What to expect

Spigrimace

I am about to send 100 cards from the 50's thru 80's to PSA. I only currently have about 10 PSA cards in my collection that I've bought and for the ones that are an 8, I can see a barely touched corner, maybe like 70-30 centering and that's about it. My 9's have perfect corners but maybe a 65-35 off center or a print mark that would keep it from a 10. yet a 10 I have, I can see it's not a perfect 50/50 centered.

My question is, how realistic should I be? For example, i sent some 68 - 69's that are dead centered, have FULL gloss, untouched corners and even the backs don't show any wear or roughness. (for example, the red on the back of the 69's are pure red to the edges and not roughed off where you can see some discoloration/roughness on the edges. What type of grade should I be expecting? I hand picked these cards abpout 13 years ago. I wasn't fanatic about using a magnifying glass and spending 10 minutes evaluating the card, but I took a minute to make sure corners were untouched and centering was decent. I wasn't one of those who knew about the typical smudge or print line for a certain card that a fanatic would try to find without it. I am going to be crushed if these in paticular come back 8's or worse less than 8!

I have a 1975 K. Hernandez that when I bought it, I was astonsished as it was perfect corners, perfectly centered front & back on all 4 sides with NO roughness on the edges. Just looked unbelievable. Should I expect a 10 or perhaps a very small print dot knocks it to at worst a 9?

My gut feeling on my 100 cards: 10 PSA 10; 20 PSA 9; 40, PSA 8, 30 PSA 7, 10 Trimmed (from the 50's that were in supposedly great shape).

I know u don't have scans of my cards, but how were your first experiences?

jaybyrd

The first thing I had to learn was to be totally objective with the cards that I sent to PSA. I think it is human nature to think your cards are better than they may appear to a non-biased grader.

Unless you are really good about seeing every nuance of each card, I would recommend to expect at least a grade lower than you initially expect.

Good luck with your submission, even if they don't come back graded as high as you hoped, it will help you in long run to know what to look for in future submissions.

magellan

Spigrimace, I'd really love to know what your final grades are . Please update us when you get them back. Hope you get the grades you're looking for.

Dave

Scumbi

I don't want to be the grim reaper of card submissions, but you have quite a surprise in store. Nobody guesses close to the correct grades for their cards on the first submission. I hope you get all PSA 10s, but I would severely lower my expectations. It takes a few years to really train your eye. Also, there's a logic behind it that doesn't immediately surface until you've done a ton of submissions. Some cards like Mantle, Ruth, Mays, Koufax, RCs and rare issues have a different standard. The graders pay more attention to possible high value cards, thus, they are more critical.

After you get your cards back, sift through them and see if there are any with a huge discrepancy. Pick 5 - 10 to resubmit. Cards can go up depending on the grader. However, don't expect the moon. Population reports equal a bell curve that protects the value of the cards. A lot of it has to do with your timing. Unfortunately, you never know when it is a good time to submit.

Keep us all posted because it's always interesting to compare predictions to the actual results. Some people walk away happy, but most don't. If you put up a few posts on disappointing cards, the people here will help you analyze the cards so you are better trained on the next go around.

Taking a flea bath,

Scumbi

wolfbear

Agree with all the above comments. Just wanted to add
that you should also look at the card at different angles under a strong light source,
to help spot surface flaws, and also check the surface and all edges under magnification.

Good luck !

SOM

And I'll add one of my personal rules:

Since I'm sending in many cards for registry sets, I only submit cards that I won't mind looking at even if they come back 2 grades lower than I expected.

Good luck!

DeutscherGeist

My first submission was the Upper Deck Griffey about 10 years ago. I did it through a dealer. I cherry picked the card when I purchased it and also from my collection. It was a perfect card, so I thought this would be at least a PSA 9. I have very good eyes and I pick up details like a hawk. I am very picky and critical--I piss off a lot of dealers when I look at their cards and tell them I have to pass because I found an imperfection. They really hate that, but what do they expect from a potential buyer... just to blindly hand over money.

I got the PSA 9


Use light and a magnifying glass to make sure the surfaces of the card are perfect, the corners are sharp. Hold off submitting a card with surface wrinkles or minor punctures unless its really old and rare.

Do you really need to submit 100? Check your cards again and submit the cream of your crop and then see what happens.

SDavid

My first PSA submission of modern cards included an 87 fleer bonds and an 89 donruss sosa. Both were bought raw on ebay within a week of each other. This was my first real submission...the previous ones just involved older cards and it was more about authentication than grading...and I was hoping to just get a nine on one of them.

Both came back 10's.

If you're careful and thorough, anything can be expected.

Vincecarder

The thing I find with older cards (when your looking to submit) is the surface is the place with the most issues that can really mess up your grades. I've had cards that have had perfect centering, edges and corners come back as PSA 6's because of a indentation or wrinkle that I didn't see (have to tilt it in the right light). Basically really look at your cards for wrinkles or indentations....especially on your vintage stuff. Corners, edges and centering you can basically judge them with the naked eye although I would really suggest buying a 10X light magnifier (you would be amazed at some of the stuff you see under magnification).

I say be prepaired for the worst on your grading submission although sending in 100 does give you better odds of getting good grades.