[ricebondsmntna2young]

Upper Deck for all its foibles still occupies a special place in the hearts of many a hockey card collector. After all, when the card-maker arrived on the scene some 23 years ago, today's 30 and 40-year olds were 7 and 17, so they remember the fanfare surrounding UD's debut having witnessed it as kids in the midst of their most enthusiastic years of collecting. And ever since, kids expect UD Hockey to come to market every year.

So it's no wonder Upper Deck is slowly becoming a matter of (hobby) life the same way O-Pee-Chee and Topps were for previous generations, and why in 2013, with all the super premium products being released annually, UD Series 1 & 2 remains one of the (if not THE) most popularly collected sets across the industry. And it helps to explain why Young Guns are considered by some to be the purest rookie cards made, so heavily sought-after even though there are by some calculations at least 5,000 and as many as 10,000 copies available of every player.

Sure UD, ITG, Topps, OPC, you name it, have all lent the strength of their brands to more expensive releases. Many high-end sets consistently draw great interest but many more have been all but lost to history. As a core brand Upper Deck somehow managed to survive its contemporaries, including Donruss, Fleer, Pacific, Score, and Bowman just to name a few. And Young Guns may be the biggest reason for that fact.

Anyways for the first time I sent in some cards to be graded by Beckett Grading Services (BGS) including a trio of YGs: my Crosby earned a 9, Ovechkin a 9.5, and Tavares drew a 10 (scans to come).

I got to thinking about the scarcity of mint-condition YGs and having looked at the BGS population reports, I began to wonder what the numbers say about our hobby. Let's have a look some of the most coveted RCs since the 2005-06 season (plus an underrated star/prospect or two for comparison's sake). These figures are as of August 22, 2013 (taken from http://www.beckett.com/grading/pop_report), rounded to the nearest tenth of a percent:



Some random thoughts and questions...

1) Do you think BGS manipulates grades to create scarcity? What about to appease customers? In other words, are collectors that good at screening or does BGS want happy customers by returning a very high percentage of 9.5s?

2) Do these percentages reflect all raw YGs or is there a LOT of skew? Basically, do you believe nearly 4% of all Crosby YGs would earn a 10 or do you think the sifting process means that if you grade the other 8000 copies, you'd get a way way lower percentage?

3) Which years are most condition sensitive?

My opinion: 07-08, 05-06, 06-07, 09-10, 08-09, 10-11, 11-12. Card condition has markedly improved every year since 09/10 based on every metric and 07-08 is clearly the most dinged-up year. Depending on how you measure it though, 06-07, 08-09, 09-10, and even 05-06 are interchangeable depending on what indicator you look at.

4) Has BGS been increasingly generous of late in order to one-up the previous year and create buzz...or has YG quality control actually improved over the last few years?

5) How much does a BGS 10 boost value against higher BV cards? Like, would you trade a Toews BGS10 (#d to/16…and counting) for a Crosby BGS9.5 (#d to/1269…and counting) or vice versa?

6) Random fact: more "Pristine" RNHs (110) exist than all the BGS 10 Malkin, Toews, Kane, Price, Stamkos, Giroux, Tavares, Duchene, Doughty, Pietrangelo, Karlsson, and Subbans combined (107, by my count). I'm not a numbers/statistic guy so that's about all I got. Do you see any interesting trivia in these numbers?

[anavrin78]

I have recently gotten into graded cards, but while researching some brands like KSA and others outside of BGS and PSA I have read more than a few stories about the card show graders for bgs, and friends getting cards graded by a friend who works for beckett and rec'ing a 9.5 on cards that really should be 8.5 or 9's.

Regardless I am really loving these things right now, nice to know the #'s on the Stamkos is around 670, makes mine that much more special. Also I think the pop reports will make it that much easier to spring a couple of extra bucks for some of these guys that are low populations like Karlsson etc...

[Optimus_Prime]

The biggest problem I have with grading is that there is no industry standard persay. To my understanding, This is how it's done. If it isn't, please correct me. A person....a single human being grades the card based on what they feel. So you could give the same card to 2 different graders and get 2 different grades. Granted they all follow the same guidelines...but me being in the medical field i can easily compare it to my profession. We all have protocols to follow, but yet the same patient with the same problem could get treated 2 different ways.
If each card were scanned on and a computer program gave the grades than i would hold some value to what each grading would be. It would be consistent. I would know that you could scan that card in and no matter how many people look at it, it would be the same. Until there is some sort of reliability and they take away the grade based on a persons opinion, i will hold no value in graded cards.

[one20]

Very interesting read.

I really think the number of Crosby and Ovechkin YGs graded really puts it in to perspective just how many cards UD is probably cranking out. I know 2005-06 was a hyped up year due to the lock-out the previous year and 2 potential all time greats entering the league and the same time, but unless everyone that owns a Crosby or Ovechkin got it graded it does show that the press is running wide open. Also how many PSA graded copies can be thrown into the mix?

I will admit I do have some graded cards which I purchased already graded (most are pre 1990 cards), but I do not understand the fascination everyone has with grading modern cards. Don't have a definitive argument, just an opinion. I know it is not BGS, but I have one card in my collection that comes to mind that is graded 10 by PSA, and from my plain sight the edges look terrible.

I am also surprised by the percentages of cards graded as mint. I no longer really purchase and bust wax, but up until around 2000 I opened tons of UD wax. From what I saw back then, I can't believe UD can produce that many mint copies of anything. If I ever were to go to the parent's house and retrieve them, I could show you shoe-boxes and shoe-boxes full of straight from the pack cards with plenty of flaws/imperfections. Do I think UD has improved their quality control since my wax breaking days, doubt it.

Don't think I hit any of your questions, but still it is an interesting read.

[ricebondsmntna2young]

...I have read more than a few stories about the card show graders for bgs, and friends getting cards graded by a friend who works for beckett and rec'ing a 9.5 on cards that really should be 8.5 or 9's...

That'd be a shame but it wouldn't surprise me. My hope is that these are isolated cases though. The biggest hit to their credibility IMO was that one super expensive 1/1 Bryce Harper RC parallel that everyone was freaking out about. I recall it getting a much much higher grade than it deserved just based on a scan and an eyeball test.

The biggest problem I have with grading is that there is no industry standard persay...So you could give the same card to 2 different graders and get 2 different grades...If each card were scanned on and a computer program gave the grades than i would hold some value to what each grading would be. It would be consistent....Until there is some sort of reliability and they take away the grade based on a persons opinion, i will hold no value in graded cards.

I think you have a point, especially at the sub-grade level where they have to make a 50/50 call on whether to round up or round down for the final grade. And I think consistency is a problem for any given card. But overall trends tell a different story. The fact that there are zero Pristine Carey Prices despite all these different people, moods, and standards lends some credibility to the process.

Any grading process is going to be somewhat arbitrary, even by a computer program which would have to be programmed to the specifications of a person's opinion. I disagree that BGS grades holds no value, especially if the rumor is true their standards for modern hockey cards, whatever they are, are the toughest in the industry. You can't remove all subjectivity from a subjective exercise like card-grading, but I believe you can refine the process to the point where it becomes useful. The question is whether BGS has done that.

[shierydana]

There are many YouTube videos from people sending in cards for grading and then reacting negatively (and comically, in some cases) to the grades their cards receive when they get returned.

Interesting numbers, to say the least, OP.

[roenickle]

Thanks for posting the spreadsheet and % of BGS9.5+

It is somewhat ridiculous that the last two years have such a disparity with the rest.