General Forum

Hey everyone...recently returned to card collecting after doing it as a kid.  I went to an estate sale this past weekend on a whim and just happened to run into a table of cards in the basement where I bought several complete sets at bargain basement prices.  Nothing fancy...just re-buying my childhood with a $6 pickup of a 1989 Topps complete set, $6 for the 1990 Topps set, $4 for the 1990 Bowman complete set, and $2 each for the 1989 AND 1990 Topps Traded sets!  Obviously these aren't worth anything, but what better use of a 20 dollar bill on a Saturday afternoon?  Plus I got to enjoy the expression on my wife's face when I came walking back to the car all loaded down with them!

So some basic questions that I'm sure have already been asked here a thousand times...I'd love to break all of these open and put them in the 9-card pages for display, especially so my son can enjoy them too.  Is Ultra Pro the best brand for that?  I'm not looking for anything investment grade here...just a way to keep the cards enjoyable so they're not in boxes in the corner.  Also, what is the best binder for these?  Can I put a full set worth of pages in one binder with some way to prevent the top and bottom pages from getting pulled forward and bent?  Finally, 792 cards in a base set plus 132 cards in a traded set equals 924 total cards.  To house them all, that requires 103 total pages.  I'm breaking the bank here buying a 100 pack of pages, plus some extras, plus the binder(s)!  Any advice you guys have would be appreciated...thanks in advance!

I'd reccomend Ultra Pro Platinum pages and a D-ring binder.  The D-ring helps the pages sit flat.  

Welcome back to the hobby. Ultra Pro or BCW are good choices. As with anything the more you buy the cheaper it gets. With the popularity of the hobby now it's harder to find good deals but they are out there still. Page lifters are good for the front and back of the albums to keep the cards from sliding. Office supply stores are your best bet for finding those but you may need to order online.

I like BCW platinum pages which can be bought on Amazon for about $16 or so for 100. I use the D ring, Avery 3 -ring binders from target. These are sturdy and pretty cheap. I'm a little weird so I also use penny sleeves (card sleeves) for any rookies or hall of famers before I put them in the binder

I use rembrandt pages, And they are awesome. If you look on Amazon you can get some good deals on D-ring binders

Not sure if you plan on reading the backs all the time, but for those sets, I'd save pages and put the cards back-to-back, fronts out, so you get 18 cards per page. And yes, a full base set and Traded set will fit in one binder, plus you'll have room for Glossy All-Stars and Glossy Rookies if you wanna go for those as well

I remember someone said that Amazon had their own brand of pages. Quality was supposed to be decent for a good price, but it is been a while since last time I bought 9 pocket pages.

They do, but I'ver seen and heard that a standard size card does not fit in the page properly. I think it was the top of each card that was exposed and not fully protecting it.

I use Ultra Pro Platinum pages and Avery 3-inch D-ring binders. The pages have become hard to find in large quantities since the pandemic began. But the good news from the pandemic is that the Avery binders have dropped by a dollar each in-store for the 3" binder. I guess the demand for those has dropped with so much online schooling these days. I just bought 2 of them for $8.99 each yesterday when they used to be $9.99 pre-pandemic.

As was mentioned above as well, I'd double the cards in pages too. Since they are pre-glossy cards, cards sticking together inside the pages wouldn't be a problem.

Thanks for all the information, guys.  One thing I forgot to ask in the original post - can the binders be stored on a shelf vertically (like books), or should they be horizontal (laying on their sides)?