The Proper Care Of Sports Cards
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
http://www.teamlogoandgear.com
Back to Index of All Sports Articles
Find More Sports Related Information:
Index of all Baseball Articles
