Hi. I had an emotional roller coaster with a slabbed 9.6 GSXM#1 that was damaged in shipment (ended ok with a full refund), but I have this raw book which I will now get graded by CGC. Hopefully this baby will grade well and would very much appreciate your thoughts. The issues I saw:
(1) On the big red "E" of X-Men on the front cover, there is very limited liquid or chemical damage but luckily is NOT a hole in the "E"'s black shadow. A bit of discoloration went through to the back of the front cover (see pic).
(2) Related to (1), there is the tiny discoloration on the bottom of the red "T" of "GIANT".
(3) The lower left corner is a bit rough (perhaps typical of square-bound spines) which is visible from one of the side shots.
(4) There is a soft lower right front corner with what looks like a small impact dent, which might leave a small crease even after pressing. I hope not?
(5) There appears to be a tiny missing speck of black on the black line over the "6" of the "68" -- is that considered a flaw?
(6) I am not sure if the pix show any other issues. But I should add that the book is very flat, and the square-bound spine is very square (perpendicular to the front/rear covers), so I do not think this book was ever pressed. Although not visible, there is a slight fold that you can feel if you slide your gloved finger over the front cover from around Colossus's left hand (in the middle of the page) down to about Thunderbird's foot. You can also feel it (not see it) on the early interior pages, just barely, so maybe the book was slightly or partially folded at some point, but apparently only temporarily. A pressing candidate?
(7) Almost forgot to add, since not visible from pix, there is a 1mm overhang along the non-spine edges of both the front and rear cover that has survived well, as you can see from the pix, except for the slight impact crunch I noted at the lower front left cover.
I wonder if a CCS press prior to CGC slabbing would improve the grade, but also whether I should slab this book with overhang in the first place.
So what grade do you predict? I am hoping for a 9.0, would be happy with an 8.5, and would be content in life with an 8.0. If this looks like a 9,2 or more (my heart just skipped a beat), please tell me to sit down before you throw that at me because I would likely faint.
Thanks in advance!