Thursday, June 28, 2007

How To Keep Sports Cards In Top Condition

Collecting basketball cards can be fun but can be difficult. When you collect basketball cards, you can collect your favorite players and much more. However, getting the card is only half the trouble. If you do pull the card of your wanting, you will still have the trouble of seeing whether the card will be in good condition or not. Card grades and conditioning is very important because people only want the best. Having a card of someone good if nothing if the card is not in good condition. When collecting you should control what you can, how good the card stays in it's current condition.

When keeping your cards, be sure to:

1) Open the pack carefully: When you open the pack of cards, you can possibly damage the cards inside by the way you hold it and by how you place the cards. You can do this correctly by holding the pack of cards with two hands and by clearing space to place your cards. YOu should hold the card near the sides, but not on the corner.

2) Placement: When you have your cards in your hand, you have to put the cards in a safe location. You can do this by buying a container, closet or safe which can prevent people from going through them, prevent water and much more. You should also place the cards in small piles so that not too much pressure is placed on one card.

3) Protect: When you pull a card that you think is valuable or you want to save in top condition, you have to keep the card in a holder. You can place the card in a sleeve, which is a thin sheet that is shaped for the card to be placed in. This protects the card a little but not from hard and heavy material. Next, you should place the card in a holder that is harder and can also contain the card and the sleeve that is protecting it. Next you should then place the things by order. You should place cards of the same set together, place rookie cards together, holders and more so that the same things can support one another. If you have a valuable card that you want to showcase to others, you should then place the card in a snappie, which is a very harder glass container that holds that card so that it is crystal clear. You can also use identifications, such as tags and stickors that will help you identify where a particular card is.

4) Organize: When you have a lot of cards, you may want to buy small plastic boxes that you can order and place things together. This way cards are separated and are not messy. You will be able to manage your cards better and look at them when you want to. You can also place cards in small plastic bags, zip lock bags that can effectively hold the card.

5) Don't be haste: When you protect your cards, remember that you should not be too quick but to be careful when handling everything.

6) Clean: At times, you may want to clean off dirt and more than fall onto your cards over the course of time.

7) Fix: If you are able to, you can fix up your card only to a slight degree. You can reshape the corners a little if they are dented, you can wipe away an autograph mark that is stray. However, when you are doing this, you run the chance of further damaging your card. To further answer this, when you make a decision about whether or not you want to fix up your card, you must think about the risks.

Collecting card is something that is fun, interactive and interesting but isn't if we let our collections go to waste. We have to make the needed preparations to keep our collection a thing to look at.

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