Freezing Baseball Card Test

I bought a box of 1994 Pinnacle baseball. Problem with buying wax boxes from that year to middle 2000s now is the UV coating on the cards will cause the cards to "brick" and stick together. You have to be careful on pulling the card off or you will end up with paper loss. First two packs have significant paper loss and the loss is down the middle of the cards. Since I been hearing freezing the cards might work I decide test that theory. I decide do it two ways hoping for different results. I opened three packs, puts the cards in ziplock bag and put in the freezer. Then I put three unopen packs in the freezer. I left them in for three hours.

First with the cards in ziplock bag. The cards are still stuck after I took it out. To get them unstuck I put the cards on palm of my hand then palm press strike it with my other. Often it works but you still have few cards that are stuck together. For those few cards that are still being stuck you have to be careful peeling or bend it lightly. The results look like this:

Small amount of paper loss on Brian McRae card. Wade Boggs look almost clean with little paper loss while Chuck Finley have it down the middle.

Jimmy Key barely have paper loss in the front while the back have noticeable loss after being stuck on Finley's card. Dwight Smith have noticeable loss. Front of Billy Wagner is clean while back of his card does show paper loss.

Those three cards are clean on front and back.

Armando Reynoso card is clean front and back. Back of Jerald Clark card is clean while good amount of paper loss on front of the card. Same with Chad Krueter on both front and back.

Wayne Kirby got paper loss on both front and back. Scott Fletcher back also have paper loss but is clean on the front as he was top card of the pack.

You can tell the paper loss on those cards. Devereaux and Alexander got on both sides of the cards.

Henke got small amount while Stottlemyre got it down to the middle. Back of Christman have loss being stuck on Stottlemyre but is clean on the front.

Four of those cards are clean on the front and back

Back to paper loss with the four cards. Horn got it on the front while the back is clean. Montgomery was top card of the card so the front is clean than the back of his card.

Biggio and Justice got the worse of it on paper loss. Both sides of Bonilla's card have small loss as well Tapani.

Snow got snow on his card while Perez got on the back but is clean on the front.Nilsson and Buechele cards got no paper loss.

No loss on Martin and Frey cards. Back of Beck's card is clean while the front got snowy paper loss.

Back to paper loss with Hoiles who got it bad along with Mack and back of Hulse's card. On this batch about 12 out of 42 cards have no paper loss. Few have clean fronts but some loss on the back.

Now time for unopen packs test.

Not much paper loss on all the cards. Tartabull is almost clean. You have to feel the card to notice there is paper loss but not much.

Tomlin card does have paper loss. Back of Billy Wagner card does show some but the front is clean. Ruffcorn card is clean on front and back.

Three of the cards are clean front and back. By this time I notice the collation starting to suck.

The cards have noticeable paper loss on front and back. Shoot it ruined Ken Griffey Jr card.

Not bad on the second pack. Small specks of paper loss shown on the cards.

Cooper showing specks of paper loss while remaining cards are cleans. Back of Pena card did have small amount paper loss from being stuck on Cooper's card.

King and Castellano cards are clean on both sides with cards going back to paper loss. DiSarcina back is clean but did have it on the front. Banks have it on both sides of his card.

Last two cards of the second pack showing amount of paper loss in the middle. Perez have it on both sides while Surhoff on the back.

On the final pack these four showing small amount of paper loss.

Paper loss showing right by Mitchell's name. Mike Moore back showing paper loss from being stuck on Mitchell while the front is clean. Manny and Charlton cards are clean on both sides.

Dave Magadan card is clean on both sides then back to paper loss with following two cards. It's noticeable on front of Smiley's and back of Lofton's cards.

Final two cards showing loss as well. Like cards in the ziplock bag about four of them will most likely be clean on front and back of the cards.

From my freezing experiment its a mixed result but freezing unopen packs seems to have less paper loss than loose ones. Also I notice there's fewer amount of the paper loss from the cards on back of the pack. It's the card on front of the pack you have deal with good amount of paper loss. Maybe I should have rotate cards from time to time. For packs of this Pinnacle set its the middle of the pack you have good opportunity on cards not having paper loss.

So far freezing theory does work often, but its still a crap shoot. You still have to smack the pack and/or bend it lightly to loosen even after its been in the freezer for hours. I got few more packs and going to test it again based on how long being left in the freezer to rotating it.