SGC or PSA for ebay sales of these cards
ricardouno
Posts: 242 ✭✭
Which service, SGC or PSA would be best to grade these vintage HOF baseball cards for their intended sale on eBay? Suspected grades run from 4 to 9 with most of the "newer" 1959, 1960,1961 cards being likely 7 or 8.
If there is essentially little difference 
also kindly let me know or weigh the positives and negatives. Thanks!!
1
Comments
Either company you choose, it's probably best you lower your expectations because I don't see "most" getting 7s and 8s, and I don't really see a 9 candidate from that pic.
Thanks so much for your input and realistic opinion. It is greatly appreciated.
First off, please post better pictures of you want people to evaluate your cards.
I have submitted to PSA exclusively for the last 30 years, on cards like yours, I would either wait and see if PSA adjusts their present grading of vintage cards, or send them to SGC if you need to sell them quickly.
Many posts lately with cards that look like 7's & 8's coming back PSA 5-6.
Funny but I have 4 or 5 of those at PSA currently that I sent in on the 60s Special. Fingers crossed but preparing for an Exorcist-level event upon return.
If you're looking for a quick sale then you have to use SGC. Their turnaround is best.
PSA sells better than SGC. Looking at the pics (though not good enough to grade accurately) I think those are in the PSA 4-6 range.
Yes, PSA has always sold better than SGC..........if both cards were the same/similar grade.
Some people even just avoided SGC altogether.
How many people are going to want a PSA 5 over a SGC 8, if both cards look the same?
You should always buy the card and not the holder, but we all know this is often not the case.
For now, I am holding off sending anything in to PSA, but if they continue to grade vintage as harshly as it seems they are, I'll try SGC.
I suppose the answer on which is best can only be answered by submitting to both and doing all the accounting after, which is no fun and not cost-effective. Its just a guess but I would say give SGC a try for a number of reasons. Yes, the card in a PSA holder with the same grade gets you more money. But if I was guessing, I would say that won't be the case. I think you could be getting a handful of half grade to full grade higher on those with SGC, just based on everyone on the boards' recent experience feeling their grades are as much as 2 grades too low and personal experience attempting crossovers with SGC. So there is that, what the cards would be worth. Even if it was slightly less, you have a $15 per card submission price which is lower. If you find 5 more cards you can get $19 per card with PSA. If not, 25. Then there is the convenience of getting them sooner to be able to sell them sooner, maybe 8 days vs. 45 to 60. And while there may be business benefits to getting them earlier, its just a nice experience and fun seeing your grades pop so soon, avoiding that stress of checking status each day for 40 days and going oh man. If you feel confident your card is a 5 in an SGC holder and a 5 in an PSA holder, its a more profitable move to go PSA. But who knows? Its a risk. Its a dice roll but I would go SGC in this case. If you dont like your grade in the SGC holder and the card is valuable enough you can always crack it.
Thanks so much for the insight and opinions so far. Much appreciated!
Sell them raw
Ive been getting decent prices for my SGC cards. Some sit longer but they sell.
You would definitely get the faster turnaround going that route. I don't know if there would be much of a disparity in price on mid-grade cards, really.
SGC for vintage is about as good as it gets. $15 a card flat fee with no upcharge and the cards are back in your hands in 5-10 days.
Be aware that SGC does grade tough so if you expect and 8 you'll probably get a 6 or 7.
If they're mid-grade HOFers, consign them to Greg Morris.
Hate to say this but SGC is really your only option. If you want your cards to Grade 2-3 times lower than ACTUAL Grade send to PSA, if you want a Fairly accurate Vintage Grade, SGC ALL DAY! Whatever difference in grading you will realize, Real money from accuratley graded SGC will bring more and I think as PSA's Reputation is further moved into the Crapper, rather than some Punk 17 year old wet behind the ears trying to figure out the nuiances of Grading at PSA, I'll go with SGC!
YeeHaw!
Neil
I'm one that avoids and never really looks at SGC for my PC. If these were my cards and considering the current grading environment at PSA I'd definitely send in the '56 Williams, '60 Yaz & Mays to SGC for a quick turnaround and expect 4,4,5 as grades.
Thanks for all the kind, thoughtful comments and the help! The cards are going out to SGC next week.
Let us know the results when you get them and good luck!
I would go with BVG or SGC.
Terry Bradshaw was AMAZING!!
Ignore list -Basebal21
Good luck with the submission! I've been getting cards back from SGC in about 2 weeks. Vintage looks good with the black frame, IMHO. Please post some pics when they come back.
Hold.
Successful card BST transactions with cbcnow, brogurt, gstarling, Bravesfan 007, and rajah 424.
Just got the results on another 15 PSA crack outs sent to SGC
2- Down 1/2 grade
2- Same grade
1- Up 1/2 grade
4- Up 1 grade
4- Up 1-1/2 grades
2- Up 2 grades
15 or so more leave today
Over 75% going higher...
So, does that mean PSA's grading is too tough or SGC is too easy?
It's a definite they're not on the same page at all anymore. Even if they weren't ever similar in their grading they were certainly closer than this.
My question is, are the grading companies trying to accurately grade cards, or do they grade them to attain a bigger share of the market.
accuracy in the grading world is so subjective. Most of us want centered sharp cornered cards that look appealing to the eye. That's what sells. When you receive a card back that gets a 5 and there aren't any visual issues, then there are problems. A 5 should have easily to detect visual issues. An 8 might not.
We see in some cases where someone has a 10 on ebay that looks more like an 8 due to centering or maybe another slight issue. And we ask how can this be a 10, I would have never got a 10. And here is where the big issues are. Joe and Myself would not get a 10, but this card is a 10 and somebody received it.
back 12-13 or so years ago (and probably still today) large investors (dealers) would get special rates to grade cards. At one time I heard around $3 to $4 per card. If they weren't 10's they wouldn't be holdered. 10-20 (maybe a few more) dealers did this with a very large volume of cards (2k - 5k per month).
there are graders that didn't have these arrangements and you can tell who they are by the pop report. One has 700 10's for a particular issue and one has 10 for that same issue. The pop report, while not the end all be all, certainly means a lot the hobby, to a card and to a card grading company.
at this point, i think a fair evaluation of the cards is what the investor/collector desires (maybe that means accurate, maybe that means consistent). So if I get back 3 1989 cards bought from three separate places at separate times all grade 6's when they look like 8+'s, there are major issues. If they look like 8+ then they should be.
grading kind of reminds me of a play review in football. If you have to slow it down and review it 50 times to see if it's fumble then there is a problem. It should be noticeable or move on quickly. Shouldn't have it 500x enlarged and in super slo mo to figure it out. If the card looks good then it should be a good grade.
This post is not pointed at just PSA, but all the grading companies.
Any card graded at a higher than minimum fee should absolutely give the reason for the grade, and for a nominal fee, any card graded at the lowest level should have the option of an explanation.
If I'm sending in cards that appear to be 10's at first glance, I want to know why they are getting any grade lower than that.
Because of grading, there are many beautiful cards not worth the grading fees if they don't achieve a 10.
If you are sending in cards for your personal collection and aren't chasing high grades, you should have a "bargain" level where you get the card graded and holdered without an explanation.
As consumers, we have become accustomed to getting either the bare minimum, or poor service without complaining.
I have not sent in any cards since you could get them graded in "bulk" for $9.00 per card. I was a completely loyal PSA customer, but now I just don't care to send cards in.
Grading is only subjective to a point. Cards should not change more than 1 full grade upon reviewing unless a mistake was made, and in that case the fee should be refunded.
Funny stuff huh?
For context, what decades are these cards from?
And are they HOFers or stars?
joe there are many people like you for sure. all we want is fair mostly accurate grades. 3 6's on 1989 cards without obvious issues is not a fair representation of the cards. a 1 for a card without creases is not fair for a card. no creases and centered should start at 2.5.
i got a 3 on a 1973 baseball card. i will use beckett grading to explain:
centering front 9 or 10
centering back 8 or 9
edges 8 or 9
corners 8 or 9
back surface 8 or 9
now here comes the problem, front surface. has a small raised portion. the cardboard itself was not perfect when the card was printed. i would say it's 1/8" slightly raised up. everything else about the card looks like it could be an 8 - 9 range. this surface should place it at the low end of my range the 8. i would even say maybe lower it to 7.5. they gave me a 3. in hand the card looks and feels almost brand new.
these are the new issues, the cost the original cardboard issues to your grade. the cardboard was the cheapest crap topps could find these type of surfaces on others are on just about every card. so when things started, if getting a 5 on a 1973 card was the creme de la creme then so be it, i have a 3. if there 100 9's and hundreds of 8's, then my card should reflect what the prior grading standards were.
I think its all about the years, much older, PSA too tough. I think it is becoming pretty clear. I am confident that if you took your PSA 5s 6s 7s that were graded in 2007 2008 you would struggle to get the same kind of bumps from SGC Harnessracing is reporting. Its recent strictness. I had similar results but none 2 higher. Dang. Congrats. Most all of us here know what a grade has looked like in the past and it didn't matter who you sent it to. A 2009 PSA 7 might have gray rounded flaking layered corners and the card has a brownish grayish dirty hue. In 2023 a card can have sharp corners and more bold white borders and bold color and its a 5 or 6 and looks like it should be an 8 or 9 compared to the old 7. To be honest I still feel SGC is reasonably strict on the old stuff, just not as strict in most cases. Having said that, recently, I am a happy PSA customer. I just had grades pop and had 34 of 56 come back PSA 10. Only 2 were 8s. So feel that like 97% are nice cards. I dont feel surprised. I feel like what I believed they were was almost exactly the same as what they were graded. I bought cards that appeared Gem Mint or Mint and PSA agreed. I will not send one of them to SGC expecting to do better. The cards were 2023.
I have another order that is 79 and older. On that one I'm terrified. 51B football 75 football 72 baseball. 70s baseball I am confident 12 years ago was PSA 8 and if I bought old PSA 8s they would look like these. I assume a decent number I will have to at least see what SGC thinks if the potential value of the card makes it worth it. A lot of it bought from Greg Morris where it is listed as NM or NM-MT and it is bid up because it looks like a nicer example of the grade and the final gavel is like 90 to 125% of what the card sells for in the PSA 7 or PSA 8 holder. So I feel like a moron for going there but sometimes I just really want that card. But think I have learned.
I think I know how I have to play this game if I want to win. I see a lot of buy the card not the holder here but for me a lot of it is I want the card to be valuable and I know a pretty card in a PSA 4 holder is not going to get me a sale price I like. So I do buy the holder. If its just for me and my appreciation then a toploader or semi-rigid can be the holder.
Its just kind of a shame cause I felt I would just not buy old raw cards and would get them already graded. But with recent harshness with grading some of these old 7s and 8s just look so much uglier now and its hard to want them.
The cards are all from 50 Bowman to 1968 Topps.
I think SGC is more accurate and consistent at this time. PSA for the most part is no longer grading according to there standards.
I also get near PSA price for the SGC’s. Even got higher than PSA on a couple of 50’s cards.
The cards I crack out for the most part are stars and ONLY if it makes sense to try for the higher grade monetarily.