Quote:
Originally Posted by jchcollins
Yes. Bingo. This is exactly what I am saying. A "10" is the total fabrication / dream construct of professional grading. Both 9's and 10's are "Mint" cards. The bump from 9 to 10 is supposedly so that Mint cards with "extra eye appeal" or pop or whatever can be recognized for being extra special, (and so that TPG's can charge extra fees, and so that their slabs with 10's can garner additional ooh's and aah's.) The 10 was the original purple label sticker, or PWCC "E" designation. It means nothing other than an already Mint card is somehow "extra" minty. It is a total superlative if you will, that the TPG's pull out of thin air. In practice on their scale since PSA does not have a 9.5, the 10 is the ".5" to any other grade for the 9, and there is no super clear rhyme or reason other than perhaps centering as to how it is awarded.
So yes, the argument that they may legit be giving out 9's instead of as many 10's as with other cards in the rest of the sets in question is not based on the fact that maybe the 9's would show a microscopic bit more handling. If so, those cards wouldn't be 9's to start with. As simple as it gets, the argument here is "If they are both already Mint cards - why does Joe Blow get X percentage of 10's, and Rickey Henderson gets Y (much lower percentage)?
We could have a pile of 100 cards all Mint, and say fifty of them are 10's and fifty of them are 9's. Without the flips, could you tell which are the 10's? In classic Jolly Elm "guess the qualifier" style - of course not! Neither could the people who graded them an hour or a day later. It's a complete gimmick in the vast majority of cases where minute centering differences are not an obvious factor - and even then it's super arguable. And if you busted all the cards and sent them back to be graded again - you would likely end up with totally different results. So once again - the argument that they are from the gate being stingy with 10's v. 9's on marquee vintage cards suggests not that those cards don't meet specs for mint - but just that they don't want so many 10's. If people don't believe this is happening, fine. I just think that most people are not taking the time to understand the argument.
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Now this I'm on board with. I've always wondered how/why TPGs discern between a 9 and 10, or even worse if they do half points, add a third grade in there with 9.5's. Jolly Elm/Darren's other thread in this same forum, Certified, Qualified, and Glorified!!!, points out and shows how inane and inconsistent the high-end grading by TPGs can be. Meanwhile, look at the unbelievably vast differences in looks, condition, and appeal of cards graded at the lower end of the grading scale. Top end, the differences are so narrow (or non-existent) you can't see any light between them. At the bottom end some of the holes/gaps in condition between cards of supposedly the same grade are so big you could drive a Mack truck through them. I can see the potential for the possible manipulation of the grading system, what I don't get though is the why. TPGs artificially controlling the population of cards in certain grades doesn't directly benefit them over the long term, as far as I can tell. Are they doing this on behalf of certain collectors/dealers so they can take advantage of the market and get a big score, or is it more to preserve the value of cards already in the hands of certain collectors so that if more cards of similar high grade are suddenly found and graded it doesn't shrink the perceived value of those cards in the hands of those original collectors? I can understand the numbers and the perceived grading disparity, but without a why (motive) for the supposedly guilty parties (TPGs) doing this, it makes no real sense for the TPGs doing this without there being something in it for them. And anything suggested so far as a possible motive just doesn't seem that plausible for any TPG to go through the trouble of manipulating high-end grade pops of certain cards, at least not to me.