Sports Cards--Bicycle Spokes Beware!

A Slice of Sports Heaven

A sacrilege or an ingenious marketing ploy? Either way, it's one of the newest and hottest innovations unveiled by Upper Deck.

The card in question is the game-used souvenir card, first introduced in 1996 with Upper Deck's "Game Jersey" cards in football. The card combines a picture of the player with a game-used item: a jersey swatch, bat shaving or a sliver of a football, hockey puck, basketball sneakers and even the automotive gasket head from a race-used engine. The company stirred quite a furor among traditionalists when it chopped up a Babe Ruth-used bat. Some felt it was akin to destroying a monument to an American hero, while supporters claim it is the only way for people of unremarkable means to obtain a piece of history.