If slab says 9.8, does it matter what grade the actual comic actually is? What are we buying, anyway? The comic or the grade? 5 5

[chrisco37]

[trademarkcomics]

On 1/1/2024 at 9:13 AM, Gambold Vintage said:

I mean, think about it. Some scam artist gets a 9.8 IH181. They then crack the case and put a 9.4 in there, and sell it as a 9.8. 

That means until the case is cracked again and the comic regraded, it's a 9.8 as far as anyone knows. So does it matter? What do we buy, when we buy a slabbed comic?  We buy the grade, and the belief that the comic in the slab is accurately graded.  What do we sell, when we sell a slabbed comic? The same thing. 

And grading is not exactly a hard science. I'm sure many of us have been happily surprised or bitterly disappointed at grades we've received from our CGC submissions. I know I have.  Yet we still use the service and we still buy and sell slabs based on grades.

So if I get a 9.8 comic, I'm not going to worry if the comic inside REALLY IS a 9.8, whatever that means. I bought the grade.  And when the time comes, I'll sell the grade. If someone else wants to crack open a 9.8 and have it re-graded or verified that it really is a 9.8...go for it. 

The comparison would be purchasing an art forgery.  You bought a Picasso only to find out years later that it's a clever fake...if you or anyone else bothered finding out. But the comparison only goes so far.  A Picasso IS a Picasso. A 9.8 comic could well be a 9.6 in someone else's eyes. 

 

 

You're calling into question the entire professional grading industry. How do we know the book is not just a cover and the interior is blank?

If there wasn't a gif, did the tree actually fall?

When you go to Chipotle, how do you know whether your taco beef is actually beef? Or if it was spit in?

So many things in life are taken on faith. Is CGC perfect? No. Does every tax dollar you give go to where it should go? Hell no. 

If everyone realized just how tenuous and risky investing in company stock was, the entire economy of the world would collapse. 

Just go get a taco, eat and enjoy it because life is too short to worry about every little thing.

*Gets off the soapbox.*  

Edited January 3 by trademarkcomics

[Lazyboy]

On 1/3/2024 at 7:22 AM, Phill the Governor said:

The grading should go 9.0, 9.5 and 10.0 like normal grading should

That would be true if the original scale was numerical. It wasn't. 25 steps were shoehorned into numbers that only go up to 10.

The numbers are meaningless, except relative to each other, with higher grades obviously being represented by higher numbers.

[Lazyboy]

On 1/1/2024 at 7:37 PM, Gambold Vintage said:

Maybe they want to preserve their comics better than bags and boards.

Well, since slabs don't accomplish that, even completely ignoring that the comics will have to be subjected to the hazards of shipping to be slabbed...

On 1/1/2024 at 8:17 PM, Gambold Vintage said:

>because they care more about bonus checks, paid vacations, stock options, pleasing executives and Board members (not this Board) than they care about a graded comic book.<

I'm curious how you know this.  I mean, do you know anyone who works there? Or who is on the Board or the leadership team? The CGC site has zero information about any of that - no names, no titles, nothing.  They do have the graders, and one of them apparently is the President of the company.  

https://www.cgccomics.com/grading/cgc-graders/

I'm just spitballing here, but I doubt that crowd of graders is getting "stock options."  I don't think CGC is a public company. 

He's talking about the people in charge, who actually have some power. Do you know who owns CGC (well, CGC's parent company CCG)?

[BA773]

On 1/1/2024 at 6:13 PM, Gambold Vintage said:

I mean, think about it. Some scam artist gets a 9.8 IH181. They then crack the case and put a 9.4 in there, and sell it as a 9.8. 

That means until the case is cracked again and the comic regraded, it's a 9.8 as far as anyone knows. So does it matter? What do we buy, when we buy a slabbed comic?  We buy the grade, and the belief that the comic in the slab is accurately graded.  What do we sell, when we sell a slabbed comic? The same thing. 

And grading is not exactly a hard science. I'm sure many of us have been happily surprised or bitterly disappointed at grades we've received from our CGC submissions. I know I have.  Yet we still use the service and we still buy and sell slabs based on grades.

So if I get a 9.8 comic, I'm not going to worry if the comic inside REALLY IS a 9.8, whatever that means. I bought the grade.  And when the time comes, I'll sell the grade. If someone else wants to crack open a 9.8 and have it re-graded or verified that it really is a 9.8...go for it. 

The comparison would be purchasing an art forgery.  You bought a Picasso only to find out years later that it's a clever fake...if you or anyone else bothered finding out. But the comparison only goes so far.  A Picasso IS a Picasso. A 9.8 comic could well be a 9.6 in someone else's eyes. 

 

 

A Picasso is a Picasso and a Liefeld is a Liefeld

Edited February 16 by BA773

[BEAUMONTS]

I use my own company its called RAW

[Hepcat]

On 1/1/2024 at 12:55 PM, Chip Cataldo said:

I only have raw books. To hell with numbers on paper encased in acrylic.

I love comics, not plastic...unless she's cute.

I love comics and I just say "No!" to plastic.. Even if she's cute otherwise, I wish she'd left them in their natural state.

 

[Hepcat]

On 1/1/2024 at 12:13 PM, Gambold Vintage said:

I mean, think about it. Some scam artist gets a 9.8 IH181. They then crack the case and put a 9.4 in there, and sell it as a 9.8. 

 

Breaking open a case and substituting another comic is fraud though, simply fraud.

What's not fraud though is accepting a higher evaluation/number from CGC when you believe the comic doesn't deserve such and selling the slabbed comic with the number you think it doesn't deserve. After all, nobody ever asked you to guaranty CGC's grading accuracy. You're just selling a slab with a number.

[Coverless 9.8]

Buy the book, which beyond the front and back covers you are unable to inspect, not the grade, which you are unable to trust with any reasonable degree of assurance!  I'm glad that's settled!  

[onlyweaknesskryptonite]

Orson Welles would be proud.

[Mr. Zipper]

On 1/1/2024 at 7:39 PM, KCOComics said:

2)  Buyers should do their diligence. Before CGC was big,   many dealers and fly by night sellers would call lots of books NM.  Buyers had to review the book and determine if they agreed with the grade. CGC did alot to take the debate out of it,  but CGC isn't unflappable. We've all seen overgraded and undergraded books. So if you are spending 5 figures on a comic,  you have a responsibility to make sure its exactly what you think it is. And if your buying the grade without executing that diligence, sometimes you'll be fine. But sometimes you won't. 

This is all true, but it overlooks a key contingent of the market: investors. 

Professional grading brought in specu-investors who will never know (or care) how to grade, detect restoration, etc. Going back to pre-CGC era likely means losing that segment of the market. It doesn't matter much to me if they all went away, but there would be hobby-wide consequences. I'm a firm believer in rising water floats all boats. 

[BrashL]

On 1/3/2024 at 3:15 PM, trademarkcomics said:

You're calling into question the entire professional grading industry. How do we know the book is not just a cover and the interior is blank?

If there wasn't a gif, did the tree actually fall?

When you go to Chipotle, how do you know whether your taco beef is actually beef? Or if it was spit in?

So many things in life are taken on faith. Is CGC perfect? No. Does every tax dollar you give go to where it should go? Hell no. 

If everyone realized just how tenuous and risky investing in company stock was, the entire economy of the world would collapse. 

Just go get a taco, eat and enjoy it because life is too short to worry about every little thing.

*Gets off the soapbox.*  

Well except no, that's completely wrong. We know Chipotle beef is beef because we have a third party regulator (multiple really between state, federal, etc) that more or less guarantee it. We trust stocks (mostly) for the same reason (Google SEC). The problem is that CGC was supposed to be that third party for comics and we've learned over time they completely fail at that job and probably need an third party to evaluate them. If the philosophy is just enjoy the comic you buy because life is too short, why do we need CGC again?

[Ride the Tiger]

It certainly was easier back in the day when your only grades were Good Fine and Near Mint. You had a 33% chance of being right.

[Mr. Zipper]

On 3/12/2024 at 1:44 PM, Ride the Tiger said:

It certainly was easier back in the day when your only grades were Good Fine and Near Mint. You had a 33% chance of being right.

Yet Mile High Chuck was wrong 66% of the time. 

[Hepcat]

On 3/12/2024 at 9:05 AM, Mr. Zipper said:

This is all true, but it overlooks a key contingent of the market: investors. 

Professional grading brought in specu-investors who will never know (or care) how to grade, detect restoration, etc. Going back to pre-CGC era likely means losing that segment of the market. It doesn't matter much to me if they all went away, but there would be hobby-wide consequences. I'm a firm believer in rising water floats all boats. 

Me I'd be happy to see all the specu-investors go away. Good riddance!

[trademarkcomics]

On 3/12/2024 at 6:43 AM, BrashL said:

Well except no, that's completely wrong. We know Chipotle beef is beef because we have a third party regulator (multiple really between state, federal, etc) that more or less guarantee it. We trust stocks (mostly) for the same reason (Google SEC). The problem is that CGC was supposed to be that third party for comics and we've learned over time they completely fail at that job and probably need an third party to evaluate them. If the philosophy is just enjoy the comic you buy because life is too short, why do we need CGC again?

Thanks for proving my point that some take all of this way too seriously by attempting to destroy my argument point-by-point MONTHS after it was posted. Even though it has become a business for me, I still want my collecting to be fun. Unless CGC is proven to be ripping people off purposely, I still think they can have an important place in the hobby. Maybe what we need to take away from this is that CGC is not the God of comic book grading(which they never should have been looked at that way in the first place). They are mostly accurate, and their grades should boost value, just not as inflated as its been(says a guy who has too many CGC books in his inventory).

[Coverless 9.8]

On 3/12/2024 at 9:43 AM, BrashL said:

If the philosophy is just enjoy the comic you buy because life is too short, why do we need CGC again?

$o you can get ten time$ a non encap$ulated re$ale price!  

[BrashL]

On 3/12/2024 at 5:43 PM, trademarkcomics said:

Thanks for proving my point that some take all of this way too seriously by attempting to destroy my argument point-by-point MONTHS after it was posted. Even though it has become a business for me, I still want my collecting to be fun. Unless CGC is proven to be ripping people off purposely, I still think they can have an important place in the hobby. Maybe what we need to take away from this is that CGC is not the God of comic book grading(which they never should have been looked at that way in the first place). They are mostly accurate, and their grades should boost value, just not as inflated as its been(says a guy who has too many CGC books in his inventory).

Well I don't know if I'd describe two months as MONTHS(!) but I guess that's technically true. That said there's no expiration date on being wrong.

[Ride the Tiger]

I hear people talking about CGC boosting the value of their comic. I've always looked at it the other way around. A book in a CGC case holds the true value of the book and a raw book is worth less because it didn't get "checked out". 

[shadroch]

On 3/11/2024 at 9:01 PM, Hepcat said:

Breaking open a case and substituting another comic is fraud though, simply fraud.

What's not fraud though is accepting a higher evaluation/number from CGC when you believe the comic doesn't deserve such and selling the slabbed comic with the number you think it doesn't deserve. After all, nobody ever asked you to guaranty CGC's grading accuracy. You're just selling a slab with a number.

Is it really fraud? 

I have two X-men 94s. One is in a mylar with an NM label and a $4,000 price tag. The other is in a mylar with a VF label and a $2,000 price tag. While doing my monthly check for rusty staples, I accidentally switched mylars. Someone buys the VF book in the NM label and pays $4,000 for it. Where is the fraud?

CGC goes to great pains to say their grade is an opinion only , and provides no guarantees that it is accurate. 

It's a scummy thing to do, and anyone who suspects a switched slab should avoid doing business, with the seller but I'm not convinced it is a crime. I think the lack of any real punishments in these cases is going to encourage an awful lot of imitators and open the door to more scams.