Grading Baseball Cards

How Baseball Cards Are Graded

How a baseball card is graded is a major determinant in its value. There are several professional card-grading companies who, for a fee, will grade your cards and encapsulate them in sealed plastic containers, also called "slabbing." If you're selling a collection, the baseball cards buyers at Midwest Mint & Sports Room will give you a free appraisal of your cards. If you want us to consider buying your cards, please let us know if they have already been graded by a professional grading company. We are buyers of baseball cards professionally graded by SGC and other companies.

For free appraisal of your baseball cards:

• Call our sports cards buyers TOLL-FREE at 888 380-MINT (6468). OR -
• E-mail us a description or attached photos of your baseball cards. OR -
• Send your cards in to our professional card buyers for a free appraisal.

Professional Sports Cards Grading Companies

These card-grading companies are listed here for your convenience and information. Midwest Mint & Sports Room does not necessarily endorse them, and they are listed in alphabetical order.

1. BGS – Beckett Grading Services – Major online presence; grades on 1–10 scale, with half-points, 10 being the best. Grading fees start at $6 per card. Dallas, TX
2. CSA – Certified Sports Authentication – Grades on 1–10 scale, 10 being the best. Grading fees start at $8 per card. Mastic, NY.
3. CTA Grading Experts – Bill themselves as the first grading company to provide computer-calculated grading; grades on 1–10 scale, with half-points, 10 being the best, and an 11th grade, "Flawless Diamond 10." Grading fees start at $10 per card. Rohnert Park, CA.
4. IGS – International Grading Service (formerly, Professional Grading Service [PGS]} – Grades on 1–10 scale, with half-points, 10 being the best. Grading fees start at $5 per card. Cleveland, TN.
5. PSA – Professional Sports Authenticator – Perhaps the best known of the professional card graders; uses a rigorous grading system of whole numbers 1–10, 10 being the best. Grading fees start at $6 per card. Newport Beach, CA.
6. SGC – Sportscard Guaranty Co. – Uses dual-scale 1–10/1–100, equating them to each other. Grading fees start at $7 per card. Parsippany, NJ.

Grading baseball cards is a fairly objective process. The subjectivity comes into it only regarding the "star quality" of the player, the overall "look" of the card, or the baseball cards collector's individual tastes. Here are the major factors considered when professional grading companies evaluate baseball cards:

• CENTERING – This refers to the evenness of the white space or border (if any) around the baseball card's main image. It is measure left-right and top-bottom in terms of percentages. For example, if a card is slightly off-center (to the right), and way off-center (to the bottom), its grading here might be 55-45 and 65-35. That means that to the naked eye, the baseball card's left border is just noticeably wider than the right border, but that the top border is almost twice as wide as the bottom border.
• CORNERS – This refers to the sharpness of the corners, as well as any creases in the corner. "Dinged" corners can drop the value of a baseball card almost more quickly than any other factor. If to the naked eye the corners are a very sharp point, that's good. But professional card-grading companies check them out under low magnification. Some unscrupulous sellers will re-cut a card, giving it sharp, new corners. But this is easily detected with a metal template that is cut to the exact size at which that particular card was originally manufactured.
• EDGES – While not as important of a factor in grading baseball cards as the previous two, chipped edges will reduce a card's value. The two causes of imperfect edges are –
  1. How well the card was cut when manufactured
  2. Edge damage due to handling of the card.
  There is nothing you can do, of course, about how well the card was made, but you can reduce handling damage by keeping valuable baseball cards in protective sleeves.
• SURFACE – The refers to coating on the image of the baseball card, as well as – but to a lesser degree – the printing on the back of the card. Other than unacceptable problems (except for the very rarest baseball cards), such as pin holes, tape, staples, writing, etc., the biggest devaluer here is creases in the card, which are typically visible to the naked eye. Less obvious, but nearly as important are scratches in the surface of the baseball card. These can be observed by the naked eye under a normal light bulb by holding the card close to it and rotating it so the light hits at different angles. A third flaw can be printing dots that are a different color than the area around it.

Learn how baseball card values are determined, how cards are graded, how to sell your cards, and more about our baseball card buyers.

Call our sports cards buyers toll-free!

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