Latest / Sports Card Clubhouse / "PSA Is Like A Stripper!" --John Mangini Talks About the Recent PSA Uproar

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"PSA Is Like A Stripper!" --John Mangini Talks About the Recent PSA Uproar · Sports Card Clubhouse

0:00
Hey everybody. It is Mike and I am joined by
0:03
John Mangini. John, how are you today?
0:05
I'm great, Mike. So in the past couple weeks,
0:09
I've covered the PSA. I'm I'm going to say scandal in
0:13
quotes here. If you're watching video, there
0:16
are some pretty serious allegations about PSA.
0:19
And I was thinking every week I have to think, who do I want to
0:21
have on my podcast this week? Was there big news?
0:24
Was there something to talk about?
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And I don't want, I feel like I'm kind of AI don't know how to
0:32
describe the way I some people think.
0:35
I don't go after PSA hard enough.
0:38
And I thought, who can be the opposite of me?
0:41
Who would be passionate about this PSA thing?
0:44
John Mangini has to be it because John, you for years I've
0:49
watched your videos and you have said PSAI don't I'm not going to
0:54
you. I think it feels like you say
0:55
PSA is a scam. Keep your cards raw, things like
0:59
that. Tell me your take.
1:03
Oh God, how long is this? Podcast I.
1:09
You know, I'm not a fan. I am of the opinion grading is
1:15
is a bit of a scam and not a scam like the emails we get from
1:20
India trying to get our trying to hack our our bank accounts.
1:24
But just in the general sense of the word, I find it to be a cult
1:30
and a bit of a scam. PSA has become like the IRS.
1:37
It's essentially A cult. And then they get a piece of
1:42
everything the sellers get and they no longer even hide that
1:48
fact. Their executives go out and say,
1:51
well, if you can sell this card for this much money, then we
1:54
should get a piece of it. It's just like the IRS, man.
2:00
And do you think that they, if we go back to last week's thing,
2:06
the PSA gave nines to somebody and then after he received
2:13
offers and sold them, they then upgraded them to 10s.
2:16
Do you think that that was intentional on PS as part that
2:19
there's some scheme that they do to to get get some extra money
2:23
and buy them at 9:00 and then regrade them to 10 and then sell
2:27
them themselves? I don't think so.
2:30
I certainly hope not, right? I think I just say it all the
2:35
time. No one can tell the difference
2:38
between a nine and a 10 including them.
2:41
And that's why you could send in, send in, send in and get
2:45
different grades all the time because it's no one can tell the
2:50
difference between a nine and a 10A card is mint.
2:53
There's nothing higher than a mint.
2:55
You can make up gem mint. You can have an 11, you can have
2:58
a 12A mint card is a mint card. And for it to be more than mint,
3:03
that's subjective. Now I can buy that a gem mint is
3:09
a mint card that's perfectly centered and a nine, you know,
3:14
is may may not be perfectly centered, it's packed fresh,
3:17
perfect card, but maybe, you know, has some little tiny dot
3:23
on it or fisheye or it's not perfectly centered.
3:27
And a gem mint is like totally clear registration and perfectly
3:31
centered. But as we see with the cards we
3:33
we find, that's not always the case with 10's.
3:36
And so how do you get a more than 50% of your cards with the
3:42
guy that sent the 99 in? How, how, how are more than 50%
3:46
upgraded from nines to 10's? And doesn't that make you a
3:49
complete chooch for paying 100 times more for A10 when nobody
3:53
can pay the tell the difference? That's why I say it's a call.
3:56
It's, it's, you're buying a number.
3:58
That's what you're buying. And people will say, well,
4:01
you're, we're just buying, you know, we're just paying for
4:03
opinions. No, you're not.
4:05
Because when, when you're paying that much for a 10, you're not
4:08
paying for their opinion. You're paying for the 10 baby.
4:11
That's what you're paying for. You're not paying for an opinion
4:14
'cause that opinion could be wrong.
4:15
I how about, how about the Wembe card that got all that
4:18
attention, the one O 1 Wembe card that was totally off center
4:21
and they give it a 10 and every collector out there was saying
4:24
that's not a 10. They're paying for that opinion,
4:27
but they get mad at the opinion if it comes back an an 8 or A9.
4:30
Right, 'cause it costs them a ton of money.
4:32
Right. So over on Twitter, you know
4:35
Eric, those back pages, yes, anytime somebody tweets out that
4:39
nines are junk, he will reply to them.
4:42
What's wrong with Mint? And I think it's a fantastic
4:44
question. Every time he does it, they say
4:46
yes, what is wrong with him? That's what.
4:48
I'm saying there's nothing higher than Mint Mike, really.
4:51
It's just a made-up thing. Yeah.
4:55
So this week, as you mentioned there, somebody on blowout
4:59
forums, I think posted that he had 105 card order 5299 came
5:05
back as nines or lower 6 or 10s. So about 6% roughly were 10's.
5:11
And he complained to PSA and PSA then went back in and upgraded
5:16
52 of the 99 nines or lowers at which is more than 50% of his
5:22
nines or lowers. They upgraded them.
5:24
They did not downgrade a single one of them.
5:28
And, and to me that feels like the biggest scandal of all that
5:32
they are listening on social media.
5:35
They're willing to to change it for certain people.
5:37
This guy was a like a registry high end registry user, I guess.
5:44
And so if you have a social media following, if you're a
5:47
registry user with some influence, you can get them to
5:50
go in and upgrade your cards. They won't downgrade any of
5:53
them. And it feels like the bigger
5:56
scandal here. Yeah.
5:58
If that is true, if they're doing that intentionally and
6:01
they're doing it for special people, that is a major, major
6:05
problem. But listen, they get a pass for
6:08
everything. That's why it's a cult.
6:10
You know, it's a cult following. They get a pass for everything
6:13
you blindly follow. It's just like when the PWCC
6:16
scandal and they had somebody in there who was knowingly, you
6:19
know, grading trimmed cards. Nobody cared.
6:23
They, you know, PWCC got got beat up.
6:27
But what happened to PSA? Nothing, nothing.
6:31
It's a cult. You know, PSA is like a strip
6:33
club. You know you're getting scammed,
6:37
but you, you pay the money anyway.
6:40
You go and you enjoy. You know that stripper isn't
6:43
into you, but she's pretending like she is.
6:46
And you know you're just overpaying and you're going to
6:48
have your money taken, but you don't care.
6:50
You go in there with a smile on your face and say, here you go,
6:54
PSA. Here you go, stripper.
6:58
I just that's going to be the title of this video.
7:00
PSA is like a stripper. Yeah, these these up charges,
7:07
let's talk about this because they used to just say it's our
7:12
insurance. We we guarantee the grade.
7:15
So we have to pay for our insurance.
7:17
Now they just come out and say, well, it's our insurance and we
7:20
should get a piece of the action.
7:22
If you can grade this card and, and, and it gets a 10, it's
7:25
worth, it's not worth this much more and we should get a piece
7:29
of that. Well, what about us collectors?
7:31
We get screwed, we get punished because we have a card that we
7:34
don't intend to sell that they want a piece of.
7:37
And it just happens to be a really nice card.
7:39
So we get a high grade, we have to pay more and we're not
7:43
selling it, but they, they get extra money.
7:45
Now here's the thing, businesses have blanket insurance policies.
7:50
You're, you mean to tell me that they are buying individual
7:53
insurance, insurance policies for all 1.5 million cards they
7:56
grade every month and that's why they have to up it.
7:59
If it's a higher grade, it should be a blanket policy.
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Now I've heard somebody say, well, they self insure, they
8:05
don't have insurance. Well, if that's the case, then
8:07
you're just taking a risk. It's like guaranteeing your
8:10
service. You come in, you do service of
8:12
my house, you have a guarantee your people screw it up.
8:15
Well, that's on you. Why am I paying for that?
8:19
Why am I paying for that? You're the experts.
8:21
Yeah, and if. You were grading fake cards and
8:24
you're making all of us pay, you know, for your guarantee.
8:28
Again, it's a cult and a bit of a scam.
8:31
I don't know how you can look at it any other way.
8:33
When nines go to 10s at that rate, it's just unbelievable.
8:37
And there's some sort of weird loophole with this insurance
8:42
guarantee as well to where, like if I remember correctly, the
8:45
person who submits it is not protected by the guarantee.
8:48
So if I submit a card to them and it comes back at 10 and then
8:52
for some reason it's discovered that it's not really a 10, I
8:55
can't go back to them. I need to sell it to be
8:58
protected by the guarantee. Or there's some weird loophole
9:02
that's it's just very strange. Are you familiar with that at
9:06
all? I'm really not.
9:08
I don't really follow it too much.
9:09
I do find it funny when a big influencer go, I'm so happy to
9:13
pay the $4000 up charge because I'm making more money.
9:17
Jeff Wilson, you know, again, we're right back to the the cult
9:21
strip club. I'm happy to get scammed over
9:24
because I'm going to make more money.
9:25
But what about what about the collectors who don't aren't
9:28
selling? Who aren't selling what they're
9:33
not going to be happy with up charges?
9:35
Yeah, so the. Whole hobbies just turned into
9:37
one big flip, Mike. So like a hot potato era.
9:41
Yeah, you talk about that and that was a Jeff Wilson thing
9:43
that became big maybe two months ago or so.
9:46
He had like $100,000 Steph Curry card and he paid AI don't know,
9:50
a four thousand, $5000 up charge to PSA to grade the card.
9:55
And it brings up a question, if he holds on to that card and
9:58
ends up going down in value, let's say it goes down to
10:01
$10,000 in value, can he go back to them and say, yeah, I want my
10:05
up charge back because they're not guaranteeing the upside of
10:09
that card? I was just going to bring that
10:12
up. You know, you go out and you you
10:15
grade. Just in a hypothetical, you
10:17
grade A wonder Franco card. They give you an up charge, you
10:21
pay it before they even send it back.
10:24
He's dating a 14 year old girl and gets cancelled and his cards
10:27
go to 0. Do they refund you?
10:30
No. No, no, up charges are great.
10:35
What you know they're taking if they take seven months to grade
10:38
a card, by the time you send it in, I don't know, maybe you get
10:41
that up charge, maybe something happens, that card goes down in
10:43
value. They don't they don't say, OK,
10:45
you're going to pay us less now. Have you ever seen that happen?
10:48
It's a one way St. So let's go back for a second to
10:53
the the 100 and 105 card order, because I I was thinking about
10:58
this. If you send in, you get 99 out
11:02
of 105 come back as nines or lower and you ask them, hey, can
11:06
you re review these cards and they re review them all 99 or 52
11:12
of the 99 come back higher. What if some of them come back
11:16
higher and some of them come back lower?
11:18
That feels a little bit more fair, right?
11:21
Yeah, but why are they changing that many to begin with?
11:24
Yes, it shows you that they are just what are they guessing?
11:28
Yeah. Is it, Is it just on a whim?
11:30
What are we paying for? What are you?
11:32
Paying for. It's wildly inconsistent and not
11:37
reliable in any shape or form. No, and the minimum size
11:43
requirements. This is another problem, but
11:47
that might be a different topic for another time.
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But. I I always enjoy paparazzi doing
11:53
the talking ball cards when he does his PSA reveals and men
11:58
size required at PSA sends it off to SGC and it gets graded.
12:02
Yeah, doesn't that make grading a scam?
12:05
It it certainly makes it something.
12:07
How about that? How about that 1936 Worldwide
12:10
Joe DiMaggio Worldwide Gum Joe DiMaggio Man, just as a great
12:15
card. So it goes to auction.
12:19
It's in a SGC authentic minimum size, not met.
12:25
Somebody buys it at auction for buddy.
12:27
I think somewhere between 18 and 23,000 can't remember the exact
12:31
number. As soon as they get it they they
12:34
send it off to PSAPSA. Gives it a six or 6.5.
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Sells for $130,000. Like within a month.
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Same exact card in two different holders.
12:47
People are only paying for the number on it.
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Doesn't that make grading of scam?
12:53
Absolutely. Same exact card.
12:57
I've always avoided the term scam with grading, but there's
13:01
something scammy about it. I don't I don't think scam is
13:05
quite the right word, but there's, you know, I.
13:10
You know, like, I don't mean it's an illegal scam.
13:13
It's just a it's just a passionate word to.
13:16
It's a racket. To describe something, right?
13:19
Yeah, yeah. So when was the last time you
13:22
graded a card? I know you used to a little bit.
13:24
I went out, it was, it's been years, Mike.
13:26
I was out in LA having some dim sum and I went outside and they
13:31
had one of those local newspapers and I grabbed it and
13:35
I'm, I just wanted to see like if they were how in my industry,
13:39
like, you know, if they were hiring for my industry just to
13:41
see what kind of projects were going on there.
13:46
And I'm looking through the pages and I see PSA for a
13:50
greater an ad and I'm like, oh man, maybe I'll move out to LA
13:53
and become a greater, you know, joke and rock.
13:57
It was, it said $13 an hour, no experience necessary.
14:02
And that was the last time I sent them a card.
14:04
Like I'm sending my rare vintage cards in for people who had
14:10
don't have to have experience knowing cards.
14:13
Like I'm an idiot. I'm a complete moron for paying
14:17
these people. Who am I paying?
14:19
They should be paying me. Yeah, it's I do.
14:25
I like to get my autographs authenticated.
14:27
I do like to have, when I'm buying a vintage card, I do like
14:31
to have it already graded because I want it to be
14:35
authentic. But I prefer the lowest of low
14:38
grades because why would I pay them extra?
14:41
Why would I pay extra for a card that is A6 or A7 when I can get
14:47
a 1 1/2 or A2 that looks just as good if not better for a small
14:51
fraction of the price of the six or seven?
14:53
Yeah, the authentic thing, sometimes, you know, it's
14:56
overblown for, you know, there's like 99.9% of cards that have
15:01
never even been fake. You know, the big ones, Michael
15:04
Jordan, rookie Gretzky, rookie 49 Leaf, Jackie, Those kinds of
15:09
cards you have to be very careful with.
15:10
There's absolutely no doubt about that and it's probably
15:13
worth paying for the opinion for those.
15:15
But I'll tell you, I saw CGC had graded a 1955 Johnson Cookies
15:23
Hank Aaron and it was a complete fake reprint.
15:27
It was bright white. It had sharp edges, which
15:30
anybody that knows those cards knows those are cutouts.
15:33
They came in a big long strip and you you RIP them off.
15:36
The edges were were sharp. It was white and it wasn't even
15:40
the right size because those are oversized cars.
15:43
This wasn't even the right size. They slabbed it PSA and this was
15:47
on a Probstein auction a few months back.
15:51
They had slabbed a it was a lake to lake Hank Aaron on the back
15:58
it said 1988 reprint like it said that and PSA had it listed
16:04
as an original. Now, Probstein, to their credit,
16:08
they, they, they put it up there and they listed in the
16:10
description that it was a reprint that PSA mislabeled, but
16:16
it's still sold for a lot of money.
16:18
I don't think people read the description to me that's, you
16:21
know, just selling it. Like that's even a little, a
16:24
little underhanded. Like you got to be very blatant
16:26
to let people know there are a lot of new people coming in and
16:30
new flippers who are, you know, if they think they're getting
16:32
something for a value, they're buying it.
16:34
And I know it's always buyer beware, you know, that kind of
16:38
thing. You could say that.
16:39
But sellers, I think, have some responsibility to say, hey,
16:42
look, this is not the real thing.
16:45
You know PSA screwed up the label.
16:49
Yeah, look at the, the one that's getting a lot of
16:51
attention recently is the tops Shohei Watani through the years
16:56
autograph where they're they're just reprinting.
16:59
It's kind of like the, you know, 1987 tops through the years.
17:03
But the problem is they have an autograph on it and it even says
17:08
this autograph is obtained by Tops and it's authentic even
17:13
though it's a reprint of a card. And PSA is slapping it as
17:19
through the years, but it's still PSA.
17:23
For some reason Tops is making it look like a real autograph
17:26
even though it's they're reprinting their own autograph
17:29
and then PSA doesn't make it any better.
17:32
The fact that people are even grading this 12 cent card
17:36
through PSA, it looks bad. Yeah.
17:40
And that's not APSA fault, but I feel like PSA, and this is
17:47
probably my craziest opinion here today, should say no to
17:50
some cards. They should just say we're not
17:53
going to grade this. You shouldn't pay us to grade
17:54
this. Of course they're not going to
17:56
because they're it's more money for them.
18:00
Yeah, and you know, like I said, because they're a cult, there
18:03
are people that if it's not in APSA slab, they won't they won't
18:07
want it at all, right. Nobody wants.
18:10
If you're collecting slabs and you have all these slabs like
18:14
you're doing a player run and you have some obscure card like
18:17
a bond bred or something, and then PSA is like, well, I'm not
18:19
going to grade that. So you have all these slabs and
18:21
then one rock art and collectors don't like that.
18:24
They want them all. They want uniformity.
18:26
I'm not like that like you know, but a lot are and they get
18:32
frustrated when they won't grade something and they won't collect
18:35
anything. They won't slap.
18:37
Like there's certain oversized things and certain, I don't
18:41
know, not not things that aren't cards, but more memorabilia type
18:45
things or whatever. It's just the way it is.
18:49
If you mail me your raw cards, send me $10.00 for each card.
18:53
I will put it in a one touch and mail it back to you.
18:57
Well, the I say, I say it all the time, the paradox is the
19:01
more that we get, you know, knowledgeable about all these
19:06
different cards and card issues and everything, the less we know
19:10
about cards because all of the cards that people are getting
19:15
are in plastic. No one's ever touching one or
19:17
feeling one or smelling one. And and now nobody can tell the
19:21
difference. Newer collectors, they have no
19:22
idea what these cards are, what they feel like, smell like.
19:25
So you're really doing yourself a disservice because you might
19:28
be at an antique mall and stumble on something and you
19:31
have no idea if it's real or not because you never touched one.
19:34
Everything's encapsulated in plastic and you might be missing
19:37
out on something good because you're fearful.
19:42
A couple years ago. You know, that's the other thing
19:44
PSA, they're, they're like they're marketing.
19:50
Well, they're marketing now. They've just come out and said,
19:53
great with us because you'll make more money.
19:55
But really when it comes to grading, it's, it's kind of like
19:59
home security. They, they capitalize on your
20:02
fears, your fears that you're going to, everything's fake,
20:06
everything's trimmed, everything's this, everything's
20:08
that. And you'll see people that say,
20:10
I just want to know that it's authentic.
20:12
I don't even care if it's been altered.
20:15
But they and they won't buy a rock card and then they'll pay
20:19
more for a slab with an A on it, which makes no sense to me.
20:25
I know you're a big Jeff Wilson fan, right?
20:31
You know, I don't talk about anybody else in the hobby.
20:33
OK, so Jeff Wilson said recently the PSA or collectors has
20:43
conflicts of interest and he acknowledged this.
20:45
And then he said, doesn't every company have conflicts of
20:49
interest? And it's, it's kind of that what
20:51
about ISM that he's defending PSA by saying, well, other
20:55
companies do this too. Yeah, it's like stealing
20:58
somebody's cards. And they say, well, other people
21:00
stole their cards. Right, exactly.
21:02
It's OK, I did it. Yeah.
21:04
And one of the big conflicts of interest and a lot of people
21:07
misunderstand this a little bit and I did for a long time, is
21:10
the PSA buyback the offers program where they're offering
21:14
their brokering sales. Once they've graded your cards
21:17
in their app, you'll get an offer for to buy your card.
21:21
One of their partners will buy it from you at like 70 to 90% of
21:26
the value. And a lot of people say, well,
21:28
PSA shouldn't be buying the cards.
21:30
PSA is not buying the cards. They're brokering the sale.
21:33
But the problem is that they have a collector's PS as parent
21:37
company has a partnership with power packs.
21:41
PSA Power Packs, which is GameStop.
21:44
Nat Turner is AI believe an investor in GameStop and they
21:50
are then turning around and selling these cards to GameStop
21:54
for these PSA power packs which collectors benefits from and
21:58
that Turner benefits from. This feels like a conflict of
22:01
interest. What do you think about that?
22:03
Well, I've been saying from day one that this is all a conflict
22:05
of interest. I mean, when you are the
22:08
authenticator and you have anything to do with buying stuff
22:11
back, regrading it, selling it, that's a conflict of interest
22:19
period. Yeah, there, there's no way
22:22
around that. That's a conflict of interest.
22:24
That's like you you hire a a an appraiser for your home that
22:28
you're selling and the person appraising it is the one buying
22:31
it or the one selling it. Or or it comes, it comes.
22:37
Back that's not going to affect the price, you know the value he
22:39
puts on there. Yeah, so the appraiser comes
22:42
back and says this fails inspection, you need $45,000
22:47
worth of work done. I'll buy the house from you.
22:50
Yeah, right. I'll take it.
22:52
Or it's like a dealer, like you go into a dealer, oh, these
22:55
$300,000 worth of oh, you know, they got this problem, I got to
22:59
grade them, blah, blah, blah. I'll give you 35,000.
23:01
Yeah, You know, that's, that's actually happened.
23:05
Yeah. And so you should have nothing
23:09
to do if you're the authenticator, you should have
23:12
nothing to do with buying, selling any of that.
23:16
It's just period. But when you're a cult, you can
23:19
do whatever you want. Nobody cares.
23:22
They're going to take the juice and, and, and on the Jones
23:25
Island. That doesn't matter.
23:27
As long as people are willing to pay up for 10s.
23:31
This is what's going to happen. Nothing's going to change.
23:33
And this is the world we live in.
23:35
So everybody just needs to stop complaining about it and bow
23:40
down. Bow down.
23:43
How many 10s? Let's form the Church of PSA.
23:47
Let's all pray with me. How many 10s do you have in your
23:51
collection, John? I got a a bunch.
23:57
They're you've had them for a long time, right?
24:01
Yeah, like I won't pay up for 10s anymore.
24:03
Well, I, I bought one recently, but it's just a good deal.
24:07
Puka Nakua when he first came out 'cause I'm a big fan of his
24:10
Yeah, let me see if I bought any other recently.
24:13
I, I, I try to buy rock cards now I, I, when people started
24:18
like opening packs of Chrome or, you know, brand new cards and I
24:22
understand their issues with Chrome.
24:24
I see them all the time when I open them, but just saying like
24:28
the brand new cards coming out of there that are just perfect,
24:31
like just perfect. And believe me, you can't tell
24:34
the difference between a nine and a ten.
24:35
I see people on YouTube all the time sending in and being
24:38
shocked because you know, it got us an 8 or an 8 1/2 or a nine
24:43
and they're shocked because they can't tell the difference and
24:47
neither can PSA because PSA will change that grade.
24:51
They will change that grade as we've talked about.
24:53
So I always found a funny pulling brand new cards out of
24:56
packs and sending them off for grading, especially the non
24:59
chromy ones that are just right out of the pack because, you
25:03
know, when grading came out, it was to authenticate old cards
25:06
and the judge old cards because they've been handled, you know,
25:11
and faked and stuff so forth. So altered.
25:15
But it's gotten to the point now where why don't they just put
25:19
the PSA grated 10s in the packs? Why don't you just do that?
25:24
I don't. But they won't do that because
25:25
they make so much money with people cracking these and
25:28
sending them 10s of thousands of dollars to grade all their brand
25:31
new cards out of a pack because people are willing to pay for
25:34
them. And now you have all those,
25:36
these repacks, so like the PSA power packs where they, they'll
25:39
buy one card that's $3000 and then hundreds of cards that are
25:44
worth like 40. And then they'll put them all
25:47
one card in each Power Pack and tell you, you could get this
25:53
$3000 card and you spend $300. And I'm just making up these
25:57
numbers. These aren't.
25:58
I assume they're not the real numbers for PSA power packs, but
26:01
pay $300 to open a car a pack that has one card in it.
26:05
Because there's a chance you get a $3000 card, but in all
26:08
likelihood you're only going to get a $40 card.
26:11
Right. And they're all graded that one
26:13
card is like APSA 10 or maybe it's APSA 71933 Gowdy something
26:18
or other. But for the most part they're
26:20
ultra modern. You know, that chase card is a
26:22
show, hey, or an Aaron Judge or a some sort of a prospect.
26:26
That's crazy to me that that it's straight up gambling.
26:31
It's straight up gambling. It's no different than going to
26:33
the convenience store and buying a scratch off.
26:35
But you know when all these guys got together and said we're
26:38
going to 10 times the hobby, Well, how do you 10 times the
26:41
hobby that fast? You turn it into a gambling
26:44
operation. Yeah.
26:46
People love gambling. You could put a casino in any
26:48
town and it'll be packed and make money.
26:51
Yep. And that's, that's what, that's
26:53
what our industry is right now, for better or for worse.
26:57
That's what drives the hobby today is the gambling aspect.
27:00
And the only thing that will change that is if people stop
27:03
paying these ridiculous prices for these, you know, 10s or, or,
27:06
or pools, one of ones or whatever.
27:09
I mean, there must be what, 1,000,001 of ones out there?
27:13
You know, every, every rookie has 2001 of ones.
27:18
To me, that diminishes the one of ones if there's that many.
27:22
But still that card is A1 of 1. And I could see if you're
27:26
excited to have a card that nobody else has and it's so it's
27:30
this created scarcity and gambling aspect.
27:34
And then you have these investors who will just blindly
27:37
buy cards for $6 million or whatever as an investment.
27:42
And these are billionaires. Like this is like, man, this is
27:45
like, you know, money you and I would have in the console of our
27:49
car comparatively to what they have, right?
27:52
So they don't care, they don't care.
27:54
Then it hits the headlines and the next time maybe it'll sell
27:56
for more. And you know, when this all
27:59
started, I mean, that's what like Vegas Dave, when he came
28:02
out and he said, I'm going to pay 400,000 for this Mike Trout
28:05
and I'm going to sell it for a million.
28:07
And he did. And then he did a video after
28:09
this because it started catching on.
28:11
And he, he did a video and, and, and said exactly what I said was
28:14
going on. He said what happens is you get
28:18
your friends together, you sell to your friends, it goes for 500
28:22
next. Now you send it to auction
28:23
again, it goes for more because it hits the headlines.
28:26
And yeah. And he come out and said that
28:30
after I I had done a video saying this is what I suspect is
28:33
going on because these prices just became outrageous.
28:37
And these big auctions, I'm just convinced it's like flippers or
28:40
investors selling to each other. Yeah, it's not your average
28:43
collector, but paying $6 million for these cards.
28:47
Yeah, so back to the gambling thing.
28:49
Two years ago, I was taking my family to the Grand Canyon and
28:53
we flew into Las Vegas because my youngest child, who at the
28:55
time was 13, or I guess just turned 14, and we wanted to just
29:02
spend a day at this theme, like an amusement park near Las
29:06
Vegas. And so we flew into Las Vegas
29:09
and I, I have this idea, 'cause my kids love the idea of doing
29:14
the slot machines and I thought it would be awesome if I could
29:16
drop a 20 into a slot machine and lose all of it very quickly
29:19
just to show them. And I did, I put 20, I said
29:23
watch this, put $20 in and it was gone like 3 minutes later.
29:26
And I said see. And they were like wow, what a
29:28
scam, this is terrible. And neither of them wanted to
29:32
gamble anymore. And I was thankful that we
29:35
didn't win a bunch of money because they would have wanted
29:39
to do it more and more and more and more.
29:42
Yeah. So, John, what can?
29:44
Go ahead. You were going to say something.
29:46
I just wanted to say like it's not my place to tell people what
29:49
to do, it's not my place to police the hobby.
29:54
But the gambling aspect. I do feel bad for people who do
29:58
get in it and rack up credit card debt, go bankrupt, lose all
30:03
their money, get scammed in this hobby.
30:08
I, I feel bad they're chased out of it.
30:10
I feel bad for people that are new coming in and what, what do
30:14
they see the new people coming into our hobby.
30:17
I used to be proud to be a collector.
30:19
I'm embarrassed. I'm embarrassed for our hobby.
30:22
I'm embarrassed to tell people I I'm in this hobby because I say
30:25
all the time, I love the hobby, but I absolutely hate the
30:29
industry. Yes, the longer, the longer we
30:33
go on, everybody at the top of this industry just turns out to
30:36
be some sort of bad actor. What whatever you want to call
30:42
it. Not, not the not the most
30:44
upstanding people you want running, running an industry in
30:50
my opinion. And I think like we're the one
30:52
of the few industries we're going to look at it as an
30:55
industry that doesn't have an association, right.
30:59
Do you have the the dairy association got milk, You have
31:03
the Bar Association for lawyers, You have the Dental Association
31:06
for dentists, You have the Realtor associate Realty
31:10
association for Realtors. You have these associations
31:13
whose job is to promote the industry, protect consumers, you
31:19
know, make it a safe, make it safe.
31:23
And two, call out the bad actors.
31:26
We don't have that and that is what we need to improve it.
31:29
We need an A card association, a hobby association, a place
31:34
people can go and learn about what to be careful with, who are
31:40
the good you know, who are the good dealers, what to be careful
31:42
with in the industry. How do you start that?
31:47
Somebody needs to start it. Well, Ziggy, you're familiar
31:52
with Ziggy? No, he tried starting, According
31:55
to him, a breaker association that would pull all the Breakers
32:00
together and make sure that they were, I believe, if I understand
32:03
correctly, doing things in a non shady way.
32:09
And none of the big Breakers were interested in joining,
32:12
which I think is pretty telling. Yeah, of course.
32:18
You want us to to actually be regulated and volunteer to not
32:22
do shady things? Nah, we're out.
32:25
Yeah, it's the Wild West. I mean, back in the Wild West
32:29
with gunfights and everything, excuse me, You think they would
32:34
be warm and fuzzy to have somebody come in and monitor
32:37
which guns they were carrying and if they can shoot somebody?
32:40
Like, no, nobody wants to be self monitored.
32:44
It's very telling if they don't want to participate in that.
32:47
Absolutely, Yeah. So, John, the the two PSA things
32:50
of the past couple weeks, are these going to get swept under
32:53
the rug? And we've seen immediately
32:56
already, I agree, but we've seen several LC s s come out and say
33:02
I'm not grading with PSA anymore.
33:04
There's been a groundswell of people saying I'm not grading
33:07
with I've I've received hundreds if not thousands of comments
33:10
saying I'm not grading with PSA anymore.
33:13
But it's going to go away, right?
33:14
I. Mean well, that's refreshing to
33:15
me. That's refreshing to me because,
33:18
you know, I vote with my dollars.
33:20
Yeah, me too. And if we all did that, imagine
33:23
for one moment if we just had enough and every collector
33:26
around just said, you know what? I'm not submitting for grading.
33:29
I'm not buying a cart for three months.
33:32
I'm not buying a box. I'm not buying a pack.
33:33
I'm buying nothing for three months.
33:35
If everybody did that, people would wake up.
33:39
I mean, that'll never happen, but it is refreshing to see
33:42
somebody standing up to that. The problem is or not the
33:46
problem, but The thing is, is that I don't think they're big
33:51
enough players to. It's like pissing in the ocean
33:54
to warm it up. They're not big enough to make a
33:56
dent. Yeah, I I also agree if if there
34:03
is a small dent, it will be brief.
34:06
I, I just think that the, the hobby has very short memory,
34:10
very short attention span. And once people start seeing
34:14
these 10s come back and you know they're selling at 2X what other
34:18
companies cards are selling at, they're just going to be like,
34:21
oh, I'm going to submit to PSA or PSA will do a special and
34:25
people will go back to PSA. Yeah, now if these people stay
34:29
not submitting, if they if they keep it up and more people add
34:33
to it over time, they could make a dent.
34:36
There's no doubt. But I think we all know that AI
34:39
grading is coming. I think with with the way
34:43
they're hurting their reputation.
34:45
PSA that you know, the door is open for other grading
34:48
companies. Collectors are absolutely and
34:51
I'm not one of them absolutely thirsty for a grading company
34:55
that they can get a decent turn around time, accurate grades
35:00
takes care of them, listens to them good customer service with
35:03
a nice looking slap. They're just thirsty for that
35:05
and and they try out these new grading companies.
35:08
But you know, for me, I'm like, OK, it's great.
35:12
You you think their slabs look good.
35:14
You just, you know, you want a grading company that's not PSA.
35:17
But are they qualified? You just blindly sending to
35:21
these guys? You don't know.
35:22
Are they are they grading better than PSA?
35:24
Probably not. Are they grading more
35:25
consistently than PSA? Probably not.
35:28
But you have a warm and fuzzy because you like the look of the
35:30
slab and you get it back faster. AI is going to change all this.
35:34
I have long been a proponent that I would not, I, I don't.
35:38
I no longer grade any cards and I won't grade until right before
35:42
I want to sell because you don't know at the time you want to
35:45
sell your cards who the hottest grading company is.
35:49
We have seen the old PSA slabs are now considered junk and
35:53
won't sell for as much. And you see the the change in
35:56
how PSA grades now tougher and in some cases like the 1980
36:01
Ricky Henderson, we all suspect quality control and pop control
36:06
it. So you, in my opinion, to get
36:10
the best bang for your buck, you should only grade right before
36:13
you're going to sell and grade with the hottest company that's
36:16
going to get you the hottest, the, the, the largest amount of
36:19
money, right? And if a firm comes out with
36:22
some sort of AI grading that takes the human element out of
36:25
it can have an exact image of every card graded so that you
36:29
can always, they will always know if it's resubmitted or
36:33
whatever is going on with that, then you know that's going to
36:38
change. That's going to change the
36:39
world. Yeah, the problem is the world.
36:42
Of the hobby. The problem is that AI is going
36:44
to be trained by humans on cards that were graded by humans, and
36:50
that creates some significant challenges with what we want,
36:55
which is more consistent grading.
36:56
We had that with SGC for years. It could.
37:00
Or it may not. Yeah, well, John I.
37:06
Can tell you this if AI is grading a card and it has you
37:09
know it's off center, it's an off center wemby one of one they
37:12
they ain't giving it A10. Only a human would do that
37:16
because it's silly. Yeah.
37:18
Any final thoughts before we wrap up here?
37:22
No, man, I hadn't. I had a few cups of coffee and
37:24
got wound up. Thanks for thanks for giving me
37:27
an outlet. My pleasure.
37:29
This was great. I really appreciate you coming
37:31
on. If anybody's somehow not
37:33
familiar with John the Mangini Collection here on YouTube,
37:37
check him out. One of the best YouTube channels
37:40
for collectors out there. Thanks, John.
37:44
Thanks for coming on. I appreciate it and thanks
37:46
everybody for watching. Thanks for having me.