1974 topps psa mike schmidt psa 10

[philliesphan]

Well -- I'm a huge Schmidt fan, so I have perhaps a bit of a bias in my opinion here.

I'll also disclose that I am the owner of one of the five 1974 Topps Mike Schmidt #283 PSA 10 cards, and I am happily so.

A few thoughts:

I get that grading is not for many / all folks. PSA 10s of Hall of Famers go for crazy prices. They have for a decade or more. This is not a new thing, there is a market for it, and if you're not willing to pony up for a 10, so be it. Collect what you want, have fun with the hobby. For as much as I like my Schmidt cards, I equally like my beat up Zeenut cards, which are measurably rarer.

It is deceptive that Brent listed this card in the subtitle as Population 1 of 4. As mentioned already in this thread, there are five of these PSA 10s.

From a pure grading perspective, I looked at hundreds of Schmidt #283 over the years, and I quite like the PSA 10 that I have. That said, I've seen scans or handled four of the PSA 10s (haven't seen the fifth). Two of them have a very common print defect, the dreaded "pair of yellow dots" in the Philadelphia red background area to the top left of Schmidt's head. I find those damned dots quite distracting. When you've seen dozens upon dozens of the same card, I promise you this is one of the things that sticks out like a sore thumb, even moreso than the centering that is so often off on this card.

Here's the other PSA 10 of this card with the two ugly print dots:
http://apr08.hugginsandscott.com/cgi...pl?itemid=7448

Luckily, the card I have doesn't have the dots.