Sports Cards Collecting

By: Charles Oxford

Sports card collecting appeals to a wide variety of people from different age groups and backgrounds. These people collect for various reasons which range from the love of sports to monetary gain. The sports cards themselves have grown to represent most of the major sports including Nascar.

My first recollections of sports card collecting were in the early 50’s when baseball was a major part of my life. These were the good times when I looked on life as being simple with my greatest concerns being good grades in school and finding another pickup game of baseball to play in.

This was the era when a few extra pennies meant that I walked or rode my bicycle about a mile to the store below my house and purchased Topps baseball cards. It meant that they were separated into teams and put into a small toolbox that my father had made for me. I collected Yankee baseball and Mickey Mantle cards along with others until I graduated from high school and went off to college. This was the year that my cards were given to a younger boy in the neighborhood by my mother. To this day I still get a funny feeling when I walk into a store and see the new packs of sports and racing cards.

When these sports cards were first produced, they were used primarily as promotional items for products such as tobacco which was later replaced with bubble gum. By this time, the cards were taking over the focus more so than the products that they were advertising. Sports cards, to this day, are still used to draw attention to various products.

One sports collectable that some may not consider a sports card but has always been a fascination to me is the 1952 and 53 Dixie Cup lids. These were Dixie Cup ice cream lids with famous pictures under them and covered with a paper similar to wax paper for protection. The Dixie Cup company produce these picture lids from the early 30’s until the mid 50’s but the 2 afore mentioned years were the only ones that produced sports figure pictures.

After WWII major league players returned from the war and the paper stock was no loner need for the war effort, the first nation wide baseball card set was produced by the Bowman Gum Company of Philadelphia in 1948. Compared to the standards of today, these cards weren’t very much to look at and contained no color. The faces were black and white pictures of players. These contained not writing referring to the players name or position. The backs had writing but were kept very simple with some player information included. There was an advertisment at the bottom of the back. These were smaller than most of the cards produced at a later date. This was the first nationally issued set since the early 40’s.

These 48 Bowman cards were produced in two series and were printed in sheets of 36 cards. This was the size of the sheets that the factory could produce. This whole set contained a total of 48 cards and the twelve additonal cards were were substituted for 12 of the original cards printed on the first sheet. This resulted in short-prints of some of the cards from the original series.

Naturally, this first set since the war had an abundance of rookie and first time printed players. Included in these, were players such as Berra, Musial, Spahn, Sain, Henrich, and Rizzuto. Some of the popular and rookie players fell into the short-print group making their cards even more sought after.

Topps, probably the most know bubble gum and sportscard producer, came onto the scene in 1951 and along with Bowman were the only card producers until the early 80’s. Topps purchased Bowman in 1956 and was the only producer until this time. In the early 80’s Fleer and Donruss began producing sportscards. In 1989 Upper Deck, what I consider the supreme sports card maker, started production. These upper end cards went for a premium price and led the way for the later more expensive card lines.

Since the late 80’s and early 90’s the number of various sports card sets have increased considerably. Each of the 4 main card companies produced many sets in each sport category. Some produced under different labels such as Topps Stadium Club etc. Along with this increased production came a dilution of card values. Each producer also over produced the lines that they had.

Even though this lowering of values came along, it probably just did away with some of the inflation of prices due to hype and demand. Some felt that the newer cards didn’t carry their true value and were overpriced when they first came onto the scene anyway. Some of the new cards had inflated value that caused their prices to be as high as the true collectable older cards. There was no real reason for the new cards to carry the prices that people were asking.

No matter what the price, true or not, there a still a lot of people collect the sports cards for various reason. These people collect in different ways and concentrate on different areas of collecting.

One of the main areas of collecting is the individual player rookie cards. These cards may not necessarily be from the first year that a player plays in the major leagues but it is his first card produced within a set. Generally a player has a first card produced by several manufactures and may even be in some subsets. The number of each sets produced helps determine the value of the individual players card in that set. His card value is also affected by his statistics in his career, others expectations of him at the plate and how popular that he has become on his way to the major leagues. Some collectors lose money due to the fact that the player does not live up to his expectations. I have also seen other players card values change because of his life off of the playing field. In some cases, drug use by a player has greatly affected the value of his career and also his sports cards.

Another type of collecting is the area of special cards or insert cards added to the regular. This became popular in the mid to late 80’s and early 90’s. The insert cards can be special player cards from other sports. One of the first popular inserts that comes to mind was the Michael Jordan card in the Upper Deck packs. Signature cards are also a popular type of insert card. Most of these cards were produced in a limited number thus increasing their value due to lesser quantities. Sometimes redeemable cards are used that you can turn in for other products or cards. The practice of inserting older valuable cards into packs have been used.

Some individuals collect cards by buying and keeping unopened packs. This practice seemed to be more prevalent before the price inflation caused the values to drop. Unopened cases and boxes were kept as investments for the future. Some of these unopened cases were like gold. Some of their values were unbelievable.

Complete sets from certain years are very popular collectables. If Topps or one of the other manufacturers had a very good card for a certain year or the set contained a lot of good rookie cards the sets became more collectable and sought after. Some collectors only kept factory sets and others built sets from boxes and packs. Most ot those that built their own sets looked for the perfect card with the highest grade. Which of the sets, factory or hand built, has the greatest value is still debatable.

A card collector that collects for the enjoyment does it for many different reasons. Some collect cards of their favorite teams, players, regions, or sports. Whatever the reason for collecting, sports card collecting has in the past and still is a very popular and sometimes moneymaking hobbie.

About the Author:

Charles Oxford. Webmaster http://www.getawaycrafts.com

By: Triston Huntsmin

I have never been too keen on collecting things. I am sort of a simple guy at heart, so I love having only what I need. I have one running collection, however, that only seems to get bigger as the years go on. Sports cards. I really love gathering, trading and owning sports cards.

My love for sports cards began as a young child. My dad would reward me with sports cards when I did well at my chores or when I studied well for school. It was one of the only rewards he offered, and it quickly became the only reward that I was interested in. I remember the joy of buying my first binder to hold my sports cards in. I had saved my allowance for a couple of months and could finally buy the special sports cards holder that I had been looking at in the sports cards store.

As I got older, I phased in and out of looking for new sports cards, but I continually cherished my sports cards collections and I spent many hours of free time looking at them and memorizing everything I could about them. Some of my brothers and my friends made fun of me for loving my collection of sports cards so much, but I didn’t care. I collected cards from baseball and basketball players mostly, but I’ve got small collections of cards from a variety of players.

When I had my own children, I could hardly wait to begin sharing my love for sports cards with my sons. I bought them sports cards within a week of their births and I continued to start small collections of cards with them. As they have gotten older, they have truly started to love sports cards like I do. Some of our best times together and our best conversations are surrounding our collections. No one else seems to understand their value quite like we do.

Once a year I take my three sons to a huge exhibition that is focused solely on sports cards. We bring our big binders and we make purchases and trades all weekend long. It is our favorite weekend of the year. We have a great time together and I love that I have something in common with my sons. They love asking my advice about particular trades and purchases, and I love giving my advice to them about sports cards.

It is never too late to start a collection of sports cards. It is a fun hobby that will keep you entertained for years to come.

About the Author:

Triston Huntsmin is a father and a car dealer that loves to collect sports cards in his free time. See www.sportscardshub.info for more details.

By: Daniel Smith

We have all heard with heavy hearts the stories about how our great grandfather carried around a Honus Wagner Card in his back pocket until the corners wore off and his mother threw it away when she did the laundry, or how our father put a Mickey Mantle in the spokes of his bicycle wheel, just to hear it click as he sped down the street. The fact that a Honus Wagner recently sold for $600,000 makes you cringe at Great Grandpa’s carelessness and wonder just what you would have done with all that money, but in reality it should make you think about what you are doing to protect the Mickey Mantle and Honus Wagner cards of this generation.

There are certain players in any sport that command the world’s attention even before their rookie season begins. When a player of this caliber is about to begin their career in professional sports, people snap up their cards and try to keep them pristine. While this is a smart move, all sports cards should be carefully stored, because you never know what the future holds for any player. Even notoriety outside the playing field can generate interest in a player and make the value of their cards go up. Wouldn’t you hate to have your grandkids shaking their heads in disbelief because you let the Mickey Mantle of your day slip away?

Even if you don’t put your favorite sports cards in between the spokes of your bike wheels, improper storage of your cards will cause them to deteriorate over time and when cards deteriorate they go down in value. In today’s world, cards are much more than the prize you get with a stick of gum. Serious collectors consider sports cards to be an investment and it is important to protect your investment with proper storage.

Cards can be stored in one of two ways. They can be stored so that they are protected but still able to be viewed and enjoyed or they can be stored away archive style. Which way you choose to store your cards really depends on how often you are interested in looking at them and whether or not you want to take them out of their original packaging.

While the days of throwing your cards into a cardboard box are long gone, archive boxes are modeled after the shoeboxes of yesteryear. These special boxes are made to hold specific numbers of cards, ranging from 250 to 1000. Unlike traditional shoe boxes, these cases are sectioned off into compartments that are made to each hold a specific amount of cards or card packs. Whole unopened packs of cards can easily be stored in these boxes that keep dust and light away from your cards. These boxes are usually marked with the number of cards they can hold so that one glance at the box on the shelf should tell you how many cards a full box contains. If you don’t have enough cards to fill the box, you need to pack the cards you do have tight, using the foam jam pads that wedge into the empty spaces.

Another popular way to store cards is in plastic coverings. You can buy plastic cases for each individual card or you can buy binders that hold plastic sleeves which display several cards to a page. The plastic on these specially designed holders never contains PVC’s because as polyvinalchlorides break down they produce gases that can cause your cards to deteriorate. These plastic cases are also UV protected so that the sun can’t do damage to your cards. The biggest thing that these covers protect your cards from is you. The acids on your fingers can do more damage to your cards than you realize.

It doesn’t really matter which system you choose to protect your favorite sports cards, as long as you do something to protect them. Just make sure that as you make the effort to protect your cards, you take time to enjoy them as well. Great Grandpa may not have been the best keeper of his Honus Wagner, but you can be sure he enjoyed owning it.

About the Author:

Daniel Smith writes about Sports Cards and Team Logos

By: Morgan Hamilton

I have observed that the influence of credit card companies have now spread to nearly every aspect of human life. For instance, people who travel frequently can gain travel benefits by using special credit cards that are affiliated with hotel chains and airlines. Those who are generous enough to participate actively in charity work can use charity credit cards to make donations every time they make purchases. Credit cards have also infiltrated the world of sports in the form of sports credit cards. These cards allow sports fans to redeem points for game tickets, autographs, and sports based memorabilia purchases.

Are you a baseball fan? I think that the majority of people in the US are fans of this game. Anyway, baseball fans can now benefit from sports credit cards that are affiliated with every Major League Baseball team. These cards can allow you to earn reward points for every purchase you make using these credit cards. The points you save can then be exchanged for items that are of great interest to baseball fans. You can get game tickets, autographed baseballs, special baseball team gear and athletic wear as redemption rewards for the points you accumulate.

The influence of credit cards in the realm of sports is not limited to baseball enthusiasts because they also extend to other major sports. Those who follow the teams of the National Football League can also benefit from a line of sports credit cards that are meant for football fans. They can choose between team based and league wide credit cards that are affiliated with the NFL. Items affiliated with a particular team are included in the rewards for the points that are earned using team based sports credit cards. On the other hand, league wide sports credit cards allow users to redeem their rewards for a wider range of events in the place of team specific rewards.

Athletic events in college are more popular than professional athletics in many parts of the Unites States. College sports fans can benefit from getting sports credit cards that are associated with most major National Collegiate Athletics Association affiliated teams. Credit cards that are affiliated to collegiate sports events are usually issued by local banks.

Credit cards that are offered by professional sporting leagues can usually be obtained from national lending organizations. However, the perks and benefits of college affiliated sports credit cards are usually similar to those available from professional sports. The only difference is that a college sports fan can make a donation to colleges with each purchase using credit cards that are affiliated with college sports.

About the Author:

Morgan Hamilton offers expert advice and great tips regarding all aspects concerning Credit Cards. Get the information you are seeking now by visiting http://www.getqualitycreditcards.com/categories/sports-cards

By: Morgan Hamilton

Credit card companies are always looking for ways to make their credit card more attractive to the consumer so they chose it over someone else card. It is common knowledge that people love to showcase their feelings and like or dislike for things, it could be through a bumper sticker or on a t-shirt. The credit card companies realized this could just be a god way to attract people to their credit cards and thus they presented credit cards with a special look. Now people could showcase their feelings on their credit card, too. Sports credit cards are one of the best selling credit card simply because they showcase sports logos and themes which people are passionate about.

Sports credit cards come in a variety of styles. The images are printed on the card and every time the person uses their card the show support for their favorite sport or sports team. There are general sports credit cards like ones for Major League Baseball, the National Hockey League and the National Football League. Then there are cards for the individual sports teams, like the New York Yankees or Dallas Cowboys. Additionally there are sports credit cards for other sports like Nascar, hunting and even the American Quarter Horse Association. There is a card for almost every sport imaginable.

In addition to looking good many of these sports credit cards offer great reward programs. The NFL Extra Points card earns the cardholder rewards for every purchase they make. The rewards can be redeemed for NFL merchandise and even special football camps and events. Other cards like the NASCAR RacePoints card offers a special incentive along with rewards. Besides earning point rewards that can later be redeemed for a NASCAR experience a cardholder get a free NASCAR licensed chair after their first qualifying purchase. The Bass Pro Shops Outdoor Rewards card offer big rewards on merchandise bought at Bass Pro Shops along with other rewards for purchases made elsewhere. These are some examples of the many perks a person can get by using a sports credit card.

Sports credit cards do more than show off love of a sport. They offer many unique rewards to the cardholder. A person who is truly a big fan or simply just loves a certain sport will find the reward programs offered through sports credit cards may be the best reason to sign up for one.

About the Author:

Morgan Hamilton offers expert advice and great tips regarding all aspects concerning Credit Cards. Get the information you are seeking now by visiting http://www.find-cards-now.com/categories/sports-cards

By: Morgan Hamilton

Do you love to express your passion for sports? If you do, then you should consider getting sports credit cards. You see, credit card companies realized that sports could attract people to their credit cards. As a result, these companies decided to create sports credit cards that allow people to express their passion for sports.

You can now showcase your love for sports on your credit card. Sports credit cards have become one of the best selling credit cards because they showcase sports logos and themes which people are passionate about. These images are printed on the credit cards. You can show your support for your favorite sport or sports team every time you use your credit cards.

You can find a card for almost every sport imaginable. There are general sports credit cards like ones for Major League Baseball, the National Hockey League and the National Football League. You can also get credit cards for individual sports teams such as the New York Yankees or Dallas Cowboys. There are also sports credit cards that are dedicated to other sports like NASCAR, hunting and even the American Quarter Horse Association.

Some people sign up for sports credit cards because of the rewards they can get through reward programs. You can appreciate the unique rewards that sports credit card offer. For example, you earn rewards for every purchase you make with the NFL Extra Points card. You can also get NFL merchandise and tickets to special football camps as rewards.

You can also get the NASCAR Race Points card that offers a special incentive along with rewards. You will get a free NASCAR licensed chair after your first qualifying purchase and earn point rewards that can later be redeemed for a NASCAR experience. The Bass Pro Shops Outdoor Rewards card offer big rewards on merchandise purchased at Bass Pro Shops and other rewards for purchases made elsewhere. These are just some of the benefits that you can get by using sports credit cards.

About the Author:

Morgan Hamilton offers expert advice and great tips regarding all aspects concerning Credit Cards. Get the information you are seeking now by visiting http://www.getqualitycreditcards.com/categories/sports-cards

By: Adam McFarland

In recent years there have been discussions among collectors suggesting that the internet may actually be hurting the sports cards and collectibles hobby. They point to decreased card show attendance and the struggles of brick and mortar stores as evidence of the demise of the hobby. I am here to tell you that they are wrong. Not only was collecting not ruined by the internet, it was saved by it. That’s right, the internet saved sports collectibles. There is more money in the hobby now, consumers have more buying options, and it is easier to start a business than ever before. Those things are good for everyone involved.

The ‘Golden Age’ of Collecting

Within the last 15 years we have seen the sports cards and collectibles market fall from grace only to rise again to it’s current form. Most collectors and business owners over the age of 20 will point to the late 1980’s and early 1990’s as the best time to be a collector and the best time to be a dealer. Up until that point the sports card hobby had grown steadily from the 1970’s, when shops started popping up around the country, in to a $1.4 billion a year national pastime in 1992.

Card shows were packed with dealers selling top notch memorabilia, signature prices were still reasonable, no authentication was necessary because counterfeiting was minimal, and card shops were able to thrive with loyal customers who were begging to spend their excess cash in their stores week after week. And I don’t disagree with any of this – those truly were great times to be a collector. But factors out of collectors and dealers control would cause the ‘golden age’ of collecting to come to an end.

All Good Things Come to an End

As the US entered recession in the early 1990’s the hobby crashed. Couple economical problems with a hobby oversaturated with companies trying to capitalize on collectors by overproducing (and thus devaluing) their product, and we were left with a hobby on life support. Americans gravitated towards spending their money on other things and card sales plummeted to $400 million in 1999. Failure was inevitable and neither the collector nor the business owner could do anything about it.

The Rebirth of Collecting Online

Lucky for collectors, this little thing called the internet had grown from an information exchange for research, education, and government use into an economic juggernaut that pulled the country out of recession and into the age of eCommerce. Largely due to the advent of eBay, the hobby went virtual and hasn’t looked back since. In 2003, eBay alone sold $3 billion in cards – more than twice the sales of the entire industry at the peak of the ‘golden age’. In addition to eBay, other auction sites, trading forums, as well as fixed price web sites have sprouted up all over the internet. The amount of money in the hobby now is far greater than it ever has been.

Collecting is BETTER Because of the Internet

Not only did the internet save a dying hobby, it made it better. Consumers now have more choices. According to Beckett.com, 34% of collectors still buy in shops, 33.1 % from online auctions, 24.5% buy from online fixed price dealers, and the remaining through other methods. You can still go to a card shop or show (although their presence has been reduced), but the internet has enabled consumers to find what they are looking for easier and cheaper. The consumer is now able to become more educated in less time. In minutes they can compare prices from stores all across the world. They can join message board discussions and chat rooms with other collectors to exchange both information and memorabilia. The hobby can now reach everyone, not just those with a card shop or show nearby and some free time on a Saturday.

Counterfeiting a by Product of Success, Not the Internet

One potential downside to internet that a naysayer is quick to point out is the increase in counterfeit memorabilia. It has been estimated by the FBI that over half of all autographed memorabilia is forged. While this is bad for the hobby, it is not solely because of the internet, and it is not a problem faced solely by sports collectibles. Most other industries (music, movies, software, etc) that thrive on the internet are also subjected to counterfeiting. It is the nature of the beast. There will always be people looking to make money by cheating the system. As technology increases, it becomes easier and easier to create counterfeit memorabilia, as well as to counterfeit CD’s, DVD’s, and software. The best thing that we can do is educate our consumers and continue to develop measures against counterfeiting. Unfortunately, counterfeiting is a by product of the success the industry has had on the internet. The hobby was not brought to the internet by counterfeiters looking for an easier way to scam collectors, nor did the internet “cause” counterfeiting.

Where Would We be Without the Internet?

Back to those who would rather the internet never happened: where do you think the hobby would be today without the internet? It is illogical to think that it would have been able to boom without it. It likely would have continued to struggle. Instead it has flourished. To think that less information exchange, higher prices, and more difficulty finding items is good for the hobby is ludicrous. It seems that the only ones who are complaining are those who have failed to embrace the change. Those who have taken advantage of the many resources the web has to offer are certainly not complaining. The reality is that it the hobby is far bigger and better today than it ever was in the past.

Business is Good for Businesses Large and Small

From a business owner’s perspective, the market is better today than ever. There is significantly more money in the hobby today than there was in 1992 and it is much easier to start a business. All you really need to do is start posting auctions on eBay and you can grow from there – no store, no employees, not even a table at a show. Anyone can do it. The catch here is that it is drastically different than it was ten or fifteen years ago. And where there is change, there are always those who resist. Many who invested a great deal of time and money starting brick and mortar businesses during the ‘golden years’ only to see them collapse were not quick to embrace the internet. While I certainly feel bad for those who lost their business, I don’t correlate that to the internet being bad for the hobby. I can also point to all of those (myself included) who wouldn’t have even had a chance at entering the industry fifteen years ago, who now have had the possibility to live their passion because of what the internet has brought to the table.

Embrace the ‘New Golden Age’

Factors outside of our control caused the ‘golden age’ to end, but by adopting technology and using it to grow and expand the hobby we have introduced a new golden age – one that is better for both buyer and seller. Change in everything is inevitable. We should be embracing this new golden age of collecting as opposed to wishing it never happened.

About the Author:

Adam McFarland owns SportsLizard.com - an online marketplace for buying and selling sports collectibles http://www.sportslizard.com. Try our new search feature that enables you to search eBay, Amazon, and SportsLizard.com all at once to make sure that you get the best deal on what you are looking for!