Opinion: The Toughest Grade to Give -- PSA 8
scottsusor
Posts: 1,210
In another thread I mentioned that it is my belief that a figurative "wall" has been inadvertantly built within PSA's grading system between what represents a PSA 7 and a PSA 8 card. What I believe has happened, based on my three months of submitting high grade vintage commons to PSA, is that PSA 8 has become the toughest grade to give a card -- any card, not just commons, but my experience is with commons so I'll stick to what I know.
Why do I believe this? Close observation and common sense. Its almost impossible to get a vintage card graded a PSA 10, and I believe that's as it should be. I'm of the same opinion on the PSA 9 grade, which is essentially a "virtually perfect card." Now let's look at the next two grades -- PSA 7 and PSA 8. PSA 7 is supposed to correspond to NM and PSA 8 is supposed to correspond to NM-MT. That SOUNDS simple, but in practice, I don't think it really is. Oh, certainly, one can conjure up a slew of possibilities for separating the two generic types of cards that would garner a 7 and an 8. But in the end, it comes down to "eye of the beholder."
Where the "human equation" enters here is that I believe many of the graders have inadvertantly concluded that -- to give a card a grade of PSA 8, it must be "almost a 9." That's incorrect if we superimpose the expectation that a PSA 8 should fall somewhere between the imaginary "7.5" and "8.4" level. With simple math, a 7.5 should get an 8, as should an 8.4. I can't help but wonder if slightly altering PSA's INTERNAL system to include a 1/10th of a point in their scale would effectively offset this.
At any rate, I may just be imagining all of this, but again, observation and common sense leads me to believe otherwise. I believe that a grade of PSA 7 has become too easy to give, perhaps necessitated by the speed at which PSA graders have to produce grades. Again, as I added before, I am not "bashing" PSA with this -- just urging them to investigate whether or not such a figurative "wall" has been inadvertantly created.
Comments?
Scott
Why do I believe this? Close observation and common sense. Its almost impossible to get a vintage card graded a PSA 10, and I believe that's as it should be. I'm of the same opinion on the PSA 9 grade, which is essentially a "virtually perfect card." Now let's look at the next two grades -- PSA 7 and PSA 8. PSA 7 is supposed to correspond to NM and PSA 8 is supposed to correspond to NM-MT. That SOUNDS simple, but in practice, I don't think it really is. Oh, certainly, one can conjure up a slew of possibilities for separating the two generic types of cards that would garner a 7 and an 8. But in the end, it comes down to "eye of the beholder."
Where the "human equation" enters here is that I believe many of the graders have inadvertantly concluded that -- to give a card a grade of PSA 8, it must be "almost a 9." That's incorrect if we superimpose the expectation that a PSA 8 should fall somewhere between the imaginary "7.5" and "8.4" level. With simple math, a 7.5 should get an 8, as should an 8.4. I can't help but wonder if slightly altering PSA's INTERNAL system to include a 1/10th of a point in their scale would effectively offset this.
At any rate, I may just be imagining all of this, but again, observation and common sense leads me to believe otherwise. I believe that a grade of PSA 7 has become too easy to give, perhaps necessitated by the speed at which PSA graders have to produce grades. Again, as I added before, I am not "bashing" PSA with this -- just urging them to investigate whether or not such a figurative "wall" has been inadvertantly created.
Comments?
Scott
0
Comments
This is in no way an arguement for half point grades ( I hate the idea ), but illustrates how my 7.8 example could be frustrating to us submitters.
We work within the system. Simply "buy the card, not the holder" if your buying, and resign yourself to the nuances of the 10 point scale if your a submitter. We are all faced with it.
RayBShotz
<< <i>Scott - I like your premise. However a 7.5 is a PSA 7 outright. The system is simple. If the card were a theoretical 7.0-7.99 the card is a 7. If it is an 8.0 to 8.99 the card is an 8. This is why your premise works. A card that is lets say 7.8 quality is hung with a 7 based on the 10 point scale. >>
Huh? If that's the case, then to get a 10, a card would have to be a 10.0 to 10.99, correct? Sorry, I must be confused. Is that really what you meant to say?
Scott
<< <i>Scott - I like your premise. However a 7.5 is a PSA 7 outright. The system is simple. If the card were a theoretical 7.0-7.99 the card is a 7. If it is an 8.0 to 8.99 the card is an 8. This is why your premise works. A card that is lets say 7.8 quality is hung with a 7 based on the 10 point scale. >>
There are plenty of 7.3's, 7.5's, and 7.7's in Psa 8 holders.
Comments to Scott:
I think you are overthinking this. There are guidelines that I'm sure that Psa uses to come up with the grades. Agreement on
these grades is another story. That is why it is subjective.
aconte
I think if you examine enough cards, especially under the proper magnification and lighting, you'll start to see very obvious differences between 8's and 7's. Microscopic corner wear, which shows up under a 10X loupe and is unseeable (or perhaps barely visible to a trained eye), is generally the determinative variable along with the more obvious centering and minor print problems of any kind. When you get back a 7 that you think is an 8, loupe it again for ANY corner wear. Generally 8's do not have corner wear.
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Technically if a card falls short of it's grading standard as an 8, regardless of how close it is, it is supposed to be assigned a 7. If it's really close then it is the graders discretion based on eye appeal that gives it the bump. (Fuzzy math?...maybe.)
Scott - 10 is 10. there is no 10.something. However we can definitely argue the merits of the difference between 9 and 10 till the cows come home. Your post referred to grade 8 and that formed the basis of my reply.
RayBShotz
Not necessarily so . . . most PSA 10's are no better than a 10.2 or 10.3 at best.
<< <i>Not necessarily so . . . most PSA 10's are no better than a 10.2 or 10.3 at best. >>
LOL! I think David got it. I stand by my belief that a PSA 8 should have a "range" of 7.5 to 8.4 and a PSA 9 should have a "range" of 8.5 to 9.4. That leaves a sufficient margin of 9.5 to 10.0 for the grade of PSA 10. Obviously there cannot be a 10.1 or 10.2 etc. Maybe I AM overthinking this.
Scott
All of a sudden, I'm a fan of inflation.
I submitted my entire raw 1956 set (all cards came right from wax and straight to storage folders as a kid and not physically touched or handled since then--I was, and still am, a neat fanatic) in 50-card increments between April of 1999 and January of 2000.
After getting the first two submissions back, I was extremely disappointed. I had expected most to be 8's and 9's....I had weeded out the obvious oc cards but had not visually inspected any before submitting. I bought a high-power gem loupe and broke out the 5's, 6's, and even the 7's. I found light wrinkles on the 5's, but could only find touches on the 6's and 7's. Without regard for cost, I decided to include these with my next submission and of the 29 resubmissions, 6 came back as 7's and the rest turned into 8's.
The final result: 11 resubmitted PSA 6's --- 1 PSA 6, 4 PSA 7, 6 PSA 8
71 resubmitted PSA 7's --- 13 PSA 7, 58 PSA 8
About half of those 7's were on one submission in which I experienced the grader-of-death....they averaged almost 2/3 of a grade drop from my other submissions.
The conclusion: the grading process is very subjective even in the case of experienced graders....and expensive too, as I incurred an additional $700.+ in resubmission and postage fees. I also concluded that in order to maximize the value of your cards, you have to calculate what percentage of bump-ups you need in order to justify the cost of resubmission fees.
I ended up with only 7 PSA 9's out of 322 cards submitted. But I have not tried to resubmit any of my PSA 8s, though I often wonder if I did, how many would come back 7's or even more intriguing, how many could become 9's!
JIM