1921 W551 Babe Ruth/Ty Cobb Strip Card Pairing

The awesome thing about flipping through old catalogs is running across random cards and sets that pique your curiosity and make you learn more about the hobby; that’s precisely what happened when I saw this 1921 W551 Babe Ruth/Ty Cobb Strip in Mastro’s August 2006 catalog.

This example is graded 88 NM/MT 8 by SGC, but I found the 1922 date on the slab and the auction’s title interesting. I used to collect Babe Ruth strip cards and swore this was a 1921 card. So I double-checked Old Cardboard and PSA, and they both date the W551 set to 1921, and it turns out SGC does now as well. Weird…

After some more research, I learned that, if anything, someone could reasonably confuse these W551s with W514s since nine of the 10 baseball player strip card poses are the same. However, the text below the picture is a little different, and Ruth’s picture is entirely different.

Anywho, back to W551, here’s PSA’s set profile: 

The 1921 W551 baseball card set consists of 10 cards, each measuring approximately 1-3/8” x 3-1/4”. The unnumbered cards were printed in strips, with each front revealing a color drawing of a National Pastime hero. The player’s name and team name are printed in the bottom margin. The backs are blank. The W551 set is made up of Frank Baker, Dave Bancroft, Jess Barnes, Ty Cobb, Walter Johnson, Wally Pipp, Babe Ruth, George Sisler, Tris Speaker, and Casey Stengel. Ruth’s example is by far the most desirable item.

And here are a few more W551 fun facts:

• The cards are 1 3/8″ x 2 1/4″ (but vary drastically from hand cutting).
• The set has 40 cards (boxers, other sports, movie stars) but only ten baseball cards, but it does have Gene Sarazen (golf) and W. Tilden’s (tennis) rookie cards, which are pricier than you’d think
• 8/10 of the baseball players are Hall of Famers
• There are really good reprints with blue labeling; there are also a lot of fake two-card strips (including fake Ruth/Cobb pairs)
• The cards came in strips of 10

Also, despite there being a ton of them out there, including 13 Ruth/Cobb Panels from PSA and 8 from SGC, 168 PSA and 91 SGC Ruth strips, and 139 PSA Cobb and 76 SGC strips, these cards aren’t cheap. Happy collecting!