Posted By:
warshawlawWhen they were lower priced. I am now out of all of them.
The story of this "find" was great reading, as would be any find story (call it the lottery winner syndrome; there but for the grace of God go I) but it seems to me that it has been given way more play than it might otherwise have received because SCD was chosen to grade the cards. This raises the rather ugly specter of conflict of interest. Those of you who know me know that I railed against PSA in its early days (check out the old VCBC issues) for falsifying prices in the SMR and hyping its own products in the guise of objective reporting. I also noticed that when Beckett began grading cards it hyped its own product by immediately placing its graded cards on a par with PSA and SGC, despite the fact that older grading services, like CSA, existed and were being given no play. Now, with SCD, we see a fairly routine "find" of cards played up like a Wagner discovery with the coverage very heavily salted with references to SCD Authentic, then we have the cards up for sale on ebay fast in the wake of all the hype. If the PR machine works and these cards sell well, which it appears is the case, SCD stands to gain significant marketing advantages for the longer term. My questions therefore are (1) how was it exactly that this neophyte card finder chose SCD rather than PSA or SGC, (2) Did SCD charge the finder its regular fees and were any special deals made with the finder (such as faster turn times than normal), and (3) is there any influence peddling going on here? Anyone want to comment?