn to different things. I see image quality and registration first, corners second, and centering (unless really bad) third. I might not even notice a slight tilt until a later look. If I had to guess why this is, it's because so many of the cards I pulled from packs as a kid were not all that well centered and I am just used to it.

Great point, Peter. I started opening packs in 86 and I remember a good amount of cards that were less than perfect on the framing front— yet I would imagine the 1970s would have been a MUCH different experience. I opened a few 1975 boxes when I first got out of college, as that set was my dream set growing up with all that color and star power and big RCs, and the centering was way worse than I had in my 86 cards!

When I open boxes today from sets I loved as a kid, I am totally cool with slightly off centering. Once I saw how expensive individual single vintage graded cards were, when I got into them, that was when I began to say to myself, "Hell, if I am shelling out this much, I wanna get great centering, too." From there I began to see how certain cards, like '76 Topps Brett for example, were usually so OC that hunting centered examples became a fun challenge— and also a way to find rarity in a card that at first blush didn't seem rare. So that is how my journey into centering came about.

[Snowman]

As someone who hunts for centered copies of all the oversized early 50s Topps cards, and as someone who obsesses over data, I should also probably point out that the centered pricing gap (or perhaps 'multiplier' is a more appropriate term) has also been widening in recent years. I think as more and more of the modern collectors wake up and smell the vintage coffee after bastardizing their modern rainbow glitter cards, it seems like they are trying to compete for some of the higher eye-appeal copies.

Here's a snapshot of a few of my 52s with lower-tier HOFers and commons. I often find myself paying double or triple "comps" for these as well. Sometimes I get lucky and don't have to pay much of a premium, but it's always fun to get into snipe wars on eBay with other centering OCD collectors. There will be cards that otherwise sell for $20 sometimes where I'll bid $120 and lose to some other nutcase like myself. Always get a good laugh out of those ones. Guy probably thinks he got shilled. Nope. Just another centering-focused collector.