Grading question... why hammering Hank??
 

Morning all

I’d appreciate some N54 experienced input on how graders technically grade cards - specifically, I am unclear why Hank is getting Hammered here ;) with only a 3.5 SGC grade

I guess either I don’t have a very good eye or I just don’t yet know the technical grading principals well enough.

I do see a line extending from Hank’s mouth toward the bottom of the card. I included a blow up of that area.

Appreciate your thoughts.... otherwise, the edges, corners and image quality look pretty good to me (the centering is not great, but I don’t think would drop the grade this low - right?)

Thx for taking a look

Jeff

The centering is an issue here, and not sure if there are any other surface issues? Or what the back looks like

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Btw, beautiful card, one of my favorites, as I own a raw one. 56 is one of my favorite Topps sets.

But I don't think you posted this is in the correct forum

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Wrong forum? Sorry about that... where is the right forum for Q’s like this one?

(Here is the back, btw)

Post war cards forum

Well, it's a post-1945 card, so the post-war baseball forum. But it's a generic question, so it's not too out of place here. There isn't a specific grading forum on this board.

As to your question, the print line is probably not bringing it all the way down. There is probably a crease you're not seeing, or SGC has swung the pendulum the other way and is really discounting the 85/15ish centering both directions.

Yeah, hard to say with the small pictures, but the centering definitely holds it back some. Either way, it's a beautiful card!

A few years ago I had a brief talk with one of the guys from SGC about a couple cards that recieved puzzling grades.

Neither had one glaring defect that made it lose grades, but a few small things that added up.
He explained that it was a cumulative thing, so perfect card with iffy centering might be a 5, but add some other small defect and it would be 4.5, another.. down to 4

Cards like this can be the tricky ones, centering holds it back, plus a small print defect, plus maybe whatever else.

Technical grade aside, it's a really nice card. One I wouldn't be in a hurry to upgrade. I've always thought more of how well it's preserved than how well it was made. (Unfortunately for me in many cases. )

SGC recently is murderously tough on centering. Even tougher than their documented standards in some cases, I have observed. That affects most, but not necessarily all cards in their newest "tuxedo" slab. The did give your card the .5 bump, so they were not as tough on the centering here as they could have been, and that in itself is suggestive of the fact that it's likely not centering alone which led to the grade. I'm guessing as others have suggested that you are missing a crease or a wrinkle somewhere. Again, this is where "buy the card, not the grade" comes in heavily when considering eye appeal. Particularly for the larger mid-50's cards, I think many in the 3-4 range have the capacity to retain huge eye appeal. Perhaps it's because most were printed on thicker cardboard stock than say, Topps was using when the late 60's / early 70's rolled around.

Sometimes the graders miss, or leave a mystery though. Last year I had a '67 Mantle that I thought had a chance at a 6; SGC gave it a 4. There was little wrong with that card besides a moderate centering shift. No creases, sharp enough corners for a 6 easily. They could have found something I didn't under magnification, but even so it was a very tough grade. That just happens sometimes.