The Official Beckett Price Guide to Basketball Cards 2004, 13th edition (Official Price Guide to Basketball Cards)

You will find that at 6.92 x 4.18 the size of this volume is below what we would have called standard size for collectible card price guides. This is of prime importance for collectors who want a book that we can take to us with card shows. If not, then you can still use this guide to put together your want lists. I am in the process of finishing off a 1971-72 Topps set of basketball cards (about two dozen to go), so I do not need to know how many types of LeBron James cards came out this year. I need to know what cards I am missing without having to pick up the NBA and ABA Checklists for that year and then copying my own list. A book is a lot harder to lose that a list anyway and dealing with the triplet cards Topps put out in 1980-81 is too much of a pain any other way.

That is why the boxes to check off for each card are exactly what I need, whether it is the exalted card from that 1980-81 set where the three players were the rookie "cards" for Magic Johnson and Larry Bird but also Dr. J. This is the book that will tell you that if you are looking for the first basketball card ever produced then you need to track down the 1948 Bowman card of Ernie Calverley. There are about two dozen card companies covered in the 50,000 cards for which prices are provided, which means Topps, Fleer, Hopps, Bowman, Sky Box, Ultra, Upper Deck and all the wannabee companies.

As is always the case with the Beckett volumes, there are tips on how to buy, sell, and care for your cards. These are valuable whether you are in it for the fun or the economics. The prices are always the least important aspect of these books for the simple reasons that the prices are out of date by the time the book hits the stands, which is why Beckett publishes a magazine on basketball cards. However, while that will give you current prices it will not tell you who was card #40 in that 1972-73 Topps set (Bob Rule of the Philadelphia 76ers). For the younger fans the magazine will undoubtedly suffice, but for those of us who remember the red, white & blue ball of the A.B.A. and when players in the N.B.A. knew how to shoot the orange ball instead of just dunking it, this Beckett book will fulfill all of our needs.