THWC 394: Why PSA Closing down value level is a good thing

What is up? Everybody happy with Cage episode 394? Brought to you by Arena Club by card ladder. Use code Cage. Save yourself a couple bucks and buy the Philly Show. Check it out. The Philly Show. Rumors, rumors, rumors all over the place. You know what I'm gonna do? I'm gonna, you know, I'm gonna try to do one of these. They call it, like, you know, dual kind of deals, dual shows. I'm gonna talk about PSA closing down. Value level. The rumor, you know, it's not news yet. By the time you listen to this, it may actually be news, but who the hell knows? I'm gonna see if I can do, you know, a live on. On Instagram at the same time and, you know, might as well record it here and there, you know, so, you know, here we are, right here. We are recording an episode. I figured, hey, you might as well jump on the live and let. Let the folks hear, you know, what you have to say. I'm gonna try to ignore the comments section, though, as they come up, because otherwise I'll get derailed. And then, you know, you guys listening to this as a regular episode, that's an interesting kind of thing. So psa, by the time you listen to this, who the hell knows? It may be actually news. Kahana, I said I would ignore the chat, but I can't. Yes. Bellinger's having a great season, man. Look at his war. Top 10 in the league. I mean, I'm doing an episode. I'm trying to do a live. Try to do them both at the same time. Good morning, Yoda. How you doing? I mean, this impacts you. I guess I'm coming on here to kind of give a different. A different view. By the time this episode is released, you know, the. The rumor that's out there may actually be news. You've seen Boston Car Hunter. I mean, the guy goes crazy. I love the guy. You know, he. He. He. He puts out 900 pieces of content. And, you know, it is what it is. So PSA closing down. If you've been here for more than two seconds, right? 1. Is it gonna close down? Who knows? No news yet. So let's be. Let's be smart about this first. Good morning, Big John Collector's cards. Be smart about this first. This is all rumors. You know, in an hour, it might not be rumors. You know, the. The news may come out, but what I'm hearing is, you know, everything from regular up, still gonna be open. You know, all the values. You name it down. Boston Card Hunter. Wins again. I mean, what is he winning? What's he winning? You tell me. Milk crate. What did he win? He wins the loudest person in the room award. He wins the shout first. And, you know, don't think about what you're shouting award, think about this. The last thing he was shouting about was, there are technical errors, right? So let's be honest, right? There's technical errors. He was showing all the ones that were out there, all the mistakes that PSA is making. So you can't on one side shout about all the mistakes that are being made and then on the other side say, wow, how can they shut down? How can they do this? Here's the problem, right? The demand is ridiculous right now. More than I've ever seen. And you can see it across the hobby. You can see it in the gem rate reports, you can see it in the card ladder reports. Look at how much money is being spent on cards, right? And the interesting spot that PSA finds themselves in, and this is not sponsored by psa, and I don't work for psa, but the interesting spot they find them in is they can't just go to Home Depot and grab a bunch of guys and say, come to our factory, get in the assembly line and start grading cards. Here's. It is a skill. It is a skill that not everybody has. It is a difficult thing to scale that up because people have to be trained. People have to learn how to grade a card. Now, it's not rocket science, right? But it's one of those things that they can't just, oh, we're going to hire a hundred people and work up the backlog. So that's number one. That is the, why can't you just hire more people? That just goes right out the window, right? I mean, it's a great question there. Andrew Goldberg in the chat, what will happen at Cards with the World cup up? It's an interesting thing. Anyway, so here, when it comes to psa, is this move smart? Honestly, I think it is. I was at a show this weekend before the rumor was out there, and people have been talking about this, right? But the biggest complaint that I heard at the show from dealers was these guys put in submissions. Oh, I threw my pen. These guys put in submissions every month. Every month they put it in. And this month, because they want to keep the cards coming, they want to keep the submissions coming, keep their inventory going. Three different dealers told me this. I put in my submission this month, and instead of it coming back to me in September or October, as I expected the date to return is January. It's February. How can they do that? You know, I can't believe that, you know, it's so. It's pushed so far back. Well, guess what? If that is the complaint, they didn't make a move yet. Happy go Lucky Dog company Andrew Goldberg. But the rumor is that the value levels, the bulk level submissions for PSA are going to be closed down for a couple of months. This way they could catch up. They're going to catch up on the backlog, right? If you were here during COVID you were here, you had, you know, you saw this, you saw your SGC one day go and raise their price to $75 a card. You saw shutdowns. We have the same type of situation going on here where, you know, anybody who's watching this saw the turnaround time go from 60 to 80 days to like 140 days. And even that, obviously that move was not enough. Right. So like you said, the COVID blueprint again. But they did catch up during COVID and I expect them to catch up now, you know, because that's the only reason you do something like this, Right? You know, you can't have complaints on one side saying, oh, PSA is the worst. They're Monopoly, they're horrible. Look what they're doing. They're shutting down. And at the same time say, PSA is horrible. Look what they did. Did, you know, they just pushed my cards back. All right, well, if you're somebody who has one of the millions of cards that they're going to grade in the next couple of months, if you're someone who's sitting here right now, just, just. I'll talk to you, right? Don't you want your cards back? Don't you want your cards back in a reasonable time? All right, well, if you're psa, you're sitting there saying, I can't get their cards back because I continue to get this avalanche of cards coming in, right? And we just can't catch up. We can't train people fast enough. We can't do the work. We can't get the guards out. So this is a move we're going to take. The rumor, this is the, this is the move that, that we're going to take. We're going to slow down the cards coming in. This way we can catch up on your cards. The people who have paid, the people who have collectors club, the people who are expecting a turnaround in there. So I don't know why people don't think this is a good thing because I know there are a lot of you, like myself, who have cards sitting there. All right, you have cards actually there. So this has been done before. It's something I expect will work. It's something I expect, you know, is a temporary, you know, issue where. And during this time, they're probably also trained more people, you name it. I blame a lot of this on the crazy, crazy uptick in the volume of, of Pokemon cards. And, you know, maybe while they're doing this, maybe there'll be a split in, you know, Pokemon versus Sport. Because I think it's the Pokemon car, the TCG cars that are really doing this. And yeah, I mean, think about it from a perspective of, of quality, right? You want to, you know, crap on PSA and it's easy to do, right? I mean, they have, they basically own every grading company. They, you know, they bought all of your alternatives for the most part, and now they're going to shut down that, that value level that I, you know, I think, I think regular up, it's like $80 a card right now, you know, so you can't really grade a card for less than $80 is basically what the rumor is is going to happen. Right? But don't you. Doesn't that say something good? Right? I mean, they could, if they were an irresponsible company, just continue to take in as many cars as they push back the turnaround time, bring in people off the street and just let them grade. Right? Just. All right, we're just gonna have any, any. But then what happens? Then, then Boston, Carter, Hunter, instead of yelling about them shutting down, is yelling about all of the mistakes that are being made is yelling. So, I mean, you're in one of these spots where they didn't create this. Right? The demand is there and the, you know, the, the job that they do, grading cards, it is a technical skill, right there. It, it requires an expertise that you can't just have it. Right? $80 for three minutes of review. Let's go. Send them to me. I'll review your cards 100%. It's all about eye appealing. I'm a robot. No, but I mean, here's a fun thing. Let's try to look at this from a, a, a, you know, we all know the bad stuff, right? We all know the bad parts, right? You don't want this shut down, right? It interrupts liquidity. It interrupts if you are a breaker or a repacker. Let's talk about the negative, right? Right. Because that's where we Are right, that's the negatives. Any new product that comes out now, you can't grade cheap and get it back quick. So that's an issue, right? All of the new products with the new rookie class, all of the products that are coming out now, it's going to be harder to get those PSA 10s in circulation. You know, the refractors, the golds, the et cetera, et cetera. Because obviously, you know, PSA might be slowing down the submissions fanatics is not slowing down their release schedule. So you have all of these cards coming out, you have all these things that are there and, and, and you know, the worry of course is well, we can't grade these cars. Does that impact people's buying habits? And let's keep in mind, right, we got to follow the trail of, of money here, right? Child deers goes into the trail of money. Who's yelling about this, right? The people who are or are going to be upset about PSA not creating liquidity are the people who are making the cards. Right? That's one. And the repackers. But let's take a step back, all right, if you're a repacker, let's take a step back for a second. Or if you're somebody who's got cards out there, take me for example, I've got a bunch of Wemby silvers. Anybody have any idea how many Wemby cards are sitting there not being graded right now, not being submitted? So I mean, yeah, you might have the argument of you're not going to have this liquidity, you're not going to have more cards coming out. You know, keep, keep on refreshing the amount of fresh slabs that are out there. I mean, come on now, this is one of those things where, you know, some of your cards, the values on them are going to sustain a little bit longer. Think about that for a second. Think about any recent, you know, submission of Topps Chrome. You like the, the flood of these cards that were coming in and, and were there for great. They're not going to hit your, you know, they're not going to hit your, your, your, your pop reports. So some of these cards are going to maintain their value, maybe even increase in value over time. You have to be a little more nimble in when a market has, you know, something like this happen to it, right? So yeah, look at this. I'm a post late PSA shutdown guy. What happened last time around Cage the. Almost the exact same thing that I expect to happen this time, right? So when you had Covid happen. And just everybody was submitting. People tried to pull different levers, right? The different grading companies tried to pull different levers. They tried to slow down incoming submissions, they tried to raise prices. They tried to, you know, slow down the turnaround times. I'm sure that if PSA does what the rumor is, if PSA is going to, you know, shut down their lower level, their. Their value level submissions and only allow submissions for regular and up, I'm sure it's the last thing they want to do. So let's just take that right off the. Right off the bat, right? Nobody wants to stop making money. Think about that for a second, right? Think if you have a company that has so much demand, you're actually telling customers, sorry, we. We can't take you right now. Right? We cannot take your money right now. Think about what that means. What that means is that they are putting the quality of their product first. I don't hear anybody saying that. Nobody. They could be taking your money, pushing back the turnaround time to six months, eight months, because the demand is there and it's not stopping. And they realize that it's not stopping, and that's why they have to pull the lever that they're gonna pull. And remember, this is all rumor. There's no news right now. So anyway, I wanted to come on. I'll finish up my episode over here. I wanted to come on live. It's great to see Andrew Goldberg still, still throwing the punches and having some fun in there. And guys, listen, it is what it is, you know, I mean, you know, PSA is going to be there in a couple of months, and what my expectation is is that they're going to be better, they're going to have more people, they're going to be caught up. And when you submit in three months or in six months, your turnaround time is going to be more reasonable. It's going to be more like what you expect, right? And they. They didn't have to do this, but why keep limping forward? Why keep pushing these things? Why keep taking small steps? They pull the big lever, you know, they get caught up and, you know, I mean, now they're able to kind of, you know, to do this stuff the way that it's supposed to be done. So anyway, there's my take on. On. On, you know, no value, no problem. I'll talk to you guys soon. Anyway, guys, so. So just to finish up the episode here, right? Because a little disjointed, I tried to do a little live and, and do the whole deal. I don't see this as a problem. And just, you know, to kind of, to anybody who's listening to this, that's not just on social, you name it. The rumor that's going around is that PSA is going to be shutting down grading submissions below the regular that they're going to be doing, you know, no more value, no more bulk, no more anything. And it kind of makes sense, right? I mean, we've seen this movie play out before. It kind of makes sense that they're going to do this because, I mean, what other choice do they have? Go on their website and click their grading options right now. And I think it's like 140 days. I mean, it's just crazy to look at the value. Bulk, which is $25 a card, is 140 to 160 business days is the estimated turnaround time. 160 business days, not days. Right? 160 business days. When you're submitting these things, you're getting, it's May, you're getting it back next year. This is a 20, 27 turnaround. I mean, I'm sure they don't want to shut those down, but I don't know that they have any other option. Eventually people are going to be like, what are we doing here? You know what I mean? What are we doing here? And instead, if you remember what happened last time, right? Took a little bit of a breather, they got caught up, and then everything kind of, you know, moved back in the right direct. I don't anticipate this causing a humongous liquidity problem. I mean, the fanatics, weeklies have thousands of items in them now. Every auction is stocked. And if there was a time to do this, isn't now the right time? I mean, they're going to get an influx of cards at the national, right? Wouldn't you want to spend the next couple of months getting as caught up as you can? So to me, I don't know that you'll hear anybody else say this. I don't want to say I applaud the move, you know what I mean? Because, you know, it sucks. You'd want to have the machine running, you'd want to continue to have everything going. But faced with the alternatives, I mean, you can see the writing on the wall on this, right? If they end up doing this, which they haven't done yet, but if they end up doing this, I can understand why this is the move they make. And to me, it signals that they're putting the quality of their work right there. They, they want to have their quality standards upheld. They don't want to just rush things out to market. They don't want to take your money and let it sit and let your cards sit for a year, which is where we're approaching. So instead they take a hit because there will be less money coming in. I mean, if you shut the doors to a, a, a large segment of your customer base, there's less money coming in and you may lose some of those customers. And I think they understand that. But I believe that it's the right move if it's what they do. I believe it's the right move that, that they take right now, we've seen the movie before and it has worked before. And there's obviously no less demand now for PSA than there was before. There's more demand, otherwise it wouldn't be in the position they're in. So we've seen this play out, we've seen it work before, and I have no reason to doubt that it'll work again. So that's just a different view. We can come on here, scream about how PSA is a monopoly and they're the worst thing in the world and they're horrible. No, they're part of the ecosystem that we all operate in, right? And they're almost damned if you do, damned if you don't. Because if they didn't come out and do this, they would spend the next month getting beaten up for the 160 business day turnaround time that's posted for the fact that people who are submitting their cards now in April and May are not going to get them back till 2027. And there's the mistakes that are being made as people rush things out. So you know what, that's it. Rip off the band aid, you know, reset, get the stuff going, get people their cards back. Like, you know what? I haven't heard anybody say, good move. I have a thousand cards sitting with them, multiple grading submissions, you name it. Maybe I'll get them back faster now because instead of focusing on getting more cards in the door, they're going to focus on the cards they already took in. Because I paid my collectors club membership and I submitted my cards. So they owe this to me, the consumer, to get it right instead of, you know, it's like the old phone company stuff, right? Like how come me, the Verizon customer, doesn't get as good a deal on my phone as the AT&T customer who's walking in off the street? And you're giving him a better deal because he's new, right? No, I want the same deal. I want the same deal as though, well, you know what? My car's already with you. My credit card information is already stored. You can charge it immediately. Go right ahead. I like the fact that they're going to prioritize me a long time customer whose cards are already sitting there with them over somebody who's going to walk through the door now and give them new cards. It's the move that I would make. So if they make the move, your first person who tells you, good job, I applaud you. And there's an episode today, a weird one. You know, I tried to do something different there with the live. Hope you guys were able to follow along. I got some applause yesterday for getting the 21 minutes on my episode. You know, they said that was the perfect amount of time to walk a dog. So we're at like 18 and a half. Hopefully your dog did its business a little quicker today there, Don. And that's another episode brought to you by the Philly show, providing this awesome sweatshirt to me and by Arena Club. And by know I mean use code know. Eventually brought to you by. You know, that's what fuels me. I'll see you guys later. I'll talk to you tomorrow. Take care, everybody.