I was looking at the population report (below) and as of this afternoon there have been 11,732 Base Unlimited Charizards graded. Of the total, there have been 4,338 PSA 9’s graded and at last check, they are selling at auction on eBay for almost $500.
At a price point of over $500, I am surprised most of the 4,338 PSA 9’s are not hitting eBay to cash in. Charizard is an awesome card, but > $500 for a card with a population of over 4,000 seems drastically high.
$500 x 4,338 = $2.17 Million market value for all those PSA 9 Unlimited Charizard… incredible.
I did some poking around at the old cert numbered unlimited PSA 9 Charizards and I found some very large blocks of OLD Cert graded Zards:
Cert numbers: 10041781 through 10041968 - All consecutive cert PSA 9 Charizards (total of 187 consecutive cert PSA 9s)
Cert numbers: 10043569 through 10043569 - All consecutive cert PSA 9 Charizards (total of 186 consecutive cert PSA 9s)
Cert numbers: 10075174 through 10075345 - All consecutive cert PSA 9 Charizards (total of 171 consecutive cert PSA 9s)
Check for yourself: pick a cert number in the range I have indicated above and enter in the PSA Certification Verification feature: PSA Cert Lookup
Based on my knowledge of PSA grading, they assign cert numbers consecutively based on the order in which they are graded within a submission (so they typically don’t jump around assigning a cert number based on the final grade).
Looking at these massive blocks of consecutive certs cards, I am baffled that anyone submitted all these unlimited charizard cards together in one sub and they all graded PSA 9… just not practical IMO.
I see a few different possibilities:
Option 1: Along time ago, PSA use to assign the cert numbers after giving the card the final grade… thus a PSA 9 Charizard was given a cert number that was sequential within a given range that year or month etc. This seems like a logistical nightmare for graders to assign certs only after grading. QUESTION: For those that have graded with PSA from 2000-2006 range, do you know if PSA assigned different certs for cards within a given sub based on the final grade or were all the cards within the submission still consecutive (like today)?
Option 2: PSA database is completely messed up and there are very significant entry errors and thus massive errors in the true population of certain cards.
Option 3: Everything is fine with PSAs database and all these cards were really all graded consecutively in massive subs consisting of hundreds of Charizards at a time. I am curious as to who or maybe what card shops are holding absolutely massive inventory of grade WOTC PSA 9 and 10 cards. I would be surprised if this was actually legit and I doubt that PSA is disciplined enough to give all consecutive 9s (and not mix in a 8 or a 10 every once and a while).
Anyway, I thought this was all interesting. Please let me know what you all think. I have found several other massive blocks of consecutive cert cards as well… more discussion for another day.
It’s a lot more of what @jcincy101 said. Many people have cracked and regraded the 9s hoping for 10s. I can bet hundreds if not more of those 9s are cracked and regraded copies.
For the certs before your 1st list there is a block of 8s right before. The second list numbers are the same. The third list there is a block of 8s right afterwards. Sounds like a massive submission they may have assigned certs after grading while still keeping the cert numbers within the parameters of the submisison.
You are correct… there are also 100’s of consecutive cert PSA 8s (sometimes after the 9’s)… there are also blocks of hundreds of consecutive cert Japanese Promo Cards (Charizards, Venusuars, Blastoise, Porygon) around these same old certs… bizarre.
This is like my favorite topic, although in this specific case it seems above board. Vintage Card Curator on youtube does a really good job looking at the potential for abuse here
Edit: Ok, looking at this guy’s videos it’s clear he got something against PSA (which doesn’t necessarily invalidate what he’s saying, but if there’s bias present it may be clouding some of his argument). Also, because something feels true (and I’ve definitely felt this way for some of my own submissions to PSA), doesn’t mean it is true, but I’d say his arguments in the above video are pretty gosh darn compelling.
Obviously it’s hard to know how much of the 9 population is a regrade, but half probably wouldn’t be an awful speculation. In relation to why more aren’t hitting eBay, it’s possible the nostalgia factor plays in here. Though unlimited, it’s still a variation of Charizard’s rookie card and arguably the most popular card in the hobby. With that it likely carries some sentimental value.
I was asked this before and honestly I rarely paid attention to cert#s or cases. Now that it’s been brought up though I do recall many of my old subs came in order of like grades. They probably simply took all my cards and after grading just put them in an 8 stack or 9 stack then were issued numbers. Somewhere buried deep I may have this paperwork but it’s no longer online.
