1997 Finest Baseball Forum

Apologies if this has been covered already. I have some of these cards to submit scans for. Mine still have the protective film on the front. I’ve noticed most of the scans do not have this. Is there an issue submitting scans with the film on? I don’t really want to try and remove 20 year old film. 

It is acceptable to scan the cards with the film still on them. I'm with you that I don't remove the film. I didn't back then and I won't do it now.

FYI, I removed the film from #10 Bagwell, 41 Nomar, and 66 Larkin just recently with no problem, but I understand the precaution. As to your question: I prefer a clean scan without the film, but have no problem with someone adding it to the system especially since it's meeting a need on the database AND they're the ones doing the scanning.

I think either way is fine. I used to peel them when I was younger, but now I just leave them.

At this point, if they're about 20 years old (or more) and don't have a scan on here, either way is acceptable. I do think hat it is preferred to not have the film. I know in some of our player collections, we got two of the lesser priced cards to keep one with the peel and to peel the other one. If they don't have scans when I get to them, I'll be added the peeled versions.

There were some that had a huge sticker that said something like "Remove protective coating" and there were the "mystery" Finest cards with a black opaque covering to hide who the card actually was. Those should NOT be scanned with the peels on - ever. (This should go without saying, but I think I've seen a couple of the big stickers in the system.)

COMPLETELY agree with you about the "Mystery" cards. But without peeling them, how would anyone know what card they have? Someone shouldn't add scans of a card that they don't know what they have. Those Mystery cards ARE ones I would peel and have done it. The McGwire/Bagwell in 1998 has my scans. I couldn't resist not knowing and I'm glad I did peel it b/c it was a PC card! BTW, that was peeled only a couple of years ago fresh from a pack from a hobby box.

I still don't remove the see-through "protective" films on Finest cards though (or the NASCAR Precision Metal cards that also have that film). I'm not concerned that peeling it will damage the surfaces, but it's there to protect them from other things that may damage the surface. It seems like a nice barrier to me to just leave the film there.

vrooomed wrote:

At this point, if they're about 20 years old (or more) and don't have a scan on here, either way is acceptable. I do think hat it is preferred to not have the film. I know in some of our player collections, we got two of the lesser priced cards to keep one with the peel and to peel the other one. If they don't have scans when I get to them, I'll be added the peeled versions.

There were some that had a huge sticker that said something like "Remove protective coating" and there were the "mystery" Finest cards with a black opaque covering to hide who the card actually was. Those should NOT be scanned with the peels on - ever. (This should go without saying, but I think I've seen a couple of the big stickers in the system.)

Those Presicion Steel cards will peel themselves with enough handling.

I am one of those people who wants both versions. I am sure nobody has noticed, but there are no Finest cards on my tradelist from 1994-95 through 1999-00. That's because I am setting aside any duplicates I get so I can have one peeled and one unpeeled.

If you treat the cards right they are fine unpeeled. I have seen some, and have some that I got second-or third hand that are in really poor shape. I have no idea what the people did to them before I got them but I can't figure any way they could get that way with normal sorting/handling.