PLEASE don't let your kids play with your US Mint products. (Or with this population...grandkids).

I have had a recent very good run of modern coins purchased raw from eBay...mostly. I have found that if you buy platinum eagles in original mint packaging....from MOST sellers....they will grade 70 or at least 69. My luck changed recently when I bought a 2004 $25 proof and a 2006 W $50 burnished, from two different non-dealer sellers. In both cases the photos were distant and slightly blurry. However, they were in their capsules and proudly sitting in their little blue mint packages. The prices were lower than I would get for graded 69s, how could I lose? Well, the 2006 was obviously cleaned, maybe with a Brillo pad, and the 2004 looked like it was dropped and kicked across a carpet. I sent the 2004 in, because those are damn hard to find, and it was generously given a PF67...now THE lowball coin of it's type. (See pic). My question is, why would anybody ever remove these coins from their capsules? Maybe it's just those darn kids out there!

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