1993 Action Packed Hall of Fame, #31 Bob Pettit

Placing it in Context: Just because a set doesn’t command a high price tag in the market doesn’t mean it’s not valuable. The 1993 Action Packed Hall of Fame basketball card set is a must have for all collectors who respect the history of the game. Complete sets can be found for under $20 and are worth picking up just to spend some time learning about the early years of the game. Plenty of players represented with a five-card subset dedicated to Larry Bird and another subset for Julius Erving.

All in all, these cards are very attractively designed! The cards are a valiant effort by Action Packed to produce something of high quality. They are thicker with rounded corners. The back is glossy and loaded with information. The front has sculptured, raised image of the pictured players with the rest of the full-bleed photograph in an attractive flat, matte finish. The gold foil is intelligently integrated into the cards with a strip marking the 25th anniversary of the Basketball Hall of Fame and a small amount for the company name and name of the player. The backs are also intelligently designed with a basketball court background, an abundance of information (bio, career highlights mentioning year of induction into the hall of fame, NBA stats) and touches of gold foil (player’s name and a thin dividing strip). The only design failure is the red and blue font for the “NBA Totals” and “Career Highlights”…such an attractive card would be better served by blending a dark brown, more gold foil, or even simple black text.

The Card: An attractive card for your collection that can be found for next to nothing! Bob Pettit, the 1954-55 Rookie of the Year and two-time MVP deserves more respect. And this image, showing him soaring over none other than Bill Russell, sure helps with that. When he retired, he was the NBA’s all-time scoring leader. Pick up this card on the cheap, and you’ll be glad to have Bob Pettit in your collection after reading the history on the back. Watch out for the ERROR though. His hometown is incorrectly spelled “Baton Rogue” instead of “Baton Rouge.”