Greg Morris Overgrading

[bcookie]

Bought a card advertised as NM-MT+ and SGC just gave it a 3.5

No bueno

[BillyCoxDodgers3B]

All opinions.

[scooter729]

What did you think of the card? Did you think it was NM-MT as well, and is that why you sent it in to SGC?

[butchie_t]

Calculated risk and it did not pan out.

Butch Turner

[Leon]

At least they didn't give it a 2.5!

.

[Lorewalker]

Clearly you and the grader at Greg Morris must have missed a small wrinkle.

[oldjudge]

I bet Greg’s grade is closer to reality than SGCs.

[CardPadre]

That stinks, but maybe there's a gold sticker in your card's future.

[Yoda]

Greg is very sensitive about his grading. Several years ago, I made a very mild
comment about one card I thought was a bit overgraded. Since then I have been banned from bidding on his site, which is a shame because I think he runs a clean operation and brings some nice raw cards to the market. I hope one day he will reinstate me.

[Balticfox]

Originally Posted by BillyCoxDodgers3B

All opinions.

Yes. And nothing but opinions. Not that it's at all rare for dealers to overgrade what they're selling anyway.

Originally Posted by scooter729

What did you think of the card? Did you think it was NM-MT as well...?

Precisely. Your opinion of your own cards is the only one that should count to you.

Originally Posted by scooter729

...and is that why you sent it in to SGC?

Indeed! Why did you need SGC's opinion? In fact why did you pay money you could have spent elsewhere for their opinion?

[refz]

I haven’t boughten off him in a few years as I purchased a raw 1955 Topps Sandy Amoros RC advertised as ex or ex + and I picked it up for around $15. No biggie, but in hand it was clearly trimmed and bad. I mean how can you label it something like this. I guess on the same token the people he has working for him after looking at 10,000 or so cards a day or every few days are bound to let one slip or the inexperience of the worker perhaps.

[bcookie]

Scans added

[Zan]

Snap it and try it again, never know.

My buddy bought this card raw at the National, graded first time, snapped it and sent it back to SGC for a second time. See next post for that result

[Zan]

Originally Posted by Zan

Snap it and try it again, never know.

My buddy bought this card raw at the National, graded first time, snapped it and sent it back to SGC for a second time. See next post for that result

see here

[Balticfox]

Originally Posted by bcookie

Scans added

Nice card!



Pity it's entombed in a plastic slab though.

[doug.goodman]

Originally Posted by bcookie

Scans added

Looks like you got a nice looking card for a nice price, why you would pay for an opinion on a $8 + tax card is beyond my scope of knowledge, except for your hope that you bought a lottery ticket, I suppose. What did the opinion cost you "all in"?

Doug "quitcherbitchin" Goodman



PS - you're big mistake was not buying the already opinioned 10 a week earlier (I can't get the link to work).

[Beercan collector]

Thanks for adding the pics Brian. The front looks Great the reverse has some noticeable toning. Looks like GM and SGC we’re a bit overzealous in opposite directions.
Searching eBay GM has sold a bunch of these recently including already graded PSA 7 - This day and age probably best to go after one’s already graded.

[jayshum]

Originally Posted by bcookie

Scans added

Did you see anything when you had the card in hand that would make you think SGC was right and Greg Morris was wrong?

[calvindog]

That's a crazy nice 3.5.

[Smanzari]

Originally Posted by jayshum

Did you see anything when you had the card in hand that would make you think SGC was right and Greg Morris was wrong?

Am I the only one seeing the discoloration on the back? I think 2.5 is Harsh, but this card is visibly not "NM-MT+"

[Beercan collector]

Originally Posted by Smanzari

Am I the only one seeing the discoloration on the back? I think 2.5 is Harsh, but this card is visibly not "NM-MT+"

Just mentioned it in the post before yours - 5.5 would seem like a fair grade , of course TPGs being Inconsistent is an understatement

[Smanzari]

Originally Posted by Beercan collector

Just mentioned it in the post before yours - 5.5 would seem like a fair grade , of course TPGs being Inconsistent is an understatement

Definitely missed that, was honesty distracted by the photo! Agreed on the grade - definitely somewhere in "EX Land"

[Eric72]

On my computer screen, it appears the back has uneven "blotches" of discoloration. It looks like dots spread out in a somewhat random pattern.

To my eye, it seems the back of that card has something known as "foxing" on it. That's a term very common to collectors of vintage comic books. Unfortunately, it's a form of mold.

If this is the case, I agree with the low "technical" grade of the card.

If I'm wrong, and the card is not speckled with spots, I apologize.

[Zach Wheat]

Shane Dale posted a 25 card test and posted the results in a YouTube vid:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e7YDVE30TVc

TLDW summary - GM was pretty accurate overall.

[rand1com]

Originally Posted by Zach Wheat

Shane Dale posted a 25 card test and posted the results in a YouTube vid:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e7YDVE30TVc

TLDW summary - GM was pretty accurate overall.

Or was PSA so inaccurate as everybody on here claims and the cards were not really NM/M or better?

If you think Greg Morris' graders are very accurate and on a supposedly random lot of 25 cards, PSA was at 88% agreement with GM, that should mean they are also very accurate.

Clearly, the Miscut card was mis-graded by GM so I would say based on this small sample, PSA is very good at grading cards IF GM is also very good.

[luciobar1980]

People.. you have to realize.. they list SO MANY CARDS. You can't expect them to look over a card the way PSA does. They take a quick look and give a guess of a grade. If you expect every card to come back as advertised I think you're being unreasonable, sorry. 9 times out 10 a card that presents like that will come back a way higher grade and you can't expect them to see every miniscule flaw. Overall I've been happy with my purchases from Greg Morris.

[JollyElm]

Originally Posted by bcookie

Bought a card advertised as NM-MT+ and SGC just gave it a 3.5

No bueno

I was going to say paper loss to the left of "LIFE," but a search shows that strip of white appears there regularly.

[raulus]

Originally Posted by JollyElm

I was going to say paper loss to the left of "LIFE," but a search shows that strip of white appears there regularly.

Staring at the scans on the screen definitely makes this card seem like it should grade higher than 3.5.

But then again, it's always dangerous to try to grade cards based on scans on a screen, and there could always be stuff that isn't showing up in the scans.

Or maybe you just got the grader of death, and a little crack and resubmit will get you a more appropriate grade, assuming you can dodge that bullet the next time around.

[Yoda]

Originally Posted by raulus

Staring at the scans on the screen definitely makes this card seem like it should grade higher than 3.5.

But then again, it's always dangerous to try to grade cards based on scans on a screen, and there could always be stuff that isn't showing up in the scans.

Or maybe you just got the grader of death, and a little crack and resubmit will get you a more appropriate grade, assuming you can dodge that bullet the next time around.

I'd like to meet the Grader of Death just to see just how tough he is.

[perezfan]

Originally Posted by Yoda

I'd like to meet the Grader of Death just to see just how tough he is.

If you want to come over here, I can't introduce you... but I can show you a lot of his "work".

[theshowandme]

The back with some simple iPhone photo enhancements

Brilliance, exposure, brightness, contrast, etc. turned up slightly

[doug.goodman]

Come on guys, let's address the opinion elephant in the room :

That card is cheaper to buy graded than to get graded, unless you've got a registry hard-on.

[Smanzari]

Originally Posted by doug.goodman

Come on guys, let's address the opinion elephant in the room :

That card is cheaper to buy graded than to get graded, unless you've got a registry hard-on.

Everyone collects differently man, don't yuk on his yum!

[jayshum]

Originally Posted by doug.goodman

Come on guys, let's address the opinion elephant in the room :

That card is cheaper to buy graded than to get graded, unless you've got a registry hard-on.

It was sent to SGC so doesn't seem to be for the registry.

[doug.goodman]

I'm just saying he was hoping to buy a lottery ticket, not a card.

Nothing wrong with that, I hope he finds a $3 card that he later sells for a zillion dollars, but don't come on here to bad mouth a seller based on a single common and cheap card that he obviously thought it was a quality card himself after receiving it, or he wouldn't have sent it in for an opinion.

If he's going to call out a seller in a thread, maybe he should have titled the thread "Greg Morris & Butchie T Overgrading"

[Balticfox]

Originally Posted by doug.goodman

Come on guys, let's address the opinion elephant in the room:

That card is cheaper to buy graded than to get graded, unless you've got a registry hard-on.

I too am bewildered.

[BRoberts]

Not hard to believe.

[gregndodgers]

Always consider the source:

Graders today have no context with which to grade fairly. For example, my client’s brother in law is a PSA grader. He is 29 years old, has worked at PSA for six years, and makes $65k per year! He is not a collector, and to him, it’s just a job! His entire experience with sports cards spans a total of just six years! LoL.

Ladies and gents; these are the backgrounds of some of the graders grading your cards!

[jchcollins]

Even the most highly respected raw graders miss things occasionally. This combined with the inherent subjectivity in equating eye appeal to technical standards means that the longer you do this, the more anomalies you are apt to see pop out. Stories of cards that got a 2 getting cracked out and coming back a 7 are increasingly common.

I don’t hate graded cards, but increasingly as I get older - how the card looks to me and whether or not I’m happy with it in my PC far outweighs what a grader or anyone else might have to say about it. I would be perfectly happy most of the time buying raw from someone like Greg Morris who provides clear scans and where the reasoning behind their grade basically matches up to what you can see before you pull the trigger. Are they going to be 100% perfect 100% of the time? No, of course not. But neither is anyone else - including PSA, SGC, Beckett, and others who are supposedly "experts."


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk