PSA never ceases to amaze me

[conor912]

I would think that by PSA keeping the submission fee that the sumittor would be entitled to at least a one sentance description as to why their item was rejected.

[CaramelMan]

Talk about a conflict of interest....

The guy Steve is the head pack grader, but he sells the most wax in the country through his own store..

How can PSA allow this? I thought when they become a grader, they have to sell their entire collections (or not be an auction house) which he essentially is..

Never liked this set up and it seems like a MAJOR conflict of interest...

[bobbyw8469]

Never liked this set up and it seems like a MAJOR conflict of interest...

+1

[cincyredlegs]

Originally Posted by CaramelMan

Talk about a conflict of interest....

The guy Steve is the head pack grader, but he sells the most wax in the country through his own store..

How can PSA allow this? I thought when they become a grader, they have to sell their entire collections (or not be an auction house) which he essentially is..

Never liked this set up and it seems like a MAJOR conflict of interest...

Just to make everyone aware, Steve DOES NOT grade any packs. PSA ships the packs to Steve and Steve ONLY authenticates them. He ships back to PSA and PSA assigns a grade to them.

I agree the logistics is not great but Steve and his team are the foremost experts on un-opened material.

Mark

[vintagetoppsguy]

Originally Posted by cincyredlegs

Just to make everyone aware, Steve DOES NOT grade any packs. PSA ships the packs to Steve and Steve ONLY authenticates them. He ships back to PSA and PSA assigns a grade to them.

I agree the logistics is not great but Steve and his team are the foremost experts on un-opened material.

Mark

Mark,

Yes, that is true, he does not grade packs, he only authenticates them. However, it is, at least to me, still a conflict of interest if he is authenticating his own packs for PSA to grade.

I've heard nothing but good things about Steve and I'm sure he is a man of high integrity, but the door is open for fraud to occur if no one is checking him. There have been many dealers in our hobby with what we perceived at one time as having high integrity and look where they are now.

Does PSA allow other dealers to authenticate their own cards and PSA only assign a number grade to them, or does PSA do both the authenticating and grading? I'm pretty sure they authenticate and grade, no matter the submitter. I'm not sure why packs should be any different.

Anyway, that's just my opinion.

Edited to add: To put it another way, if I sent PSA/DNA an autographed baseball that was already authenticated through JSA and I only wanted them to grade it, would they do that or do you think hey would want to re-authenticate it as well? Sure they would. Again, not sure why packs are any different and why Steve gets to authenticate his own stuff for grading.

[x2drich2000]

Originally Posted by CaramelMan

Talk about a conflict of interest....

The guy Steve is the head pack grader, but he sells the most wax in the country through his own store..

How can PSA allow this? I thought when they become a grader, they have to sell their entire collections (or not be an auction house) which he essentially is..

Never liked this set up and it seems like a MAJOR conflict of interest...

While this certainly can be a conflict of interest, I believe you really need to look at the specifics of Steve's involvement. I seriously doubt Steve would even consider giving up his business just to authentic packs for PSA. Also, I believe Steve does not actually grade the packs, rather he only states whether the pack is authentic/unaltered or bad. In addition, Steve is widely considered to be one of the most knowledgable people in the hobby regarding unopened material. Without Steve doing the authenticating, I doubt many would support PSA's grading of the packs and there would be even more questions on what is/is not good that has been graded. Steve has a huge following of collectors that belief him to have extremely high morals. Simply looking at the number of raw packs, that are easily sequenced like 86 fleer basketball, that people have reported pulling superstar from speaks to his integrity. This is not to say that Steve has not made mistakes, but I know I would trust his judgement over most other people without hesitation regardless of any possible conflict of interest.

For full disclosure, I don't have any graded packs in my collection and I don't think I have ever bought something from Steve.

DJ

[lsutigers1973]

I will repeat it, Steve does not grade packs. He authenticates them as original and unopened. PSA's minions grade the packs.

Also, as a long time customer of Steve's, I can say with confidence that there is zero conflict of interest as his integrity is greater than the Pope's. I have even seen him eat the cost of a few boxes that were in the $1500+ range because the cards inside the packs were ruined by gum. No one else in this industry would do that. All dealers would tell you it's a gamble when opening old packs.

[ScottFandango]

Originally Posted by lsutigers1973

I will repeat it, Steve does not grade packs. He authenticates them as original and unopened. PSA's minions grade the packs.

Also, as a long time customer of Steve's, I can say with confidence that there is zero conflict of interest as his [b] integrity is greater than the Pope's.[\b] I have even seen him eat the cost of a few boxes that were in the $1500+ range because the cards inside the packs were ruined by gum. No one else in this industry would do that. All dealers would tell you it's a gamble when opening old packs.

Don't know if your are the best judge of integrity as you were kicked off the CU boards for scamming people....you still do the silver coin scam on eBay also?

[bobbyw8469]

Don't know if your are the best judge of integrity as you were kicked off the CU boards for scamming people....you still do the silver coin scam on eBay also?

+1. Don't you worry though. His alt/troll account is alive and kicking on the PSA board. The whole thing is quite comical/pathetic to me.

[tbob]

Originally Posted by conor912

I would think that by PSA keeping the submission fee that the sumittor would be entitled to at least a one sentance description as to why their item was rejected.

Exactly. Thanks Conor, that is my point. I'm not a pack guy so I do not possess the greatest ability to understand exactly what "altered" means so it would have been the right thing to do to tell how it is supposed to be altered.