Two things to note:
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A PSA 10 with significant damage is a mistake. Mistakes happened back then and they happen today, they happen with PSA, CGC, BGS, PFM grading, etc. We can discuss whether these mistakes are more or less common between eras and companies but ultimately there’s no real way to know.
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The thing that’s always left out of these conversations is what I’ll call card “stickiness”. When a card is bought, there’s a chance the same copy will end up on the market again within 3 years. So in this context, a “sticky” card ends up in a collection for a longer amount of time - or even indefinitely. Here’s the speculative part: a misgraded card is far less sticky than an accurately graded card. If you actually care about condition, you’re far more likely to sell off a misgraded 10 to get a better copy. Over time, the least stickiest cards are disproportionately represented on the market. In other words, the oldest certs you see for sale are biased towards cards that are more likely to be resold.
Just something to think about