How do you grade raw, uncirculated '71 Topps cards?

TheCARDKid

I came across a little collection of some raw uncirculated '71 Topps cards (Munson, Jackson, Rose and a couple of low population commons). Yet even in this state, they still don't look so hot. Instead of dreaming about a PSA 8 Munson, it looks like a 6, maybe a 7 if someone is having a good day in Newport Beach.

I haven't submitted any '71's to PSA yet, so maybe you '71 aficionados can help out.

For a PSA 9, I imagine there can't be any white showing anywhere. That's seems easy enough. What about between a 7 and an 8?

Specifically, if all four corners show some white and the borders show white? Are we talking a 6?

Does looking at the green border on the back help at all?

Any other tips, feel free to share them.

jrinck

As perhaps the person with the most 6's and 7's in their registered set, here are my observations...

8's: Have black edges and sharp corners. The corners may have a touch of white on them, but only a light touch. The only 8's I have, with the exception of one, are 8OC's.

7's: Have sharp corners, with a little more allowance for white on the corners, but not much. Sometimes you'll find slight chipping on the edges.

6's: Most of my 6's are are otherwise 7's or 8's but are downgraded due to the centering (submitted with "no qualifiers" requests, I surmise). However, a few of the 6's have some border chipping that is noticable at a distance, and/or a corner or two that is just beginning to show some wear. But overall it's a card that most dealers would grade at least NM.

TheCARDKid

Here's a good example of what I'm talking about

What would you grade this card?

jrinck

I'm not sure what the printing snow over the "NK" in "Yankees" would do to the grade, but without that I'd say this would have a good shot at a 7, although it might get a 6 due to the appearance of three slightly rounded corners, most notably the lower-right.

The price this sold for, $19.09, is probably a good price, because PSA 6 Munson's have been selling for around $40 lately. After grading & shipping/insurance, you're looking at around $30 invested.

But that printing snow does bother me. That could knock it down to a 4 or 5, or a PD at the very least.

zardoz51

Cardkid

Kinda want the secrets of the Pyramids don't you?

To be a 9, the card must be absolutely flawless. No white showing on the corners or edges even under magnification.

The 8's can have one or two flecks (light touches on one or two corners with no white on the edges) or one corner and a white chip on the border, but nothing severe,

If this is a vending set, you will have to check sizes as many vending cards do not meet the minimum size requirements from PSA and will not be holdered.

two days ago, I broke down a 71 set that was entirely vending and untouched. Of the 752 cards, I pulled 86 that were locks on 8's and another 32 cards that were marginal or stars that would be graded as 7's. everything else was either o/c, common 7's or had print defects. Watch for excessive "snow" in the black borders

Hope that helps

zardoz51

the Munson is a 6 or 7PD (print defect)

bak428

hi

if the scan shows up there should be a picture of a 7, the card in your picture looks like it has a wax stain from the "nk" in "yankees" and
shows again in the opposite border (in my opinion). hope this helps.
Bill

TheCARDKid

Zardoz,

In order of importance:

How to grade '71's
How the Pyramids were built
Who was on the grassy knoll in Dallas, Tx
How the statues on Easter Island were built

'71's are the biggest mystery of all Other much more insignificant things, like where Noah's Ark is, pale in comparison.

zardoz51

CardKid

LOL

I can guess on three of your four questions, the only difficult one would be the 71 question.

The answers to the other three do involve aliens and UFO's. Perhaps I should apply the same logic to the 71 question.

Fabfrank

I was working on a 71 set from 1988-1994 and than put it on the shelf and forgot about it. I'm now revisiting the set and am going to do it in PSA 7-8. Even when I was willing to do the set ungraded, it was incredibly frustrating to find nice cards. Bad centering, dinked corners, white chips, etc. were only the beginning. I personally believe the 71 set is the most susceptible to altering. Trimming, coloring, marking are quite prevalent.
Good Luck in putting your set together, and may God (and my wife) forgive me for trying too.

brucemo

'71 Topps PSA-7
'71 Topps PSA-8

Each scan is over one megabyte, so they take a long time to load. Blow them up by making your browser window very large. Please ignore surface "lint", which is me and my scanner. Also, bear in mind that the rails of the PSA holder are evident in both scans. The scans look very *bad* if you don't blow them up, please don't complain about that.

Both scans are at 600 dpi, with no door on the scanner. I tried a few backgrounds and I couldn't get anything to look better than black on black.

The touches on the bottom corners of the 8 are more significant than they appear on the scan.

I cannot host these forever, so please look now.

These must be similar to '86 Fleers, and I have a little more experience with those. First of all, bad centering will screw up a card real fast. Assuming that the centering is fine, if you can look at the card and see any kind of touch on the corners, you've probably got at best an 8. I'm not talking about real legitimate "micro" touches. 9's will have some corner and edge stuff going on, but it's much less severe than you get on 8's, and if you've tested yourself with a stack of these, you can tell them apart most of the time.

bruce

TheCARDKid

Brucemo,

Thanks alot of the scans. I saved them as a future reference on my hard drive. It looks like on the 7, if that upper right corner were just a bit better, it could bump it up a grade. Very subjective I know.