I’m new to the forums here and am looking for your opinions.
The following card has popped up at my local shop. I’ve looked at it closely and can verify that the card itself is authentic (as best as I can tell, anyway). But what has me concerned is the TCG case. The shop has no provenance to this card and as far as I know, TCGplayer does not certify cards. I also cannot find any other grader under the label TCG.
Have any of you seen anything like this before? I apologies for the low quality photos.
Errr... I'm not going to comment on the authenticity of the card. The resolution is too low to glean details.
I'm just going to offer some brain noodles here.
* I can't really make out what the three letters at the top say. It could very well say TCG. However, TCG stands for Trading Card Game(s). It does not exclusively stand for TCGPlayer. The full company name is TCGPlayer Inc. In other words, even if TCGP did grade cards, I doubt they would use "TCG" to emblem their slabs. This situation with TCGP differs from PSA or BGS. Looking at pictures of PSA graded cards, this looks very similar and might be the intended target. Now that I think about it, if the letters are PSA, then it might be a very old PSA graded card. In which case, I would see if you can contact PSA about it.
Did the shop tell you it was graded by TCGP? If so, I would contact TCGP for sure. I doubt they want shops ruining their good name.
* However, running with this logic it was graded by TCGP (I doubt it), I'm not familiar with the companies full history so they could have dabbled in grading cards in the past but dropped it. It doesn't seem to fit well with their business model but hey, if IBM built machines to track prisoners in WWII, then anything is possible.
* Individuals can buy blank slabs from the usual sources. Meaning that some jack*** can buy blank slabs, stick cards (real or fake) in them and "grade" them however they want. The only legitimate reason I can think of for someone (besides a legitimate business like NGS) to buy and use these types of slabs is to include some kind of meta data with their cards. On the same note, I don't know if the blank slabs can be passed off as PSA or BGS slabs. In any case, I don't recognize the slab style. The indents are unique here. But I don't profess to be an expert on the subject.
* Looking at the label, there's a lot of red flags. The label fits poorly inside the space. There is no description on why it got a 7 (out of..?) AND it's NM? What is that black square supposed to be? edit: looking at PSA guidelines, 7 is the bare minimum to get a NM. The card has a vertical crease/crack at the top near the center.
Even if it was real, which I don't believe it is, it's graded as an NM 7 with a massive crease in the top middle. Not gonna touch it with a 10 foot pole.
Sounds like a similar situation with the OP -- I would definitely not take the risk on this one.
Good find....
I was bored and tried to find out more....
Apparently there are forum posts dated around 10 years ago that lists a bunch of three letter grading companies other than BGS and PSA. One of these companies, GMA, is still around. GMA's about page indicates they started around 13 years ago, pretty close to the correlating flurry of posts about all these companies.
Is GMA bad? I can't say.
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I’m new to the forums here and am looking for your opinions.
The following card has popped up at my local shop. I’ve looked at it closely and can verify that the card itself is authentic (as best as I can tell, anyway). But what has me concerned is the TCG case. The shop has no provenance to this card and as far as I know, TCGplayer does not certify cards. I also cannot find any other grader under the label TCG.
Have any of you seen anything like this before? I apologies for the low quality photos.
Many thanks in advance!
I'm just going to offer some brain noodles here.
* I can't really make out what the three letters at the top say. It could very well say TCG. However, TCG stands for Trading Card Game(s). It does not exclusively stand for TCGPlayer. The full company name is TCGPlayer Inc. In other words, even if TCGP did grade cards, I doubt they would use "TCG" to emblem their slabs. This situation with TCGP differs from PSA or BGS. Looking at pictures of PSA graded cards, this looks very similar and might be the intended target. Now that I think about it, if the letters are PSA, then it might be a very old PSA graded card. In which case, I would see if you can contact PSA about it.
Did the shop tell you it was graded by TCGP? If so, I would contact TCGP for sure. I doubt they want shops ruining their good name.
* However, running with this logic it was graded by TCGP (I doubt it), I'm not familiar with the companies full history so they could have dabbled in grading cards in the past but dropped it. It doesn't seem to fit well with their business model but hey, if IBM built machines to track prisoners in WWII, then anything is possible.
* Individuals can buy blank slabs from the usual sources. Meaning that some jack*** can buy blank slabs, stick cards (real or fake) in them and "grade" them however they want. The only legitimate reason I can think of for someone (besides a legitimate business like NGS) to buy and use these types of slabs is to include some kind of meta data with their cards. On the same note, I don't know if the blank slabs can be passed off as PSA or BGS slabs. In any case, I don't recognize the slab style. The indents are unique here. But I don't profess to be an expert on the subject.
* Looking at the label, there's a lot of red flags. The label fits poorly inside the space. There is no description on why it got a 7 (out of..?) AND it's NM? What is that black square supposed to be? edit: looking at PSA guidelines, 7 is the bare minimum to get a NM. The card has a vertical crease/crack at the top near the center.
Just move on. Power is rife with fakes these days.
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?p=11439737#post11439737
Reality is only what man allows it to be. Few shape it so that many may accept it.
- http://www.net54baseball.com/showthread.php?t=81525
Sounds like a similar situation with the OP -- I would definitely not take the risk on this one.
Good find....
I was bored and tried to find out more....
Apparently there are forum posts dated around 10 years ago that lists a bunch of three letter grading companies other than BGS and PSA. One of these companies, GMA, is still around. GMA's about page indicates they started around 13 years ago, pretty close to the correlating flurry of posts about all these companies.
Is GMA bad? I can't say.