Why grading by anyone other than PSA or BGS is good & bad on eBay

I have no idea what it costs to get something graded by ISA but the fact they gave this card a 10 when clearly off center in that tilted way so many 75 topps minis are makes it so the seller can claim '10, pay me' and buyers are either suckered into it or annoyed and submit posts like this one.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1975-Topps-...0650838269?pt=US_Baseball&hash=item53f87710fd

I'm hunting a gradable 75 Topps Mini Jim Rice #616 , but this one ain't it.

You can also add SGC to list of (very) credible card graders for vintage cards.

Sadly, there are many" second tier" grading companies.

Yeah, I cant stand diamond cut cards. However, that is still a very clean & nice card.

Wow I wont be buying anything that company grades if they give that a 10.

Nate Colbert 17 said:

You can also add SGC to list of (very) credible card graders for vintage cards.

Click to expand...

I know some collectors that only would use SGC for vintage cards. They're not as well known, and they work off a 100 point scale, but they've been very well respected in the Community from what I know.

And I think ISA posts here some, doing Product Reviews...

Why does SGC use 100 point scale?I don't like that.

SGC uses a 100 point scale because at their start there were legal reasons whey they couldn't use a 10 point scale. They now have a 10 point scale on their flip. SGC is as good as PSA for pre-war grading. BGS is out of their league with prewar and I wouldn't trust their grades on cards like a T206.

edited to add: SGC is known to be more forgiving on centering, so keep that in mind. I think of ISA like ***, except that *** was very good on unopened pack grading, as good or better than PSA in their early days, *** silver flips.

SCG is actually 15-point scale, but they have finer gradations at the top levels, like an 88, then 92, then 96, then 98, then 100. There is no 93, 94, or 95, for instance, or 63 or 12. They started adding a 10-point grade to the flips, with 0.5 increments below 9, which was odd. 98 = 10, 96 = 9, 92 = 8.5, but there is no 9.5, and a 100 has no 10-point value, it's just "pristine." It's become conventional wisdom at this point that SCG is the best at grading pre-WWII material, and the Brancas and such of the hobby prefer them, although PSA is far more popular because of the registry. None of these companies is without a stain on their reputations, but SCG is by far the least sleazy, IMHO.

*** I think in general does a good job with grading, although they have a very shady reputation for some unclear reason. They did make a major improvement with their case, putting a label on the top so you can see what the cards in a box are without having to look at each individual face. They also were the first to put "First Graded" on the flip for each card at each grade, though I'm not sure what value that has. They don't put "2nd" or "3rd" or "14th" so who cares? I guess it's another thing for people to possibly place a premium on.

Above all, though, buy the card, not the holder. Grading cards is obviously very subjective, and each company has their own foibles. PSA is very forgiving in OPC rough edges, for instance, while BGS doesn't seem to mind if you shave them off as long as you maintain minimum size. Back centering, tolerances for front centering, print spots, how they judge centering on asymmetrical cards, etc., it's all down to whether you like the look of a card or not.

So why doesn't anyone use SGC for modern cards?

Some people like the SGC holder the best of the bunch and if you are grading to keep and prefer the SGC holder then you choose SGC.

In general I'd say the registry helps PSA get a lot of submissions of post war cards and that spills over to modern cards. BGS gets a lot of modern cards since they were the first to have a holder that could encapsulate thick cards and they built a niche in modern. That has kind of left SGC out of the mix.

I disagree on ***, their grading really suffered and when it became known that they were grading trimmed or reglossed cards they lost their credibility. The *** "first graded" had value in that it could be dated to early in their history when they were better at grading. At this point though if a high dollar card is still in a *** holder there must be a problem with it.

Most important I think is that grades across companies are not necessarily equivalent, especially on some issues. So it pays to know how SGC, PSA, or BGS grades an issue so you don't for example buy a T200 in SGC 50 (4) and expect it to cross to PSA 4. Different standards.