Collect Your Favorite Athlete: How to Start a Player Collection of Sports Cards

When it comes to sports card collectors, there are many different types. There are collectors who collect sets, brands, their favorite team, or a sport. One of the most common collectors, however, is the player collector. Having a player collection can be a great opportunity to truly set out on a collecting goal to try and get every card that has been made featuring that player. A lot of collectors have collections like this already, but they don't really know how to find out if they have a complete collection or not. Starting a player collection of your favorite athlete is easier than most people think.

First of all, pick a player that is one of your favorites. Make sure it is someone that you can realistically collect if you want to try and complete the entire player collection. For example, someone with only a few dollars to spend on cards each week or month shouldn't pick an all-star player whose nicer cards can sell for hundreds of dollars. Picking minor stars or lesser known players is always a good choice for collectors on a tight budget. Players from the 1980s and early 1990s are also good choices because the cards from that time period can be found for relatively inexpensive.

After picking your player, head over to http://www.beckett.com. Beckett is the source behind pretty much everything about sports card collecting including the price guides. At Beckett.com, there is a feature called My Collection. You will have to register with the site to do this. Registering is free. In My Collection set up a collection for your player. Once in the collection you have just created, do a search for your player. A checklist of cards will pop-up on the screen. This checklist lists every card ever made of that player. At this point, you can decide for sure whether or not you think collecting this player is plausible as some players may only have 50 cards to collect while others may have thousands.

Once you have found the checklist, you can begin looking for the cards you need. Try to get all of the regular base cards of your player first as these are the least expensive and easiest to get. After getting some of the base cards, then you can try to get inserts, game used memorabilia cards and autographs if such cards exist of your player. You can also collect random memorabilia of your favorite player for your collection such as figures or posters.