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Last Updated On: September 5th, 2024
One of the biggest stories to emerge from the early 2020s sports card boom revolved around the rise and consolidation of PSA as the hobby’s preeminent grading company. Others – SGC and, to a much lesser extent, BGS – still round out the upper echelon, but PSA’s value-added continues to trump its rivals.
But with the advent of artificial intelligence and more accurate grading technologies, is it possible we see a new challenger come for PSA’s throne? A few months ago we chronicled one such brand, TAG, that is striving to eat into PSA’s market share through use of cutting edge automation and transparency.
In this post, we’re covering another upstart grader: Edge Grading. We spoke with Curtiss Patrick, co-founder of Edge Grading, to get the lowdown on the novel brand. In addition, we’ll discuss the brand’s history, what differentiates it from the competition, and walk you through our own experience with the company.
Let’s jump in!
Table of Contents
Overview: Who is Edge Grading?
At first blush, Edge Grading looks quite a bit like many other graders. It utilizes a 1-10 grading scale, encases cards in a clear slab, and provides an online submission form to send cards in for grading.
But if we dig a little deeper, we see that Edge has built its entire brand around a single word: transparency. In their own words, Edge desires for “collectors to understand the ‘why’ behind every grade.” Indeed, Edge provides one of the most detailed explanations behind its grading system and how it assigns grades to a card.
Additionally, Edge offers an online “Card Centering Calculator” where collectors can upload photos of a card to gauge where its centering score will fall. It’s a fairly novel concept and, being free of charge, could save hobbyists significant dollars down the road.
Let’s explore a few of these facets in a little closer detail.
Grading Scale
While Edge employs a standard 1-10 grading scale (with one caveat), there are a few quirks worth pointing out. For starters, an Edge 10 is considered a “Gem Mint” and on par with PSA 10, BGS 9.5, and SGC 10.
But for the truly extraordinary cards out there, Edge offers an “Ultra Mint” grade, designated as 10+. It’s unclear if an Edge 10+ is on par with a BGS Black Label, but suffice to say, this is the highest and rarest grade an Edge card can receive.
The grading itself is broken down into four familiar primary categories (called “regions”): Centering, Corners, Edges, and Surface. Each card begins at a 10.5 for each region, meaning the grading is conducted via subtraction for each flaw discovered. For example, if a minor scratch is found on the card, that region would be deducted by an equivalent value, bringing that region’s score down.
Once all four regions are graded, Edge aggregates each value and turns out the card’s overall score. Technically, a card receives two grades – the “raw grade” of the card after all the subtractions are calculated and a “final grade” which is the nearest whole number to the raw grade. For example, if a card’s raw grade is 8.33, it’s final grade will be an 8. But if the card is above .75, the card is rounded up to the next whole number grade. So if that same card received a raw grade of 8.75, its final grade would be a 9.
That last bit is an interesting touch by Edge. Purists may wince at the rounding up, since this exposes the card to a potentially wide range (is a 9.74 really the same as an 8.75? According to Edge, the answer is yes) of grades. On the other hand, this is hardly any different than what PSA does, albeit with far less transparency in the process. Additionally, Edge makes it abundantly clear how each card’s region scores on its slab, as seen below.
Speaking of transparency, let’s talk about how Edge makes good on its commitment to keeping collectors informed through its detailed reporting system.
Detailed Reports
When we discussed TAG, we gushed over its DIG report, one of the most comprehensive grading analyses available. While Edge’s reporting isn’t quite on the same level of TAG’s forensic accounting, its report is extremely detailed.
Edge provides explanations for each region’s grade, down to the millimeter for centering and named defects for surface area issues.
We love these detailed reports because they make the hobby much smarter about how it collects. Traditionally, it’s been very difficult to pinpoint just how some graders arrive at particular grades, especially as it concerns pesky surface blemishes.
What these detailed reports do is educate collectors, giving them concrete examples of broken edges, surface scratches, and the like. Not only that, it explains how make-or-break each of these defects are, which also helps collectors properly weigh these factors as they consider whether to submit a card for grading.
We firmly believe a smarter hobby is a healthier hobby, and Edge should be commended for its efforts in that department.
Types of Cards Accepted for Grading
Edge accepts any standard-sized baseball, football, basketball, hockey, soccer, and Pokémon cards that are less than 50 pt in thickness. That includes die-cut and autograph cards as well. For now, however, only cards printed after (and including) 1991 are accepted.
Pricing & Service Turnaround
Edge currently charges $18/card individually and $15/card when you send in 10 or more cards. That puts it right around the range of BGS and SGC, and less than both TAG and PSA. The turnaround window is also fairly quick, between four to eight business days.
Slab Size
The Edge slab features slightly more rounded edges compared to PSA’s version. In terms of height and depth, these are on par with PSA, but Edge slabs are a touch wider, closer to BGS in that regard. But have no fear, an Edge slab will fit perfectly in an Only Greats graded card case!
Cards We Graded With Edge & the Results
With this background on the table, we decided to check out Edge Grading for ourselves to see how its grading and reporting stacked up to both what we expected and what’s advertised. By and large, we were not disappointed; our grades were as expected, with a few surprises we’ll discuss below.
1993 Stadium Club Michael Jordan Beam Team
Raw card before grading:
What we expected: NM-MT 8
What we got: NM-MT 8 (Edge Grading Detailed Report)
Verdict: As expected.
The first card we sent in was this 1993 Stadium Club Michael Jordan Beam Team. If you haven’t noticed, we’re big fans of Jordan cards at Only Greats, and this throwback is a perfect example of why: Jordan going for a trademark dunk crossed with the sweet ‘90s laser color scheme.
This card is far from perfect. On the raw card, we can clearly see pillowing on the surface, a few scratches, and the edges are far from crisp. At the end of the day, we fully expected a score right around an 8.
Curiously, the detailed report failed to pick up on a few surface issues on the front-bottom and back-bottom of the card that is clearly visible to the naked eye in the photos below. It’s a reminder that while technology is extremely useful in card grading, it’s far from perfect.
1997 Ultra Tracy RC McGrady Gold Medallion RC
What we expected: NM-MT 8 or better
What we got: Mint 9 (Edge Grading Detailed Report)
Verdict: As expected.
The second piece we submitted to Edge Grading is yet another sweet ‘90s basketball card: the 1997 Ultra Tracy McGrady Gold Medallion rookie card. To the naked eye, this card looks stellar, with McGrady’s throwback Raptors jersey a smooth contrast against the static background.
But here’s where the technology is helpful. Under the microscope, we see that the corner and edges are far from perfect. In fact, neither region scored higher than an 8, bringing the card’s overall score down to the anticipated 9, despite perfect centering and a lack of obvious surface issues.
2020 SC Chrome UEFA Lionel Messi Cup Holder’s Honour
What we expected: Mint 9 or better
What we got: Mint 9 (Edge Grading Detailed Report)
Verdict: As expected, but surprising at first.
This was a recent pack-pulled card, so it had the best shot of gemming — at least to the naked eye. As it would turn out, we were on track for an Ultra Mint — 10+ grades in surface, edges, and corners — until we got to centering. Unfortunately, the centering received a 9 grade, effectively cutting us out of Ultra Mint contention.
Harder to stomach, however, was the fact that the 9-centering grade dropped us out of Gem Mint, as well. At first, this would seem out of step with Edge’s own rubric: “Overall grades cannot be more than 1 grade higher than the lowest region grade. A card receiving a Corner grade of 7 would have a maximum overall grade of 8.”
However, centering is treated with a particularly technical scale, and this hurt the overall grade for this card. Edge Grading goes on to say that “The Centering grade is a ‘maximum possible’ measurement. A card with a Centering grade of 8 can have a maximum overall grade of 8.”
Given the front of the card can be no worse than 55/45 centering to achieve Gem Mint 10 or better, the Messi was cursed with 60/40 centering and at best, could only achieve a Mint 9 grade.
Ultimately, such a rigid grading scale may be suitable for collectors looking to ensure that their card is the cream of the crop. But for the poor submitter who comes perilously close to a Gem Mint or better, it’s rather cold comfort.
See Q&A below for more perspective on centering.
Q&A: Curtiss Patrick, Edge Grading Co-Founder
In addition to trying Edge Grading out for ourselves, we rang up the company’s co-founder Curtiss Patrick, to ask him about Edge and answer a few lingering questions we have about the process.
Does Edge Grading offer a card grading warranty (or plan to)?
CP: We would fully refund any fake card that was slabbed authentic or over/undergraded but have not yet put that in writing or had a situation like that arise…[it] will probably be something we put on the website very soon.
Warranties are crucial; not only do they provide peace of mind to the collector, but, as we wrote in our warranties guide, they’re just good business. Edge joins a small group of graders that offer warranties. Two top brands, BGS and SGC, currently do not provide a warranty for their graded cards.
Are there specific brands or card sets that Edge does not grade that are high risk? E.g. PMGs, Rubies, etc.
CP: There are no high risk sets currently that we don’t grade. Our only stipulations are based on year, size and thickness.
Is your A.I. grading capable of learning and adapting over time?
CP: It is a technical grading program and is not currently set up to adapt on its own. It will get better at the things it does and over time will need less and less human assistance during the grading process but that progress will be due to data input and model training as opposed to true “artificial intelligence.” As a side note, there are a number of centering cases (2024 Select Basketball Courtside, for example) where our human grader adjusts centering because the machine grading doesn’t yet consistently provide accurate centering measurements for a card that has no clear border on one or more sides.
This is an interesting admission by Edge Grading; if the technology improves after continued use, wouldn’t it make more sense for collectors to submit their cards later, once the grading technology has accumulated enough data inputs?
Another tidbit worth pointing out is the use of a human grader. This is nice for precisely the reasons we mentioned with the Jordan card above. While technology is excellent at capturing harder-to-find defects, human grading has been getting the job done, more or less pretty well, for years. Utilizing both seems like a no-brainer.
Do you have a population report accessible online (or plan to)?
CP: We do plan to but don’t currently have enough volume to make the population report very useful. Our data is stored with a future population report in mind.
Can you please clarify this verbiage about centering on your site?
“The Centering grade is a ‘maximum possible’ measurement. A card with a Centering grade of 8 can have a maximum overall grade of 8.“
CP: This means that if a centering grade on a card is 8 and corners, edges, and surface are all 10 the card will be an 8 overall because we consider centering so important to a card’s visual appeal that the overall score can never be higher than the centering score. If a card received a corners score of 8 and everything else was 10 or 10.5 the card would likely move into the 9 overall range.
More juicy behind-the-scenes details in Patrick’s answer here. For picky collectors who are especially concerned about centering, Edge Grading might be the place for you. I’m not sure I completely agree with centering’s emphasis, but it’s as fine a place to stake your claim as any.
What is the biggest challenge you have faced as a relatively recent entrant in the card grading industry?
CP: The biggest challenge for any grading company right now is the premium price that PSA-graded cards command on the market. Starting this business is an uphill climb against established patterns of collecting but we truly believe that there should be more transparency in grading so we’re rolling the dice to try to improve the industry. We’re hoping that over time companies like EDGE and TAG will show value to collectors by offering insights into grades and begin to move the industry towards a future where collectors can begin to understand the “why” behind every card’s grade.
It’s important to remember that Edge is still in its infancy. We love the direction the company is headed, and though the detailed report may not be perf it is already a step up from the complete zero that major graders have traditionally provided collectors. There’s only one way from here, and Edge is trending positively. It’s hard to find a cost-effective grader that also has a strong reputation. With time, Edge may well get there.
Is there anything else you’d like to add or share that is newsworthy?
CP: Of all of the feedback that we receive one of the most consistent comments is that our slabs look and feel amazing. We take a great deal of pride in the design and quality of our cases and labels. In our eyes, the look and feel of graded card slabs was something that desperately needed an overhaul. Again, we’re hoping that innovations from a new entrant in the market will help the industry move in the right direction.
Our Overall Opinion of Edge Grading
Solid choice, time will tell how they do in the long haul.
As Curtiss mentioned, the perceived value of slabs in the market is a major obstacle/challenge (not just for grading services, but for collectors).
Slab Design: A+
We’ve seen some pretty crummy slabs in our day, but Edge Grading isn’t among that bunch. These are great looking slabs; they’re sturdy and feel great in your hand. They don’t feel clunky, and have a nice thin profile and balance to them. Also crystal clear, and cards do not shift inside even though there is no inner sleeve around the card.
Take a closer look at the snazzy Edge slab by checking out our MJ Beam Team video reel below:
Grading Accuracy: B+
They’re not dishing Gem and Ultra Mints like candy — at least for the 3 cards we graded.
That said, some flaws appear to have been overlooked as with the MJ card surface. Since they were not depicted in the detailed report, we’re not sure if they were missed or considered unworthy of mention (to which we’d disagree even though overall grade was in line with expectations).
The Messi card being Ultra Mint in every way except centering is still a strange outcome as a Mint 9. Perhaps because the card doesn’t have defined borders, to me (or us) it has great eye appeal regardless and could be a gem.
Customer Service & Turnaround: A
Turnaround of our cards was quick, even though we had a snafu with our mailing address. Email responses were always timely (within hours, or at most within a day). Also a nice plus: they sent back our card savers, and even sleeved the slabs to prevent them from scratching.
Conclusion: is Edge Grading Right For You?
Edge Grading isn’t the first (nor likely the last) sports card grader to make use of advanced technology in assessing cards. But what truly makes the company stand out is its detailed reporting and transparency.
True to its word, Edge Grading does well to help collectors understand the grade a card earns. And though we often think of transparency as related to how a card receives a grade, it also extends to other areas as well, including response times and customer service, both of which Edge excels in.
If you do go with Edge, remember that they are sticklers about centering. Look no further than the Messi card we graded as a clear example of 10+ in every subgrade except centering and ending up with a 9 Mint. So if you’re rolling the dice for a 10, be sure to measure your card using a physical card centering tool or Edge’s online tool.
While Edge Grading may condemn a card to a mere Mint grade because of its centering issues, it’s possible another grader takes a slightly more lax approach, especially when given perfection in all other aspects.
If you like Edge Grading, let us know in the comments below. Also, be sure to drop your take on the future of AI and technology-first grading!
Thanks for trying us out. Love the in-depth review. I know we’ve told you before but that MJ is an absolutely beautiful card! We’d be interested to hear what readers think about the centering. We did a survey in early 2023 that helped shape our company beliefs and the importance of centering was a big part of that (along with the backs of cards having a lower influence on the final grade than the fronts).
Thanks for all your input and time, Curtiss. Yeah, the centering on the Messi card became a topic of conversation given the other exceptional subgrades it received. Perhaps we’ve been conditioned over the years with BGS handing out min gem 9.5s with a 9 subgrade for centering, or PSA allowing 60/40 for gems. That said, a true gem at BGS would be 55/45 according to their grading standards, and SGC also wants 55/45 as well for gems. If we do hear more about it from other readers, we’ll relay the comments to you guys. Great work all around though, we’re fans!