CONSUMER GUIDE OFFICIAL BASEBALL CARD PRICE GUIDE 1992, Signet Sports, 576 pages, $5.99.

It’s called the official baseball card price guide, but nowhere in the book does it explain who certified it “official” or what makes this particular baseball card guide more official than others.

Its title notwithstanding, this Consumer Guide publication is a good reference source for serious and beginner card collectors alike.

The one big drawback to this guide, and all others that are published in book form as opposed to periodicals, is their timeliness.

These novel-sized guides take so long to go to press, the listed values for the newer sets of cards are already out of date by the time the books reach the store shelves.

That said, on to the guide’s good points.

The guide is thoughtfully organized and effectively illustrated with photos of cards from every major set from 1948 to 1991.

Photos of most of the star rookie cards from each set are interspersed throughout the card listings. Captions including the pictured player’s name and card number appear below each photo.

Other useful features are introductions which provide helpful background information on each set. These introductions precede each set’s value listings.

The listings show near-mint values for cards issued before 1980 and mint values for cards from 1980 to 1991.

The book takes great pains to highlight special cards in each set. These cards include error and corrected versions of cards, special insert cards, and coveted rookie cards. Rookie cards are listed in italic print and error cards are accompanied by a description of the error.

Overall, this book is as good a budget-priced guide as they come.

The book’s introduction includes an informative explanation of the listings and prices, some of the recent history of the card collecting craze, a grading guide explaining the grades used to judge card condition, and what to look for when determining the value and condition of a card.

If you don’t mind the inconvenience of slightly out-of-date values, it’s a handy guide to take along to card shows. It even makes a nice companion reference book to use along with a more current price guide magazine.

Andrew Neff is a staff writer on the NEWS sports desk and an avid collector of sports cards and memorabilia.