Hello. New to the forum, first post and all that so.... bonjour!

Just had a look through some of the collections on here. Wow. I can't say anything else. You guys must have spent fortunes on them. Impressive stuff.

Anyway, I have a few replicas, nothing much. Well, until yesterday (it was my birthday, you see?!) I was lucky enough to be given my first authentic. There's no interesting history to it, it's brand new and came from the NFL.com online store so I'll hazard a guess to say that it isn't fake and cost a few pennies. More than what I could afford to spend on a jersey anyway. For the sake of details it's a home Patriots Welker #83. Needless to say, I'm over the moon with it. Anyway, I pretty much live in my replicas, and they get washed, worn, washed, worn on a pretty constant rotation. I obviously will be a tad more selective regarding the wearing of my authentic, but nevertheless I do want to wear it on occasion.

So, have you guys got any tips for the care of authentics that are actually worn? I've read elsewhere to wash it by hand in cold water, never tumble dry it, but put it on a hanger and then put it out on the line to dry. Is that the case? Is that pretty much it? Are there any other precautions I should take? Any storage tips? Anything else I should know before I attempt to wear it?

Thanks in advance!

Both welcoming and informative! Much appreciated.

Welcome Bobsyouruncle. Don't mind Dubs, I have to say it did make me laugh out loud but I am a Bills fan and it is a Pats jersey, AFC east rivalry and all that.

Now for some real advice. I just run mine through the washing machine on the usual setting and hang them out to dry. I don't tend to iron them, but if you need to do it from the reverse.

I hope that you didn't take Dubbear's post to heart we are a good bunch here and its great to have you with us.

Ah, of course I didn't take dubs' dig to heart. When it comes to competitive sports like the NFL, fans like to wind each other up and stuff. It's part and parcel. Besides, even I can understand that it's easy to hate the Patriots. They're like the Man Utd of the NFL. If you squint and tilt your head slightly, Bill Belichick even looks a bit like Alex Ferguson. It's as much as I can do to stop myself jumping on a plane to Boston and kicking his teeth in!

Anyway, thanks for the advice. It is greatly appreciated. I just didn't want to go doing something stupid and ruin the jersey. I'm sure everyone on here had a few big girls blouse moments when they got their first authentic.

You wear it with pride mate. I'm not sure how you get thousand island dressing from your prawn sandwich out of it though

Just take the usual care of any sports jersey as billsfan said and it will last a while remember watch where you are going aswell dont want to get it caught onto something like a wired fence or something like that happened to me and a soccer jersey .
I literally took it out the bag wore out before i got through my garden gate and i forgot about the roll of cage my dad had standing uo caught onto it anbd i was fuming had 2 small holes on the jerseys