Like many collectors, Buzz is a fan of grading ... so here's this month's grading diary.

TOOK ME LONG ENOUGH ...
The Mag: Taylor Swift & Travis Kelce -- Mad No 36 (April 2024)
The Reason Graded: With the Grammys set for tonight (Feb. 1), I figured now would be the time to drop one here for the Swifties -- a magazine that I picked off long, long ago with absolute intent to grade but never got around to it until late last year. This duo sold a lot of magazines in the last couple of years but this one was one of few to present itself in a way that would fit in my collection of slabs -- it's one part sports (he's in uniform) and one part comics/satire, a category where I have a few slabs. These were popular -- so much so there was at least a second printing with a green logo -- but actually finding the long-running but off-and-on-title would be a challenge at arrival. Book stores/newsstands? Probably not. Comics shops? Maybe ... but probably not a big priority for many of them. The original Mad ran from 1952 to 2018 before DC Comics took over after a couple months off that year and it's largely been new covers wrapping mostly favorite reprinted stories from the past with occasional new content.
The Grade: CGC 9.6 (Universal)

Reality Check: These mags are super thin and the cover paper is, too. How skinny? The spines of new copies have texture all the way down from the folding -- I suspect they will be the huge problem spots if you find these un-graded with an eye for slabbing. Mine has that -- as do some 9.8s I looked at before slabbing -- so mine probably had one other small issue to kick it down a notch. That was a bummer -- and my latest mags submission didn't have a single 9.8 in it, which was odd -- but I was grading this no matter what as a time capsule kind of slab from the last few years.

Keep reading for more of this month's pick-ups and new slabs for Buzz.

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Ozzy Osbourne's first certified auto was a redemption in his TV show's Inkworks card set.

What's Buzzing: Collectors react to the Ozzy Osbourne news, The National nears, talking Ichiro Suzuki cards and more.

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1 -- Collectors react to the death of heavy metal icon Ozzy Osbourne

2 -- The National nears

3 -- Talking Ichiro Suzuki cards

4 -- Pondering a David Wright purchase

5 -- The future of sticker autographs?

6 -- Reactions to an alleged autograph forgery ring

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Have you spotted a hot thread? Tell us about it in a comment or on Twitter.

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A collection of postcards, lyrics, notes and more from the early days of legendary and pioneering heavy metal band Black Sabbath will be hitting the auction block late next month via a Sheffield-based auction house in the United Kingdom.

Among the pieces going up for sale are hand-written postcards from Ozzy Osbourne to his parents, which are signed with his legal name, John, as well as lyrics, posters and flyers from when the band was briefly known as "Earth" and then after it adopted its name inspired by a Boris Karloff film.

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