Off-centered cards you love anyway...

[BigRedMachine1969]

Great thread. Glad to see so many others not terribly bothered by centering issues.

[almostdone]

How far is too far when “off centered”?
Drew

[jchcollins]

Originally Posted by almostdone

How far is too far when “off centered”?
Drew

That's fantastic!

[Harliduck]

Originally Posted by almostdone

How far is too far when “off centered”?
Drew

Drew...that is AWESOME. Did you pull those from the same pack or have any history how you got them all together like that?

[Harliduck]

Funny looking through this thread and not realizing it was an older thread brought back...and then seeing I've replied was pretty funny...and my opinion still holds true.

Also funny the discussion on the 1970 Ryan...as I received a perfect example just today in the mail relevant to this thread. I am doing a second 70 set and needed another Ryan, won this last week for a heck of a deal, and the perfect card for a second set and one where the OC doesn't bother me a bit.

[jchcollins]

Originally Posted by Harliduck

Funny looking through this thread and not realizing it was an older thread brought back...

Yeah, sorry - I've been known to do that upon occasion when I still want to talk about something.

[egri]

[IMG]1960 Topps Pittsburgh Pirates Team, on Flickr[/IMG]

I picked this up (unsigned) off eBay about five years ago. At the time, I was still in college and my signed 1953 Topps project was busting my budget. I decided I needed a project that wasn't so expensive, and I've always had a soft spot for the 1960 Pirates. I won this card for a song, due to it being miscut. I ended up getting an internship a couple weeks later that enabled me to keep going on the 1953s, so I worked them both. All of these were obtained TTM, except for Bill Mazeroski, who I got at a private signing. I'm on the hunt for a low grade Carl Yastrzemski rookie for the signing he has in November, and a lot of the ones I'm seeing are very OC, which I don't mind.

Edit: And I just realized I posted a picture from before Mazeroski signed it. I'll have to update it later.

[almostdone]

Originally Posted by Harliduck

Drew...that is AWESOME. Did you pull those from the same pack or have any history how you got them all together like that?

No. I actually picked these up here on the BST about 8 years ago for about $5.00 shipped. Thought it was to cool to pass up. I think the seller said he got them from someone who had a whole bunch of packs miscut like this in one box back in the day. He put together some “mini puzzles” and slowly got rid of them. Would have been cool to get a HOFer but still glad I have what I got.

78 Topps were the first cards I ever saw as a kid so it makes them that much more special.

Thanks for asking and to everyone else in this thread really nice cards guys. Most of yours are dead centered compared to my collection.

Drew

[JollyElm]

These pairs are in that same connective vein (and the Mantle/Mathews is just way cool)...

[Harliduck]

Originally Posted by JollyElm

These pairs are in that same connective vein (and the Mantle/Mathews is just way cool)...

So cool...wish the 67 Matthews was with that Mantle! Too bad they couldn't grade all those together...

[jchcollins]

Originally Posted by BigRedMachine1969

Great thread. Glad to see so many others not terribly bothered by centering issues.

I don't like miscuts or some "close to miscut" sliver borders. But for most vintage cards, it seems like a good many of them came out of the pack at least moderately OC, like 70/30 or so one way. While I can understand that we would all want 50/50 perfect cards if we had magic wands and that were easily attainable, what I don't understand is why mild to moderately OC cards are automatically shunned anymore here in the 21st century. Sure, if you have an eye for grading, maybe something goes off in your brain and you realize "Hey, this card isn't mint..." but that doesn't mean it's 100% ugly either. That's how they were issued, and there is nothing inherently wrong with that.

I think today's level of centering scrutiny is largely a con job pulled over on many of us in the hobby by professional grading companies. Think about it. Where in a spec for Topps or Bowman back in the day did it ever say that a card HAD to be perfectly centered? It didn't, because they were never intended to be perfect. In reality, not only did Topps QC not throw out OC cards, they didn't throw out most badly MC cards either.

To me anymore, cards in midgrade that still look nice and are not perfectly centered are just offering more proof that they are not doctored / altered here in the 21st century, because they look the way that many of them looked back decades ago. If I can pick them up at a discount because of that - well then so be it.