The concept of a ‘type collection’ (also called a type set) comes from the hobby of coin collecting. The idea of a type set is to collect one example from every different set that exists, within the given parameters. When applied to basketball cards, this means that the goal is to collect one card from every different basketball card set. For us, this includes multi-sport sets and non-sport sets which include at least one basketball card.

These questions seem simple but there is surprisingly little alignment amongst hobby enthusiasts, so we won’t aim to give a universal definition for either, but here’s how these are defined for the purpose of this specific website;

A ‘basketball card’ is a two-dimensional collectible object depicting the sport of basketball or depictions of specific basketball athletes. Most commonly, cards are printed on thick paper-based material cut in a rectangular shape, but ‘cards’ also include items like collectible stickers, collectible discs, felts and other printed materials and shapes.

To qualify as a ‘basketball card’, it must also belong to a ‘set’. A ‘set’ refers to the entire collection of a series of cards from a particular brand and a particular year, such as “1969 Topps” or “1988 Panini”. More often than not, these sets assign numbers to the individual cards in order to help collectors identify and organize them.

In the case of this website, we are not just interested in sets that contain exclusively basketball cards, but also multi-sport sets (meaning sets that may include a mix of sports other than basketball) or even non-sport card sets (such as Garbage Pail Kids cards) that just happen to contain one or more basketball cards.

Here’s a more general list of definitions of other card-collecting terms (i.e. ‘checklist’, ‘insert’, and ‘parallel’ for those who are newer to the hobby or looking to sharpen-up their hobby vocab!

• Anything produced after 1990 (read below FAQ for more info on why this is the case).

• Any team-specific sets. These are often too regionally distributed and there are just too many of them. There’s exceptions though, including Harlem Globetrotter sets, and anything distributed by a food/beverage company up until 1980.

• Anything larger than the dimensions of 6” x 8”. Beyond this we count as a poster rather than a card.

• Postage stamps. There’s plenty of cool ones, but stamp collecting is its own hobby!

• Post cards, with the notable exception of collectible series of post cards.

• Un-licensed sets. Lots of these popped up in the late 1980’s - 1990.

• Any one-off cards or stickers. Everything must be part of a collectible ‘set’ to be included.

A few reasons. First off, basketball was invented in 1891, so 1990 marks the first 100 years of the existence of basketball as a sport! Secondly, cards produced after 1990 tend to already be much more well documented than older cards, so there is less of a need in the hobby to track down information about these. Lastly, after 1990, the trading card market expanded really quickly, so there are honestly just too many sets to keep track of.

There’s tons of beautiful basketball cards from all around the world which deserve to be more of a part of the mainstream collecting conversation than they currently are. Lots of fans in the United States assume the sport didn’t have much of a following outside of the country until relatively recently, but this collection proves that basketball has been a global pastime since shortly after it was invented.

It’s such a fun challenge to track down basketball cards from around the globe, since so many of these sets have very limited documentation and they can be hard to acquire via the usual websites like eBay. The act of discovering these cards often leads to other fascinating learnings and connections with collectors from other parts of the world.

Based in California, I’m passionate collector of basketball cards by night, designer by day! This project has been a labor of love which has taken years to chip away at. If this site was a helpful and interesting resource for you, please consider supporting in whatever way possible!

Lottttts and lots of online research. Many of the cards depicted on this site come from international card sets and oddball card sets that are very hard to discover in the first place, and then often even harder to acquire. The fun thing is that one discovery often leads to the next!

For instance, one international eBay seller may have a store that has other cards you may be looking for. Or finding a quality blog post from another collector can help to fill in a lot of gaps in the knowledge about these sets. This website does its best to curate and streamline all of this research into one place, and also provides links to many of the external resources that were instrumental in building the collection.

There are definitely a few resources that came in handy most frequently which I’m especially grateful for, including the Trading Card Database (TCDB), Blowout Card Forums, VintageBasketball, Pre-War Cards, and Cardboard Connection.

The examples depicted in the type collection are not for sale, however we do operate a small eBay store under the name basketballcardmuseum where you can purchase some other examples of the sets from our collection!

Reach out via the contact page, this is very helpful! Please include specific details about the set you are referencing and which element is missing or needs correction, such as the year, country of origin, or the additional resources.

1. If you have knowledge about a set that is missing, please let us know! Please reach out via the contact page.

2. If you have a card that you are willing to donate which is missing from the type set, then please reach out via the contact page with a picture of the card and I’ll send you a mailing address. You’ll get a shout-out on the card’s page for your contribution! For higher-end cards we can also discuss finding a place on the list of sponsors on the home page of the site.

3. If you have a card that is missing from our type set that you are looking to sell rather than donate, then feel free to send us a link! High-end cards are out of reach for our budget unfortunately.

If you’re interested please just reach out via the contact page!

Any financial contributions will go towards collecting additional cards to add to the archive. If you want to donate a card that is missing from our type set, this may also qualify you for a sponsorship spot!