Post-War PSA Grading

[raulus]

Originally Posted by jchcollins

But...there's not 1 or 2 more examples. Maybe there will be someday, but his point in the video makes sense mathematically. In fact in looking at the pop since he made the video, I see where PSA has added two more 9 Ryan rookies to their "mint" totals. So his point is even further augmented.

I think the VCC videos are pretty convincing. Still I realize there are those who don't understand, and likely still more with big bucks tied up in PSA slabs that just don't care.

The '68 Ryan is a good example because it's not a rare or condition sensitive card. Noteworthy and valuable? Sure. But by the standards with which collectors have judged attainability on factors other than pure dollars for decades now - the Ryan RC is not remotely a tough card. Unlike even some of it's late 60's contemporaries (the '67 Dehney / Seaver, for example) there is a Ryan for every collector who wants one assuming they are willing to pay within a wide ballpark range of what different conditioned examples go for. So this is all just further evidence that there is no real reason in the population of the cards that this discrepancy between 9's and 10's is what it is.

PSA of course has the ultimate upper hand here. All of their grades issued are subjective judgment calls anyway, and the difference between a 9 and a 10 is even worse. Besides a notation on centering in their standard, it's pure subjectivity. When grading first got popular in the early 2000's, the difference was supposedly only the eye appeal that a 10 was a "mint plus" card. It was totally up to the whim of the grader - and clearly still is. (Maybe with some discreet corporate "guidance" now on certain cards?) "Gem" mint as a concept is virtually useless outside of the world of TPG's. And inside that world, there is nothing objective to bring back to PSA to hold them accountable, or to say that they are doing it wrong.

This is where you kind of have to digest your grading with a large grain of salt. People can believe whatever they want, but it's going to be a hell of a lot easier to get a PSA 10 on your 1980 Topps Rick Cerone than it is your Rickey Henderson.

I'm picking up what you're laying down. And I don't disagree.

My point is simply mathematical, that if there had happened to be 1 or 2 more of the PSA 9s that instead came out as 10s, then the results would be wildly different. Just because there's only 1 instead of 2 or 3 doesn't seem like a big difference in the pop counts. But perhaps it does to the person who has that 1 card, and paid a king's ransom for it.

In large part, the thrust of my argument is that statistics based on small sample sizes aren't particularly relevant. And 1 is a pretty small sample size.

Is it possible that PSA is manipulating pop counts? Absolutely. And with any luck, tomorrow some former PSA employee will come out and confirm as much.

Do the provided statistics alone prove it? I suspect that it probably depends on your viewpoint.