Posted By:
MWJay & Leon --
The basic idea and underlying tenet of professional grading services is to reduce the number of altered cards in the marketplace by legitimizing only those cards that are UNALTERED. To do the opposite, would promote altered crap and return us to the hobby mischief of the late 1980s and early 90s when some dealers took out full-page ads in SCD promoting their "razor-sharp" wares.
High-grade and even some medium-grade vintage issues have value because they are either difficult to find, or difficult to find in high grade. To emphasize encapsulation at the expensive of authenticating and slabbing legitimate, unaltered material, also promotes another activity -- the ALTERATION of rare issues. Think about it. If a market develops for cards that appear to be Mint, but are really trimmed, and the prices for such material become greater than that for lower grade cards in their unaltered states, then existing populations of original vintage material will dwindle as smartly packaged miniature baseball card guillotines begin to make their appearance at cardshows across the United States. Also, "certified card doctor" and "restoration specialist" will become more than just "honorary" degrees among hobby scalawags.