What the Hell SGC I am out

[G1911]

Originally Posted by jchcollins

Considering the leading TPG's "preservationists" is laughable at best. There is far too much profit motive involved. If you really had museum expert caliber people seeing to the care of your cards at PSA and SGC, there would be a lot more use of Mylar and preservation materials than there would be talk of grading and flips. The HOF in Cooperstown looks at all of this kind of paranoia among collectors with amusement and disdain, if I had to guess. If someone donates cards to them (and doesn't just loan them a collection) - the first thing they do is bust the slabs and throw them in the trash.

Oh I agree, it’s a load of BS, but all of them claim to be preserving items as part of their business. They’re really there to fuel the $$$ stream and nothing else, but they lay much claim to preservation, to objective expert analysis, and more. As such, they shouldn’t be allowing any contaminants to get into slabs they’re sending out to customers at all, but I understand how dust and plastic and other non-pubic things get in there.

[jchcollins]

Originally Posted by G1911

Oh I agree, it’s a load of BS, but all of them claim to be preserving items as part of their business. They’re really there to fuel the $$$ stream and nothing else, but they lay much claim to preservation, to objective expert analysis, and more. As such, they shouldn’t be allowing any contaminants to get into slabs they’re sending out to customers at all, but I understand how dust and plastic and other non-pubic things get in there.

Agreed. The preservation argument is marketing BS as it's finest. As if any collector who has been doing this for more than five minutes can't protect their cards just as well in One Touches or toploaders or Card Savers or album pages... You kind of have to try to be rough on some of those things anymore to damage them, and certainly people who know what they are doing aren't going to. It's been common knowledge that "baseball cards are worth something" from a household / pop culture perspective for multiple generations now. I'm not really worried about "preserving" my cards when I sub to SGC. I fall prey to the trend like everyone else and want to see what that flip will say...

[G1911]

Originally Posted by jchcollins

Agreed. The preservation argument is marketing BS as it's finest. As if any collector who has been doing this for more than five minutes can't protect their cards just as well in One Touches or toploaders or Card Savers or album pages... You kind of have to try to be rough on some of those things anymore to damage them, and certainly people who know what they are doing aren't going to. It's been common knowledge that "baseball cards are worth something" from a household / pop culture perspective for multiple generations now. I'm not really worried about "preserving" my cards when I sub to SGC. I fall prey to the trend like everyone else and want to see what that flip will say...

I've even had more cards sent to me damaged in slabs than I have in top loaders. Loose fitting PSA slabs letting odd sized items smack around, SGC's black insert damaging the border of a card, etc.

I'm a blasphemer though, I use to keep my cards mostly in binder sheets but had to move on from that (I collect print defects and variants alongside my base sets, and it's a pain to move all the cards 1 slot every time I discover a new one...) to penny sleeves and top loaders. That took up too much space, so now 95% of my vintage cards are completely unsleeved and actually handled. All of my Topps/Bowman are pocket free and lined up in 1,600 count shoeboxes. Most of my T cards are naked too. I mostly worry about N cards preservation wise, they have not aged so well as the T cards and post-war vintage and fade.

[jchcollins]

Originally Posted by G1911

I've even had more cards sent to me damaged in slabs than I have in top loaders. Loose fitting PSA slabs letting odd sized items smack around, SGC's black insert damaging the border of a card, etc.

Cards that move in their slabs (“rattlers”) used to bother me to no end. If the card moved constantly, I would bust the slab. Pretty soon, I was busting most of the ones I bought. Many cards in One Touches did the same thing. The thing about the movement is that while it can be annoying (especially the ones that do it egregiously) I’ve never seen it actually damage a card. I think the physics of most slabs is just such that it would be really difficult to do major edge damage to a card with normal handling. I wouldn’t suggest using a slab as an air hockey puck…

SGC’s jagged edge inserts - they used to be a lot more common than you see now - to me seem more problematic. SGC cards don’t move in the slab nearly as often as you see with PSA, but the potential for something really bad to happen there to me seemed a lot worse.

All of this in the name of grading. Sometimes it’s silly. A card in a toploader and penny sleeve generally won’t move. A card in a card saver won’t move. But oh, get your collection “preserved” with grading…


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[G1911]

Originally Posted by jchcollins

Cards that move in their slabs (“rattlers”) used to bother me to no end. If the card moved constantly, I would bust the slab. Pretty soon, I was busting most of the ones I bought. Many cards in One Touches did the same thing. The thing about the movement is that while it can be annoying (especially the ones that do it egregiously) I’ve never seen it actually damage a card. I think the physics of most slabs is just such that it would be really difficult to do major edge damage to a card with normal handling. I wouldn’t suggest using a slab as an air hockey puck…

SGC’s jagged edge inserts - they used to be a lot more common than you see now - to me seem more problematic. SGC cards don’t move in the slab nearly as often as you see with PSA, but the potential for something really bad to happen there to me seemed a lot worse.

All of this in the name of grading. Sometimes it’s silly. A card in a toploader and penny sleeve generally won’t move. A card in a card saver won’t move.


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I had a T220 Silver McAuliffe in, I think it was a 5, PSA holder. It was put into a PSA holder for a different size card, a T220 is a bit smaller than the modern standard size. So it smacked around, and during shipping, the top left corner got dinged up because the card, whenever it bounced around, was angled and it’s corner was smacking the internal bumper. I compared to the auction scan and sure enough, that corner ding wasn’t there when it was listed.

SGC I had a T card get a nasty gouge from. It was one of those cards that slipped behind the black gasket, but in so doing, only part of the left edge slid under the gasket. About half way down, the card got smushed in and indented by the black gasket.

And I don’t even keep graded cards, I crack ‘em. These may not be issues with the newest slabs, but I’ve never had a card get damaged in a top loader and penny sleeve. A penny sleeve allows some movement but it’s a soft cushion, unlike the SGC gasket.

[jchcollins]

Originally Posted by G1911

I had a T220 Silver McAuliffe in, I think it was a 5, PSA holder. It was put into a PSA holder for a different size card, a T220 is a bit smaller than the modern standard size. So it smacked around, and during shipping, the top left corner got dinged up because the card, whenever it bounced around, was angled and it’s corner was smacking the internal bumper. I compared to the auction scan and sure enough, that corner ding wasn’t there when it was listed.

SGC I had a T card get a nasty gouge from. It was one of those cards that slipped behind the black gasket, but in so doing, only part of the left edge slid under the gasket. About half way down, the card got smushed in and indented by the black gasket.

And I don’t even keep graded cards, I crack ‘em. These may not be issues with the newest slabs, but I’ve never had a card get damaged in a top loader and penny sleeve. A penny sleeve allows some movement but it’s a soft cushion, unlike the SGC gasket.

Yeah, when I say cards that “move” are generally ok, I’m talking about ones slabbed in proper holders with the proper recessed dimensions on the rails. All of that goes out the window when they run out of the correct size, and that lazy streak kicks in and they just use whatever they have. Oddball and small sizes of course are always at more risk of having this happen. I’d chew PSA up one side and down the other, and make sure I got paid out if they ever damaged a card due to using the wrong slab.

SGC and the issue from awhile back of cards slipping behind the gasket was scary. Though they have worked to improve the gasket over the last 20+ years, I’m still just not a huge fan of the design. SGC slabs seem to work more like a picture frame with a mat, with the card sandwiched in there. If they do it right it works most of the time, but just doesn’t seem like the best design to me. PSA’s slab has more of a real enclosure, but the cards generally seem to move more within them. I guess everything is a trade off. Beckett had a good idea with the internal sleeve, but it seems to be poorly implemented in most cases because of the shoddy grade of plastic they use.


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[G1911]

Originally Posted by jchcollins

Yeah, when I say cards that “move” are generally ok, I’m talking about ones slabbed in proper holders with the proper recessed dimensions on the rails. All of that goes out the window when they run out of the correct size, and that lazy streak kicks in and they just use whatever they have. Oddball and small sizes of course are always at more risk of having this happen. I’d chew PSA up one side and down the other, and make sure I got paid out if they ever damaged a card due to using the wrong slab.

SGC and the issue from awhile back of cards slipping behind the gasket was scary. Though they have worked to improve the gasket over the last 20+ years, I’m still just not a huge fan of the design. SGC slabs seem to work more like a picture frame with a mat, with the card sandwiched in there. If they do it right it works most of the time, but just doesn’t seem like the best design to me. PSA’s slab has more of a real enclosure, but the cards generally seem to move more within them. I guess everything is a trade off. Beckett had a good idea with the internal sleeve, but it seems to be poorly implemented in most cases because of the shoddy grade of plastic they use.


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Has SGC gotten better with gasket sizing? I had an oversized T206 that came in an SGC slab, and the gasket was the same size as the normal T206 one. The edges were a little smushed in, possible they were before and it was just a really tight but not harmful fit in the slab, but it seemed likeliest the card was damaged by the gasket because it wasn't really the correct size.

Beckett slabs, in my completely arbitrary opinion, are the least good looking. They are so thick and the card seems to be buried in the slab, losing something in the presentation. I think PSA and SGC at least look nicely presented. Beckett is annoying to crack open too.