I hate graded cards. I feel that the whole business is a conflict of interest riddled scam that preys on collector vanity in a way that was never the original intent of the process. I have a PLETHORA of articles on this site that speak to the major issues with the grading process, its lack of transparency and lack of accountability to the results that drive 50x value in some cases. Over the last 2 years, PSA has seen a massive overhaul in the habits of collectors, driving a business model built on marketing gimmicks and manifested a whole new type of target population.

Background of This Giant Mess

Ill say, that my issue with grading isnt that it exists. There is value in providing a third party authentication of specific cards with a history of fuckery from forgers and other scam artists, as well as a borderline need to provide condition opinions in a world where sales are done almost entirely online. However, the lack of transparency around how those grades and authentications are completed, as well as the artificial creation of a hyper mint grading scale is absolutely fucking ridiculous.

Originally grading was created to add a reliable standard for items sold online, mainly due to the lack of high megapixel camera technology. Now that our phones are built for photos, there is less of a need to deliver this side of things outside of major defects purposefully hidden by shady sellers. That hasnt stopped the grading companies from using marketing gimmicks like “GEM MINT” and “Black Labels” to goad collectors into a practice of paying exceptional amounts of money for hyper mint examples.

There are specific indicators that show this market trend was manipulated into existence in the late 1990s and early 2000s, and somehow just stuck due to constant reinforcement from the marketing arm of the hobby and hobby media. The conflicts of interest present in price guides used exclusively during the turn of the century had clear impact as well, being that the grading card niche was so small prior to the launch of a true prospecting subhobby in baseball.

Grading has become a mess of pleasing high profile customers, lawsuits, and scandals, including public relationships with auction houses and manufacturers that speak to giant potential inflection points of market manipulation and public pump and dump schemes. Because the grading companies have no accountability any longer due to the sheer volume of sales and transactions done within the market, they are free to operate without regulation or scrutiny. For a larger rundown of the many conflicts of interest present in the model, just go to the top and search “grading.”

The WWE Anti-Grade Brigade

Most of this new market was originally built around shiny cards, but it has extended to every deep dark corner of the hobby over the last few years – save one. WWE cards have not had the engagement with graded cards outside of vintage cards, whose only major attribute is a high grade in most cases. The older sets are rarely impressive, unlike other examples from the vintage era of trading cards. Most come from a junk wax era where hundreds of thousands of examples were produced of every card, and where few made it through the last 40 years without condition issues.

On the modern side, WWE collectors avoided graded cards in a way that probably puzzled the hell out of every grading company that exists. Basically, up until the massive spike in Chrome from 2014 and 2015, there was absolutely zero reason to grade a modern WWE card at all. It rarely added much value, and only very specific cards popular with crossover sports collectors had any real population reports to speak of.

Most WWE collectors lived in and live in a bubble of collecting, devoid from influence from the mainstream hobby. The community approached their collections in a different way, set collectors operated in a uniquely populated market, and graded cards just never caught on. Some of the most vocal modern WWE collectors made campaigns out of videos cracking cards out of PSA and BGS cases, and the lack of other voices deafened the grading echo-chamber that is so prevalent in the hobby today.

The Prizm Grading Revolution

With the growing crossover crowd coming to join the WWE hobby on the heels of Panini’s announcement of their license acquisition, grading in WWE has started to go in a similar direction to where it has been featured in other areas of the hobby. Chrome and rookie card examples being graded and sold for record prices to a small group of people have built a new branch of the market over the last few months.

With more and more crossover collectors joining the parade with the release of Prizm, a lot of those pre-conceived understandings are following in their wake. Already, we have seen graded WWE Prizm cards show up on eBay, with people taking advantage of proximity to PSA and / or paying for express service to get out ahead of the tidal wave.

I fully expect that over the next three months, there will be more modern WWE cards submitted to the grading companies than they have ever seen in the history of wrestling cards. Bottom line, new management means new rules, and I can guarantee that the new breed of persona coming into this niche will absolutely subscribe to the mainstream hobby approach.

Determining a Plan for Big Hits

Here is the age old dilemma that most mainstream hobby collectors have to consider as they pull cards from next generation WWE products – Do I grade and sell or just throw it up on the block. For most cards, the application of a gem mint label means more value. This includes a 1/1, where there will be no other examples to compare it to.

There is also competing timers at play that speak to the softening of the market in between release and the first graded examples being available. For the average non-connected collector, grading can take weeks to months to years (yes you heard that correctly), and there are huge implications for making a decision to grade versus sell immediately.

In my experience, if a card is one that transcends the softening of a market, its worth taking the time and spending the ridiculous amounts of money to grade it before you sell it. For some of the five figure cards that have populated this Prizm release above and beyond any other product in WWE history, this will include massive upcharges that the grading companies have instituted to further squeeze more money out of their new seat upon the throne of hobby businesses.

If your card isnt immune to the fluctuations in price, which is most of what Prizm is made up of, it becomes a measure of how fast someone needs to recoup cost of ownership in the card. For people that can wait, and have a clean example of a card that should hit the hyper mint scale, it might be worth the submission. There are many ways to do it quickly or slowly, and cost will vary. Collectors will need to figure out a path as the prices and the market settles during the time needed to get your goods back in hand.

Overall, I understand that my thoughts on this subject are largely irrelevant, as my commentary will have zero effect on what the general public decides to do. I am forced, as a captive audience, to make sure that I position myself within the market as best I can, so I will likely not have a choice as I participate in the sales myself. All I have to say is that grading, and the marketing machine behind it, have changed the face of the hobby to an irreparable degree. Most collectors are only aware of what value is created by grading a card, not the aspects of what brought that preference to light. With that, the choice is up to you.