Enough with the grievances - what are you thankful for in this hobby?

[Mark17]

I'm thankful for auctions that have things I'm interested in, because I enjoy the anticipation and competitiveness of bidding.

I'm also thankful for post #14.

[BioCRN]

I'm thankful for the handful of under-the-radar buys and auction wins that come way cheaper than expected.

I get a few a year and some I remember for many years afterwards.

I'm not a high-end/high-grade collector, but patience being rewarded is occasionally as rewarding as obtaining the card, itself.

[GeoPoto]

I am thankful for the introduction of grading and encapsulation of baseball cards. Without which, the hobby would have been closed off from me.

I realize this is not the perspective shared by most members of this forum. But it is mine. Let me try to explain.

Most of you were much more involved at an early age in the process of collecting cards. You went to shows, hung out in card shops, had friends who did likewise, etc. You acquired an ability to evaluate cards by handling them. You became specialists in identifying fake cards and confident in your ability to judge a cards condition and value. You derived satisfaction from having these skills and enjoyed being part of the fraternity of collectors. The internet, TPGs, and AHs took that away, or at least blunted it. I can see that.

As a pre-teen, I did have baseball cards for a year or two but viewed them more as a way to play gambling games than as something to collect. After that, I paid no attention to cards for 50 years. Then, for reasons I won't even attempt to explain, I decided to become a card collector. This decision was only remotely possible because it turned out one didn't need to handle and evaluate cards and populate shows or card shops in order to find cards. It could all be done on the internet, safely, with high probabilities of avoiding fake cards and getting cards whose condition correlated with the prices paid so that they could be expected to retain their value, at least in relation to the market. Cards could be bought in auctions, providing greater assurance that the price paid reflected market prices at least on that day.

Since entering the hobby, I have learned that grading is far from perfectly consistent, and that significant card alteration can be done without leaving effects that can be readily identified. This leaves a lot of variances between the assigned grade and the actual eye appeal of the card. Obviously, eye appeal is subjective, but I have learned to factor centering, attractive borders, edge and corner wear, and surface conditions to arrive at a process that works for me.

There is no question, that I began with an inflated confidence in grading. I was prepared to assume that a 6 was better than a 5, 7 was better than 6, and so on. I've learned that it is often not that simple. I can see, for example, that, at least for me, the PSA 8 shown below is less attractive than the other two cards despite their lower grade. The centering and the greatly diminished likelihood that they have been trimmed, makes them preferable to me, before you consider the fantastic price premium commanded by the 8.

So, for me, while grading and encapsulation are not perfect, I am thankful for them for a simple reason. Without them, I would not be a collector. They are existential for me.