Prove me wrong: Market Acceptable does NOT mean problem free.

Because most of the market assumes that every single straight-graded coin is completely problem-free.

 

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Check out some of the hoards they've graded. They appeared to be rather generous with some of them.

 

I’m sick of slabs and grading co my question is do you like the coin, is the coin genuine, is the price acceptable , I miss the saying is “beauty is in the eye of the beholder the grading co’s aren’t GOD!

 

Okay. I see maybe one or two airlines, but nothing excessive on the obverse, and nothing on the reverse. I've seen other coins with more hairlines than this. The color is bad, I agree, but I didn't know that indicated cleaning.

 

Can we all agree that this coin would not ever have straight-graded if it were a 1916-P or 1916-S? In other words, that a key-date coin is more likely than a common date to be straight-graded (or silently net-graded)? Or do common dates slip through, too, and we only notice it on the key dates?

I've formed the opinion that TPGs are more likely to do this on key dates. I know I don't have sufficient data to back it up, though.

 

This should be a mandatory disclaimer on almost all opinions posted here on CoinTalk, in my opinion*.

* I know I don't have sufficient data to back it up, though.

 

So you know what most collectors assume?

 

It should be understood that any post on a forum of this type is largely based on opinion.

That being said, for the last several years, my signature below has included the phrase: "All posts are the opinions of the author. I reserve the right to change my mind with new facts, experience, opinions, pictures, or viewpoints."

 

I'm a bit more cynical perhaps, but in my opinion*, hardly anyone posting here understands that. They either accept everything without question, or if they are offering an opinion or counter-opinion, they do not accept the fact they they could be wrong.

* I know I don't have sufficient data to back it up, though.

 

Given how many collectors talk about the numbers on the slabs, how many dealers say all of their slabbed coins are original, how many collectors say they don’t know how to grade, and how many collectors accost me when I say their straight-graded coin has been cleaned, I think I can make a good inference.

 

Don't look now, but you are proving my point.

 

What point? That people are trained to blindly trust the TPGs and are fed the misinformation that no straight-graded coins are cleaned?

 

My point that everyone in the numismatic community accepts that a straight graded coin is in a "problem free holder." The fact that many of those same people don't know that the "problems" are simply a matter of severity is immaterial to the conversation.

Perhaps instead of telling people their coins are cleaned, maybe you should tell them that their coins are lightly cleaned and that the TPGs will grade cleaned coins as long as they don't consider the cleaning to be harsh. Not only is it a gentler way to educate someone, it also happens to be the truth.

 

8 minutes later:

So you're really not trying to get to the bottom of anything. Rather, you're just using an anecdotal cleaned coin that PCGS says is market acceptable to try and make a point, or pick a fight -- whatever -- under the auspices of starting a discussion about the differences between market acceptable and problem free, which everyone here agrees aren't meant to mean the same thing.

 

The most heated response I have ever gotten was from someone with a F-15 draped bust quarter in PCGS plastic which had a harsh scrubbing at least 50 years ago (it had toned back fairly dark). The entire surface was covered in distracting hairlines. I said as much, but the owner explicity said that I was an idiot because PCGS does not straight-grade cleaned coins. I’ve had multiple other collectors and dealers tell me the same thing.

This sounds more like the market has erroneously assumed (or been mis-educated) that straight-graded coins have no problems of any form, rather than deciding that the definition of “problem-free” is “not having severe-enough problems to warrant a details grade.”

 

A 16 P or S would almost never be sent in as a VG or lower coin but I don't think they would be any less likely to pass or fail than the 16 D would be if they were all graded at the same time. IMO one of the things that really creates the perception is that the keys get sent in in lower grades where the common do not. The lower the grade the more that is acceptable to give a pass to within reason. Things that are okay on an AG or G wouldn't necessarily be okay on an XF or AU ect.

 

So you happen to be part of the small percentage of collectors who does understand that. Perhaps instead of using it as a cudgel, you could simply use your advantage to avoid buying the MA coins that you can’t stand, and drop the crusade.

 

But PCGS says that coins with any sign of an abrasive cleaning are problem coins, regardless of severity. And their word is the standard, after all...

 

Bingo. ABRASIVE cleaning. If you just say “a coin was cleaned” it’s not clear how and to what extent.

 

One of my favorite catalog descriptions is minimally abraded.