Help me grade this 21-S buffalo

mirabela

Hi there. I recently bought kind of a strange lot of key & semi-key buffaloes mostly to have this one here. It was a good deal whatever the grade; I had assumed this was a VG coin. I've been reading, though, that with buffaloes in these years all bets are off re the usual grading criteria of hip/horn/liberty, owing to poor strike quality. The NGC and PCGS slabbed 21's, 24's, and 26's I've seen confirm this -- I've seen half-horns in VF20 holders. So, my question is this -- what holder do you think my little friend here could make it into? The picture is head-on, taken with my scanner. The actual coin appears a little sharper. Contrast around the horn is hard to make out in the scan; the actual coin has half a horn. What do you think? Could it make VF? I wouldn't bother sending it in if it has no chance.

Catch22

I don't know enough about Buffs to help ya out, sorry. However, it looks to have spent a little too much time in a plastic flip. The green slime in the pics might be pvc residue.

mirabela

Oh, that. The scanner did that -- the coin itself isn't green at all. Nice & natural & original looking.

mr1931S

I really don't see this buff as VF. Too much wear.

OnlyBuffalos

Hi Mirabela,

I think your assumption that this is a VG Buffalo is likely a good one. I do not believe it is worth getting it in a slab.

mirabela

Thanks to all replies -- heading to bed.

MD

bennybravo

It looks VG to me in or out of a slab.It just doesn't look close enough to fine to me,even with a weak strike.JMO though.You do see lots of overgraded slabbed circ buffs from all services, but I don't see this one getting a bump.The rims just look too far gone.

BigD5

This coin has a weakly struck obv, and actually a strongly struck reverse. It's a vg coin.

Notice how the lettering on the obv. blends towards the rim, and the lettering on the rev. is quite a bit sharper?

291fifth

G6. Not worth slabbing. You need to be more critical when grading, much more critical.

dorkkarl

it's really a vg coin. pcgs or ngc might slab it higher, maybe a lot higher. for example, you can get a pcgs vf-35 w/ like maybe 1/3 of the horn showing. how do i know? i got nailed by such coins years ago when i was foolish enough to buy coins sight-unseen.

K S

koynekwest

I'd say a VG10. These coins, like Standing Liberty Quarters, should be graded by the completeness of the date from Good thru Fine. Using the horn to grade was, and is, a poor choice. But the tradition is too firmly entrenched to change it now.

RELLA

A few weeks ago I picked up a 1923-S and 1924-S pair in ANACS F15 holders; both coins have better detail than your 1921-S. On the other hand, I think they both are perhaps a bit undergraded...they both show much more detail than other F12-F15 S-mints from the twenties that I've looked at lately. I'll try to post pics of one or both for comparison later; too busy trying to get ready to hit a coin show this morning.

RELLA

ziggy29

VG all the way.