By Michael Osacky for Kovels.com

I have received an influx of inquiries as of late from sellers looking to sell baseball cards that are not genuine. Many of these collections were picked up at yard or garage sales across the country in the past ten years. I don’t believe that these unsuspecting individuals know they are selling reprints. Some of these collections were purchased for hundreds or thousands of dollars.

I don’t want any more people getting ripped off. Therefore, I have listed a few tips on what to look out for as you try and find a vintage sports card bargain. Please print this and make sure to review it before purchasing cards. It will save you lots of money.

Tip #1: Turn the card over. Many reprints will actually use the word “reprint.” If you see the word reprint, understand that there is essentially no value here. If you buy the card even though you know it is a reprint, please do not try and pass it off as genuine to others. (Many card manufacturers use the word “archives,” which is yet another word for reprint.)

Tip #2: Is the information included on the card in past tense? For example, the most valuable baseball card is the T206 Honus Wagner. There have been millions of reprints made of this Holy Grail card. If you look at the reverse, does it say “value of $10,000,” and talk about Wagner in the past tense? If you truly have an original T206 Honus Wagner, it is worth much more than $10,000. Additionally, some cards talk about Wagner’s career numbers. Obviously, cards like that were printed well after Wagner retired from baseball.

Tip #3: When looking at a card that is 100 years old, I expect to see flaws such as discoloration, heavy creasing, rounded corners, print defects, and paper loss, to name a few. There are some mint cards from 100 years ago, but they are the small minority. For a small piece of paper like a baseball card to survive 100 years without any defects is very rare. If I see a very old card, I am looking for obvious flaws. If it looks too good to be true, it probably is.

If you have other tips, please feel free to comment below.

Do you have questions for me? Please email michael@baseballintheattic.com or call 312-379-9090 and your question may be featured in next month’s column.