Hi everyone, I’ve been watching the crap out of Scotts videos and while I find them very entertaining, I still am not confident about what kinds of cards are worth getting PSA graded and what isn’t. I came across half of my pokemon collection by accident while visiting my family for the holidays and originally posted some photos to a reddit sub. I know that cards that aren’t of a certain quality aren’t worth grading, and while I feel like most of my cards would score decent, I’ve watched so much youtube of things scoring poorly from these sets, that I’d love to know how I can self-grade properly before mass submitting.
All in, I think I have about 1,500 shadowless and 1st edition cards. This album below is part of the collection: imgur.com/a/uHdHV I do have some Jungle and Fossil cards as well, but not many. I mainly only got into the cards when they first came out and then quickly lost interest. I didn’t really play the game, but I enjoyed sleeving the cards when I was a kid and trading from time to time with friends. Any help would be appreciated, and at least for the next 24 hours, I’d be able to take more photos of anything that might be helpful for answering questions.
One more question- some of the cards have different stamps on them or just have weird ink markings that look really “off” even though the cards weren’t played. For instance, a 1st edition war turtle has a 1st edition with a “shadow” on the card. and the bottom has speckles of blue which looks nothing like the other war turtles that I have. Would these be good examples of cards NOT to bother grading? Would ALL non-hologram cards not be worth grading- especially if they were only shadowless and not 1st edition?
TLDR: I’ve got about 1500 first edition and shadowless pokemon cards and I feel like it would be really expensive and a waste of money to grade all the cards. Is this a good outlook? I’ve been told to submit anything that would be psa 8+ but I’m not quite sure how to tell what would potentially make that grade. Is there a good way to figure this out?
nice to see you on here coalition! (this is gumber)
If you can post back pictures of the first edition holos and shadowless holos, those would be your money cards aside from the error pikachus.
Without seeing the play on the back and high def up close ones of the front holos it’s hard to say. Ungraded cards seem to be fetching more than they’d get as PSA 9’s lately. So just depends. Take time and study what 9’s and 10’s look like and compare yours. Holo scratches, back whiting, off center, smudged/stains etc weigh into the grade. Ya may want to utilize someone who has a membership and offers to send cards in for grading to cut down on the cost/maximize resale profit. GL
What you have experienced is the equivalent of visiting a deceased relatives estate and realising in their barn there is a 50k car in the for you.
Imo, all the 1st ed cards from common to holo are worth grading. With the noon holos more so only if they are mintt (psa 9+)
Without wasting time on explaining things im sure there are videos on youtube how to pregrade, once you get the hang of it you will get pretty good.
As for shadowless imo the rares and holos are worth grading but the market is catching upso grading the commons and uncommons may also be worth while. All the best!
For holographic, grade anything that would at least score a 5. For charizard and blastoise, it might be worth it at any grade.
For non-holo rares, anything that has a shot at 9+.
Uncommons… something like ivysaur, wartortle, charmander, and a couple others are worth it for 9+. Most of them will only see a nice return in 10.
For commons, 9’s will probably have you breaking even so only grade things that have a shot at 10 (exception to starters and pikachus, those are good in 9)
Energys. … don’t bother.
That’s my opinion, I’ll leave it to others to help you figure out what a 6 vs a 10 look like.
Anything 8+ is solid general advice, especially when considering the rares and difficult uncommon cards. As for a way to distinguish the difference between condition, there is no short answer. It is simply experience. Even with a guideline, it really won’t deliver what is necessary to properly pre-grade. This is the inherent risk, even for experts.
Either way, Good luck! If you have the time & money, start with a smaller batch to get a feel for how grading works. Then perhaps do a larger order.
That was pretty much word for word what I was going to advise OP to do.
@chrisbalestra Very nice collection you have there! You will most likely have to do a test submission of at least 50 cards with PSA to get a clear idea of what qualifies as X grade, especially on non holos. For Shadowless holos, anything under PSA 8 isn’t really worth grading except the 3 starters.
We can give you our opinion on a couple cards if you’d like, but there’s just too much there and we can’t expect you to take thousands of pictures of each card you have, nor do I think anyone would have the time to inspect and pre-grade that many.
Thank you for all the replies and hi Gumber!! Ok, I picked 4 cards at random and un-sleeved them to take pics under a lot of light. I think this represents a perfect sample size. The card on the far right has white down the left side and I think represents the worst of the worst that any of my cards are in. The card I’m holding in my hand is probably the “average” card and if you look at the bottom of it there’s white on the bottom. I can obviously tell which cards have NO white at all just by looking at them and that is what I’d assume to be a 9, and from what I’ve watched on youtube, it’s basically impossible to get a 10 from the base set, especially if the cards have been sitting around in a box for over 20 years. So, I guess the real question here is, what does the back of a 7 or 8 look like? If my sample size here looks like they’re lower than that, then I’ll just pick out the non holo rares and uncommons that are 1st edition and literally have zero white on them. Based on the advice people have given me, I think that makes the most sense. imgur.com/a/lvzxU
**edit** After reading everything you guys have said, I’ll probably start with a smaller batch of the cards I think have the best shot at a 9 (no white at all). I’ll not bother with anything with a lil white unless it’s a holo and I’ll do like Scott said and do a 50 batch sample to get a better idea for myself. You guys were very helpful and replied so quickly! This is an amazing community.
I few tips.
The centring is important on the front. Meaning that the picture border should be evenly within the yellow border. Like the first picture of the wartortle you posted and not the 2nd one.
Popular cards as well such as the Pikachus, Squirtle, Charmander. And any Uncommon and rare cards. Dragonair being the most valuable I reckon. And all holos pretty much.
It depends what you want to gain out of them really. If you start your own collection then great. And if you want to make a some money money money then obviously sell them. A quick sale on ebay as is could be pretty worthwhile for all the cards you don’t intend on grading.
Heck, I think PSA 7 Shadowless holos are even worth grading. There is definitely a market for them, with prices for some non-Big Three cards approaching $50 (i.e. Mewtwo, Machamp, Chansey and Raichu). There is a relatively strong market for PSA 5 1st Edition Base holos, so I think the market for PSA 7 Shadowless holos is only going to grow. After all, a 7 is a near-mint copy, and there aren’t many near-mint ungraded Shadowless holos left.
Awesome discovery and kudos to your former self for keeping these in such great condition. You are sitting on a nice pot of gold there!
I agree with what others have said about which cards to grade, generally 9+
In my opinion you should grade every 1st edition base card that is 9+ even cards like Pidgey and Poliwag. I would not start with those, but I would eventually get them graded for the sake of protecting them and for the long game.
I would start by focusing on the holos, rares, and uncommons.
