Three More Great Uses for Playmat Topload Holders

By Sal Barry

BCW’s Spectrum Playmat Topload Holders are a great way to display your favorite gaming playmats and protect them when going to your next CCG tournament. But don’t let the name fool you; these may be “playmat” toploaders for gamers, but sports collectors will find these useful, too. Here are three ways I use the Playmat Topload Holders to protect some of my sports memorabilia.

Newspaper Posters

Back in the day, newspapers would frequently issue full-color posters of popular athletes, usually as a pull-out in the Sunday edition. While newspapers are not as ubiquitous as they once were, they sometimes issue a commemorative poster inside or feature a poster on the front or back page if one of the local pro teams wins a championship.

Unfortunately, these posters are a challenge to keep in great condition because they are usually printed on the same flimsy newsprint paper used for the newspaper itself. Newspapers are also an awkward size. During the mid-1990s, I collected a full team set of Chicago Bulls posters issued by the Chicago Tribune newspaper. I managed to keep these posters flat for the past 30 years by storing them between posterboard. It wasn’t a great solution, but it got the job done until I could find a better way.

Fast forward to now, and I found that better way. A Playmat Topload Holder is perfect for a newsprint poster. This toploader measures 24” tall by 14” wide, while a typical “broadsheet-sized” newspaper page measures 22” tall by 13.5” wide, so there’s a bit of wiggle room.

Plus, a Playmat Topload Holder opens along the long edge, so you can easily slide a newsprint poster into it. This would be a lot more challenging to do if you used a similarly sized toploader that opened along the top edge, since newsprint paper doesn’t have the same rigidity as other papers.

Sports Card Break Mats

It seems kind of obvious, but a toploader that can store and protect a CCG playmat can do the same for a sports card break mat. Both types of mats are usually 24” wide by 14” tall, about 1/8” or so thick, and have a non-slip rubber backing. Over time, you may end up accumulating quite a few break mats, as they are popular giveaways, and decide that you want to “retire” your oldest mat from duty.

And why not? Players change teams or retire. Teams change their logos or relocate. One day, your break mat will look a little dated – especially if it pictures players who have since retired – and you may decide you want to keep it as a collectible and use a newer one instead.

A Playmat Topload Holder will protect a break mat that you want to put away – or put on display. It will keep it nice and flat and keep the corners from curling. The holder is made of archival-safe PVC and will not compromise the condition or colors printed on the mat.

Uncut Sheets of Sports Cards

Uncut sheets of sports trading cards are another tough item to store because they come in all sorts of odd sizes. Now, a standard 132-card sheet of Topps trading cards usually measures 28.5” by 43”, and BCW makes a large toploader for that.

That’s great! But what about smaller uncut sheets of cards? Those are all different sizes, and usually don’t conform to a standard toploader sizes, such as 11” by 17” or 18” by 24”. So, for smaller, team-issued sets, you again might want to try using a Playmat Topload Holder.

Assuming the cards in the set are the standard 2-1/2” wide by 3-1/2” tall, a Playmat Topload Holder can store a sheet of 30 to 36 cards. It can also work well for uncut sheets of oddball-sized card sets. The 1987-88 Calgary Flames team set you see above has 30 cards that are slightly larger than standard size, but the Playmat Topload Holder fits it like a glove.

What other oversized or odd-shaped items do you store in a Playmat Topload Holder? Leave a comment and let us know.

Sal Barry is the editor of the hockey collectibles site Puck Junk and the host of the Puck Junk Podcast. Email him at [email protected] and follow him on X/Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube.