[keyser soze]

So, actually, based upon the article the lowest grade of the 4 receives the highest weighted ranking. I guess without the actual formula used the questions are still not answered. Still seems strange to me that a card graded upon 4 categories and has 3 "9" rankings and 1 "7" ranking and can only get to an overall 7.5. Yet another reason I avoid buying/trading for graded cards like the plague!!

It's the same as looking at, let's say, a car. If the cars front left, front right, and rear left fender are perfect, but the rear right fender dented, which of the 4 fenders is going to weigh the heaviest in your mind? THE DENTED ONE! You would never sit and look at that car and think "Man, those 3 fenders look great!!", you're going to sit there and think "Man that dented fender looks awful!" That's why the weakest of the subgrades is weighed more heavily

[_ZENAS_]

to make it simple, the biggest defect in the card controls the grade. your card can never grade more than 1 point higher than it's worst subgrade. So if you card is gem mint other than a crease, it will still get a really low grade (that should make sense). Just read the description of what each final grade means and you'll see that it is always stated in terms of conditions the card cannot have (i.e. no worn corners for a mint card, or no centering worse than 60-40, etc...). When you think of it that way, there is no way a card centered 90/10 is going to get a mint grade even if the rest of the card is perfect, nor should it.

How about this: You have a gem mint card. And you take a marker and write on it. Now the only difference between when it was gem mint and now is the writing. Is that card now mint or near mint? Only one of the subrades is affected. Of course not. It is easy to understand that that card with the writing now is probably poor to very good condition because of the writing. This is because the biggest flaw is a really bad one even though the rest of the flaws are minimal.

Hope that helped.

[CJoyce10]

OK, gentlemen, you're really confusing me now. I'm new to this and trying to find out how to deal with my husband's collection of baseball cards, i.e. which ones to have graded, etc. If I can't trust the grading co. to send back what I send in, what is the purpose? If the grading is not objective and the criteria for final grade not explained, what does it get you other than confusion and questions? Is there truly no way to mark your cards in some way so you are confident of what is returned to you? Currently, I just trying to organize them by year and get a complete inventory (using the Organize section here for that).

[_ZENAS_]

If you are having them graded, use PSA, SGC, or BGS. Those are trustworthy companies. Don't let all this discussion of swapping cards bother you.

[jmc316]

It's the same as looking at, let's say, a car. If the cars front left, front right, and rear left fender are perfect, but the rear right fender dented, which of the 4 fenders is going to weigh the heaviest in your mind? THE DENTED ONE! You would never sit and look at that car and think "Man, those 3 fenders look great!!", you're going to sit there and think "Man that dented fender looks awful!" That's why the weakest of the subgrades is weighed more heavily

Not a good analogy for what we're talking about...I'll give you a better one...You a see a girl you'd love to ask out. You're grading her physical appearance on face, rear end, legs, breasts...3 of the 4 are fantastic and 1 is pretty good but not perfect...Are you telling me you weight her appearance based most heavily on one of the 4 and let that 1 "flaw" determine your overall grade as to whether you'd ask her out?

---

to make it simple, the biggest defect in the card controls the grade. your card can never grade more than 1 point higher than it's worst subgrade. So if you card is gem mint other than a crease, it will still get a really low grade (that should make sense). Just read the description of what each final grade means and you'll see that it is always stated in terms of conditions the card cannot have (i.e. no worn corners for a mint card, or no centering worse than 60-40, etc...). When you think of it that way, there is no way a card centered 90/10 is going to get a mint grade even if the rest of the card is perfect, nor should it.

How about this: You have a gem mint card. And you take a marker and write on it. Now the only difference between when it was gem mint and now is the writing. Is that card now mint or near mint? Only one of the subrades is affected. Of course not. It is easy to understand that that card with the writing now is probably poor to very good condition because of the writing. This is because the biggest flaw is a really bad one even though the rest of the flaws are minimal.

Hope that helped.

Again though...we're not talking about a card that's 9, 9, 9, 2...It was 3 "9"s and a "7"...decipher it any way you want but in this particular case 75% of the grading criteria was rendered worthless

[keyser soze]

Using a female is a horrible analogy, that's using a non-analytical part of the brain. And whether or not you'd ask her out is not even close to the same as judging the condition of a piece of cardboard.

[john1580]

Using a female is a horrible analogy, that's using a non-analytical part of the brain. And whether or not you'd ask her out is not even close to the same as judging the condition of a piece of cardboard.

I would ask her out and then make her buy me a box of cards

[keyser soze]

I would ask her out and then make her buy me a box of cards

And we have a winner, folks!!!!

[thepozr]

I would ask her out and then make her buy me a box of cards

Bahahahahahaha!! I'm LOLing. Very nice.

[jmc316]

I would ask her out and then make her buy me a box of cards

She wouldnt be able to afford it because she was graded too low for resale