1980 Topps Bird/Magic Rookie - Grading

jeremy_crosbie

Hello all. I’m considering sending my Bird/Magic rookie in to get graded. Let me know your thoughts on the top to bottom centering of this card. To the naked eye, it looks like it might meet the 60/40 or 65/35 standard but I wanted a few more opinions. Any feedback you can provide is greatly appreciated!

Thanks,
Jeremy

jordangretzkyfan

Centering and perforations all fall within MINT 9 standards. The top two corners look like they might have a very slight softness which would land solidly in a nice PSA 8 holder. Great looking card!

jeremy_crosbie

Thanks for the feedback. I think my biggest issue is determining what value to declare. To the naked eye, it looks like it might grade between 8-9 but there is a huge difference in declared value and my associated cost to PSA. Would you declare value at $9999, pay $500 and hope for a 8.5/9 or declare value at $4999, pay $250 with worse case scenario being an 8?

olb31

@jeremy_crosbie said:
Thanks for the feedback. I think my biggest issue is determining what value to declare. To the naked eye, it looks like it might grade between 8-9 but there is a huge difference in declared value and my associated cost to PSA. Would you declare value at $9999, pay $500 and hope for a 8.5/9 or declare value at $4999, pay $250 with worse case scenario being an 8?

Do the the regular service $20. $499 declared value. That's what i would do. I grade about 500 cards per year.

1951WheatiesPremium

@jeremy_crosbie

If you’ve got not much in the card, Express should cover any concerns on the value and have it back to you considerably sooner.

JoeBanzai

@olb31 said:

@jeremy_crosbie said:
Thanks for the feedback. I think my biggest issue is determining what value to declare. To the naked eye, it looks like it might grade between 8-9 but there is a huge difference in declared value and my associated cost to PSA. Would you declare value at $9999, pay $500 and hope for a 8.5/9 or declare value at $4999, pay $250 with worse case scenario being an 8?

Do the the regular service $20. $499 declared value. That's what i would do. I grade about 500 cards per year.

This.

It's pretty foolish to value any card you send in as if it were a 9 or 10.

VERY attractive card!

By the way, welcome to the boards. In the future scan the card if you have a scanner. Phone pictures are never good enough to get a very good idea of how nice the card is.

vintagefun

If you get the call that it was undervalued, you’ll gladly pay the difference.

jeremy_crosbie

@JoeBanzai

Thanks for the feedback and welcome message. I usually try to scan my cards but my scanner took a 💩 on me.

JoeBanzai

@jeremy_crosbie said:
@JoeBanzai

Thanks for the feedback and welcome message. I usually try to scan my cards but my scanner took a 💩 on me.

Hate it when the scanner dies.

Check out the Epson scanners, great for scanning cards!

BigMike79

I sold my Magic, Bird, Dr. J PSA 8 a month before the Jordan doc and 80s boon. Still have nightmares.

jeremy_crosbie

Update on this card. It came back as an N6 and I’m a bit upset as I pulled this out of a few packs that I opened. I thought maybe it was miscut by the manufacturer but when sized with the rest of my 1980 Topps basketball cards they are identical and it matches the 1980 Topps basketball specs size.

I don’t grade a lot of cards, so this is disappointing to say the least and a bit discouraging!

Thanks for all the input!

Bobby24

I have had a Gretzky rookie come back N6 twice. I have the whole 79 set and it matches up to all the other cards. I just don't get it.

nam812

Millions of N6 cards have taken 2nd and 3rd trips to Newport beach and received numerical grades. If you really pulled it yourself, then back it goes. At least that's what I'd do.

DotStore

Can you provide a picture of the card in a holder to help show the dimensions? Example - using one of those UltraPro OneTouch holders -- they have a recessed area for the card and also diamond corners to help protect/showoff the corners. I'm just curious how much margin-of-error they allow in terms of the distance between the edges of the card vs. the recessed area of the holder.