The Best Way to Carry Your Cards When Getting Autographs

With spring in bloom, you’re planning a trip to the ballpark. You will arrive early for the best chance to graph the players upon their arrival or during warm-ups. You’ve sifted through your card collection, setting aside players for both teams. You’ve prepped your cards. Your Sharpie is flowing well.

There’s just one problem.

During the last trip to the park, you missed a couple players because you couldn’t flip through your stack in time to find their cards. Oh, and there was that incident last year when someone bumped you, spilling your cards to the ground. Picking the peanut shells off wasn’t much fun.

So, how do you carry your cards securely while still allowing quick access at a moment’s notice? It’s easy with a couple inexpensive items from an art supply store.

What you’ll need:
Wire-bound artist pad (9”x12”, 140 lb.)
Acid-free self-adhesive photo corners

Step 1: Place a self-adhesive photo corner on each corner of your card.

Step 2: Affix the card to the artist pad. (You should be able to fit eight cards on each side of a page.)

Repeat these steps for all your cards. (NOTE: The photo corners do not damage your cards and they are simple to remove.)

A sketchbook with photo corners to hold your cardsThere are many ways to organize your pad—one page per player, alphabetically, by team. It’s up to you to decide what works for your collection and the file retrieval process in your head.

If you use this method, leave a comment and let me know how it works for you. If you use a different technique, share it with us.

Matt Raymond

is the founder of Autograph University. He lives in the Boston area with his wife and two sons. Connect with him on Twitter at @mattraymond.

28 Responses

  1. cubsfan731 says:

    I’m going to a MiLB game this summer, and I have a ton of cards. This answered the one question I had. Thanks!

  2. Travis says:

    The only thing I would suggest would be to use only two photocorners per card instead of four. I usually put photocorners in the lower right and upper left corners of the card, and it secures the card well and is easier to get cards in and out when you replace cards. Also you will only need half as many photocorners so it will be a little cheaper.

  3. Garrett says:

    Matt,
    I have been using this method for about 3 seasons now, and it works great. i use 2 photo corners, but it is a great way to maximize your graphs

  4. Paul Buxton says:

    I’ve used the photo corner method for awhile (2 corners per card, 4 corners per 3×5 or 4×6), though I have employed a more hybrid approach. I take normal cardstock pages and set them up as illustrated above, then 3-hole punch them and put them into a binder. This allows me to easily switch pages around and also include other items (8x10s, magazines) in regular plastic sleeves within the same binder.

  5. Dustin says:

    FINALLY!!!! I have been looking for something like this forever. I have seen people with these setups, but no one was wiling to share the details.

    thank you for posting this up.

  6. Alex says:

    I like to use the pads with the wire binding on the top of the pad. If you have say the wires down the left side & get a player who is a lefty sometimes you’ll get a sub-par graph or the player might skip the first card all together if you have multiples.

  7. Bryce says:

    Thanks guys love this article how would i store baseballs while graphing?
    Thanks

  8. Clay says:

    What do you use to carry photos? I see people using plain black boxes but I don’t know where to find them

  9. Joey Lipkus says:

    I use a different method that really let’s you maximize your experience. I use two photo corners per card on a 9 pocket page which lets you put 9 cards per sheet.

  10. MLB_Fan says:

    The two items listed to purchase through Amazon did not work for me. I found the cards were getting damaged on the corners by the photo corners. Also when carrying the book the cards fell out. This method did not work for me. I am going to try trading card sheets as that worked for me in my youth.

  11. Bob says:

    I use a different variation of this method, I use a sketchbook that hold 3 cards per page and I find that more manageable than the 9×12 artist’s pad

  12. Brady Hamilton says:

    Hey Matt, I happened to make one of these about a month ago. Right now I only have a team set for the Cleveland Indians. Do you know a way that I can get other teams and players too?

  13. Michael says:

    Any tricks to remove the cards from this setup without bending their corners (other than just “very carefully”)? I’ve managed to get most of my cards out damage-free by peeling one of the (two) photo corners off slowly, but sometimes it’s tough to do without lifting on the card, so every now and then I’ll bend one. Anyone else have this happen? (To clarify, the system seems great; I just want to know if I’m doing something wrong.)

  14. Taylor Lowe says:

    Do they make the paper for binders ?

  15. Luke Bowers says:

    Hey, Matt! Just stumbled apron your article and found this so very helpful. Been trying to find a wya to fix this ongoing problem for years and finally found a way. Thanks for being a lifesaver in the card/autograph business,

  1. August 22, 2011

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  2. December 15, 2011

    […] Here is a step-by-step guide for what Blake_2010 recommends (which I agree with)–hope it helps: The best way to carry your cards when getting autographs Autograph University – Tips, insights and resources for autograph collectors. Twitter: […]

  3. July 2, 2012

    […] Here is a blog post that offers more detail on the method peterfox16 describes: The best way to carry your cards when getting autographs Autograph University – Tips, insights and resources for autograph collectors. Twitter: […]

  4. September 29, 2018

    […] How do you carry cards? I see a lot of collectors using a flipbook with multiple cards on each page. The Best Way to Carry Your Cards When Getting Autographs […]

  5. March 26, 2019

    […] one and slips it onto the bottom of the pack. I wish I’d known about the current method of using photo corners and a notebook although I’m not sure how I’d like the bulk of carrying the […]

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