Evidence of Trimming? Your thoughts?/
 

I recently had this 1933 DeLong card come back in a sub and I want to question the description on the label. This card says Authentic, Evidence of Trimming. To me, trimming would be the cutting of a side by a person usually to make the card appear to have more even borders, or sharp corners, or to perhaps fit a certain frame of some kind.

This card obviously was not trimmed by hand, but instead has pieces missing, simply from wear and tear and handling, perhaps being stuffed in a boy’s back pocket for example.

On all four sides of the card, it has enough of a white border to meet the size of the black insert. This card was never trimmed by hand, but rather just has small portions missing from handling. Most of the missing portions are rather rough, but even the one at the bottom right, which has a more straight line to it is easily attributed to that portion being folded back, and breaking off more cleanly than the rest of the wear and tear.

Here’s the criteria for a 1:

GRADE
1

QUALITY
POOR

DESCRIPTION
This card usually exhibits many of these characteristics: heavy print spots, heavy crease(s), pinhole(s), color or focus imperfections or discoloration, surface scuffing or tears, rounded and/or fraying corners, ink or pencil marking(s), and lack of all or some original gloss, small portions of the card may be missing.

I don’t usually argue about grades received, but I think to say that this was trimmed is incorrect and I believe that it meets the SGC definition of a 1 grade.

I think it has too much card missing to be a 1…probably have to call that more than small pieces gone. But I could see it in an Authentic without the trimming designation maybe.

With all the corner areas gone, makes me think it was either pinned up on a board at the corners or was possibly cut like kids do and then suffered further wear.

But it is damaged really unusually, I can’t say with any real certainty what brought it to that condition. But a straight Authentic would probably be as good as you could get. And you might be able to get that elsewhere if SGC won’t change their opinion.

Thank you. I do think that a straight Authentic grade is better than the EOT, which makes it seem purposely altered. I don’t believe that to be the case.

I am wondering though what they consider “small portions missing” because I do have other cards with small portions missing that received a 1. I’m wondering if it is some kind of percentage that they go by that we’re not aware of.

Grading is subjective and a crapshoot.
.

The card in question has LARGE chunks missing and the bottom corners look like they could have been cut at one time. I agree with the grade but think just Authentic would also work and be better for the card owner.

This seems quite a stretch - it appears much more likely the bottom right corner, at absolute minimum, was cut off at one point. The wear pattern is strongly indicative of this.

The card appears accurately described, although not trimmed with intent to deceive.

What we’ve come to
 

Who would have thought when the grading services first came out that we’d be keeping our hopes and dreams up just for a 1????

I agree with the Authentic grade due to amount of card missing also. I can't remember seeing a 1 personally with this level of removed material.

I don't think the evidence of trimming was necessary as so many authentic grades exist without as it with obvious trims. Granted the lower half without handling it looks like it was cleaned up with scissors, but still seems petty with so much material gone already.

Sadly I think the grader nailed you on the bottom right corner edge...looks awful sharp like straitened by cutting object. Idk that's all I could think of.

Not sure I follow why it's a big deal.

With or without the notation, it's pretty obvious that there are pieces missing.

I can't imagine anyone looking at this card and thinking that it's somehow less valuable or less important simply because of the notation.

Maybe you're hoping for the return of the SGC set registry, and by losing the notation, you'll get a bump in the scoring? ;)

It does not meet the definition of a 1. Those are not small pieces missing. Not even a close call.

I guess my question then is what is considered small versus large? Probably a very subjective determination. Do grading companies base small versus large on a certain percentage of the card missing?

I also don’t believe that bottom right corner was cut. I think it was folded over back-and-forth enough times that it then separated.

It’s not necessarily that it’s a big deal. I feel like I’ve seen cards that have had significant amounts of the card missing. I was also wondering exactly what they consider a “small portion” of the card missing and the fact that they determined that there was evidence of trimming is not something that I agree with. I think the portions of card missing we’re just worn away over time Like rounded corners, but more substantial than that.

I’m not worried about the registry returning and the A versus the 1. More just that I feel that the way it was described with the trimming was not accurate in my estimation.

I have no idea how the graders do it. For me your Boxing cards are at their limit for small pieces missing. The Delong is missing way too much for me to consider it a small portion. If it was just missing either the top right or bottom left them maybe it would be just a small portion.

I seem to remember someone had some kind of a program where they could determine the percentage of card actually missing based on the photo. If someone can point me in the direction of how to do that, I would love to figure that out.

I've had ones come back "too fragile to holder" isn't that part of the POINT of holdering them

I actually laughed out loud when I saw that. Evidence of trimming? No shit, Sherlock, what was the clue that let you crack that case? Talk about overkill. It's like ta MK or MC qualifier on a PSA 1. Do we really need more than a 1 to know it's a beater?

Agree 100%. Holdering is the way to preserve it. Silly that they wont.

I would think this means they were worried that the card would be damaged during the process of putting it into the holder.

Why even grade it? Anyone with eyes can see what it is. Who cares what some random stranger thinks about it? Why is this important?

+1 on that, sir.

I had lots of cards from my childhood that should be graded "Authentic - Evidence Of Being Thrown Very Hard Into A Wall During A Game Of Knockdowns"

Hell, I might even pay extra for that notation. :D

Would you be happier with "Evidence of Tearing?". Or maybe "Evidence of Biting?"

I run into this issue often with hand cut Japanese menko. In my mind, “trimming” should have been done with an end goal in mind of trying to make a card look better. With menko, it often looks like a card was cut out by a kid whose scissor skills are lacking. (Which was often true). So in my mind, “trimming” isn’t the right term, but it often gets put on the slab.

That would be the elusive RN (rat nibble) designation.

This card seems like a good starting point to retrain any grader assigning numeric grades to trimmed cards. If they can't get this one correct, there's no hope. If they spot this one, you gradually increase the level of difficulty.

It certainly doesn't belong in a numeric holder, and they don't have a designation for "Evidence of Mutilation", so I'm not sure what the complaint is here. It's not like that flip is hurting the resale value of this card.

I can understand being annoyed by the “ evidence of trimming“
Evidence of trimming typically implies shenanigans - That Delong was obviously not trimmed to deceive .
Back in the old day you might’ve got a straight authentic or “genuine”

I don't think SGC does a straight Authentic anymore. Since they implemented their improved Authentic grade, they need a description and limited it to 4 choices. https://www.gosgc.com/authentic-Improvement

Thanks I didn’t know that - Maybe they’ll add something to address too much of the card missing that would be better than “ evidence of trimming “

One could argue the "altered" choice also encapsulates (pun intended) the "color added" and "evidence of trimming" choices.....

Not exactly true. I got this back about a month ago.

I wonder if the “hand cut” element makes a difference in this case.

This was the answer I received when I asked the question:

“When our Team is authenticating and evaluating a card for a possible numeric grade, they are looking at many aspects of a card. If our Team deemed a card to be altered, they will have it authenticated, with a secondary designation underneath this. However, there are some cards that our Team will only authenticate at this time. Some of these will include any blank back cards, modern sketch cards, or cards that have an error that affects the overall aspect of the card like missing ink or foil”.

Just use a little of Kurt’s spray on it - should bring it up to at least a 4!

SO the answer is that there is no definitive answer? And why in the world would a blank back card only get an A, if I am reading that correctly? I am sure I am missing something.

I’m just as confused.

I think the “blank back” Authentic is probably meant for cards that should have something on back but don’t. Although that’s not how it is worded at all.

I get what you’re saying, based off most examples we’d see trimmed isn’t a positive qualifier. Then again any qualifier isn’t good. Trimmed generally has the assumption that it’s doctored on purpose. This example is definitely trimmed with a straight edge, for whatever reason (likely heavy damage) but surely isn’t to trick anyone.

Don’t want to sound like daddy warbucks, but why grade it ? You can get a PR 1 for near $100

https://www.ebay.com/itm/30548918839...mis&media=COPY

Or a 5 for around $850

https://www.ebay.com/itm/30548918839...mis&media=COPY