Kudos to Sports Card Magazine and its readers in late 1993 for the “All Most Valuable Rookie Card Team,” along with the Best Name, Not as Famous, and All Ears Teams.
Before I share the article, I have to question why the author acknowledges that the 1952 Topps Mickey Mantle isn’t his official rookie card but still includes it!! Okay, it’s a great card, whatever, but then at least give me the Worst Haircuts of All-Time Team!
The All-Most Valuable Rookie Card Team
The All-Best Name Team
The All-Not As Famous As The Other Guy With My Name Team
The I’m All Ears Team
Who among you has all the cards on one of these teams?
T.S. O’Connell wrote an excellent article for Sports Cards Magazines’ April 1995 issue about World Series Cards; these were his Top 10. What do you think about the list?
You know what’s cool? A plastic radio with facsimile signatures of Roger Maris and Mickey Mantle!
Christie’s East offered this example in their October 1993 Sports Memorabilia Catalog.
They described it as a “Circa 1961 Bakelite like plastic radio depicting a baseball player and facsimile plastic signatures of Roger Maris and Mickey Mantle. This working example is in excellent/mint condition and has the correct dial knobs of a bat on the tuner and a green baseball diamond on the volume control. Scarce in this condition.”
Their estimate was $1,200-1,500. However, it’s not that pricey today. REA, which dates the radio to 1962, has offered at least nine examples; in 2023, one sold for $720. The coolest one, though, included an original box!
I ran across a rare item in Ron Oser Enterprises’ April 2001 catalog described as a 1966 Exhibit card uncut sheet from the last year that exhibit cards were issued. But I don’t know that the description was accurate!
My understanding is that the 1964-66 Exhibit cards don’t have ‘Printed in USA’ on the fronts and have blank backs, and it looks like the Berra batting card has that text on the bottom right. I’ve also read that this late series has 32 cards that were reprinted from the 1963 Stat set with blank backs (the ’63 set has 64 cards in the checklist), but Adam Warshaw has the best book on exhibit cards, Exhibit and Related Sports Arcade Cards, and he wrote, “As ESCO declined it issued a series of cards in 1964-66 that are substantially short printed and sell for a lot more than similar cards.” He went on to say that “the postwar run also yielded a key error card. Barney McCoskey is the corrected-common; Barney McCaskey is the error.” And I don’t see that card on the sheet. I also have seen 1963 Stat back checklists, and they don’t include a Mantle Portrait, which is included on the sheet and which Warshaw mentions as a key item in the late series. I’m so confused!
It looks to me like the exact same 1947-66 Exhibits uncut sheet that REA sold for $450 in the summer of 2019. They described it as a “32-card uncut production sheet.” They also wrote, “It is a virtual certainty that this sheet originates from the dispersal of The Exhibit Supply Company archives. Long ago, when the company was no longer in business, many of the photos, uncut sheets, and various advertising materials from the archives of the Exhibit Supply Company were scattered to the four corners of the collecting world.”
So, is this a late series sheet? Does the late series have 32 or 64 cards, and what’s their design makeup? Let me know if you know!
With his awe-inspiring home runs and incredible power at the plate (and seven World Series titles), Mantle solidified his status as one of the sport’s all-time greats. In this post, I’ll share 14 great Mickey Mantle baseball cards. These vintage gems, released by Topps, Nu-cards, and Laughlin during his playing years, offer a unique glimpse into Mantle’s home run-hitting prowess.
1959 Topps #461 Mantle Hits 42nd Homer for Crown
1959 Topps #461 Mantle Hits 42nd Homer for Crown – Front
The first card on the list is from the 1959 Topps set, and it’s part of one the greatest subsets in hobby history, the Baseball Thrills. It discusses his season-long battle with Rocky Colavito for the home run crown, Mantle’s third and the first for which he had real competition.
1959 Topps #461 Mantle Hits 42nd Homer for Crown – Reverse
1960 Nu-Card Baseball Hi-Lites #22 Mickey Mantle Hits Longest Homer
1960 Nu-Card Baseball Hi-Lites #22 Mickey Mantle Hits Longest Homer
A bit of an oddball release, the Hi-Lites are many baseball history fans’ favorite set. This card highlights an April 17, 1953 game in which Mantle hit a ~565 ft homer against Chuck Stubbs that left Griffith Stadium.
1960 Nu-Card Baseball Hi-Lites #50 Mantle Hits Longest Homer at Stadium
1960 Nu-Card Baseball Hi-Lites #50 Mantle Hits Longest Homer at Stadium
Nu-Card included another Mantle blast in their Hi-Lites set, this one from a May 30, 1955 game during which Mantle nearly hit a ball out of Yankee Stadium. The card says the ball was still rising when it hit the roof and may have reached 600 feet on the fly.
1961 Nu-Card Scoops #422 Mickey Mantle Hits Longest Homer
1961 Nu-Card Scoops #422 Mickey Mantle Hits Longest Homer – Front
Nu-Card released another baseball history set in 1961. This card highlighted the same homer that the 1960 Hi-Lites #22 card did, but the details were printed on the back.
1961 Nu-Card Baseball Scoops #450 Mantle Hits Longest Homer at Stadium
1961 Nu-Card Baseball Scoops #450 Mantle Hits Longest Homer at Stadium
Again, the Nu-Card mimicked a card from the previous year. This was about the same monster home run Mantle hit at Yankee Stadium in 1955.
1961 Topps #44 American League 1960 Home Run Leaders
1961 Topps #44 American League 1960 Home Run Leaders
Topps introduced cards for statistical leaders in their 1961 set. Lucky for us, Mantle led the American League in home runs in 1960 with 40, edging out teammate Roger Maris. Ernie Banks hit 41 in the National League that year.
1961 Topps #307 1960 World Series Game #2 Mantle Slams 2 Homers
1961 Topps #307 1960 World Series Game #2 Mantle Slams 2 Homers
Mickey Mantle had a legendary performance in Game 2 of the 1960 World Series that Topps commemorated in a nifty subset. In this game, Mantle hit a two-run home run in the 5th inning and a three-run shot in the 7th inning. The Yankees won this game 16-3 over the Pirates, but the Pirates won the series in seven games.
1961 Topps #406 Mantle Blasts 565 ft. Home Run
1961 Topps #406 Mantle Blasts 565 ft. Home Run – Front
Topps featured Mantle’s famous home run at Griffith Stadium off Chuck Stubbs in their 1961 set, just as Nu-Card did twice before. Topps wrote it up as a “Baseball Thrills” card on the back.
1961 Topps #406 Mantle Blasts 565 ft. Home Run – Reverse
1962 Topps #53 1961 American League Home Run Leaders
1962 Topps #53 1961 American League Home Run Leaders
Mantle didn’t lead the league in Home Runs in 1961 when Roger Maris broke Babe Ruth’s record with 61. However, Mantle still hit an impressive 54 to finish second to his teammate.
1962 Topps #318 The Switch Hitter Connects
1962 Topps #318 The Switch Hitter Connects – Front
Looking at the front of this card, you wouldn’t be sure if it’s referring to home runs, but the back shared that Mantle was running neck and neck with Roger Maris in the home run race in 1961 when an injury sidelined him in September.
1962 Topps #318 The Switch Hitter Connects – Reverse
1964 Topps 331 A.L. Bombers
1964 Topps 331 A.L. Bombers – Front
This card is cool because it features four formidable hitters: Maris, Cash, Mantle, and Kaline. The back highlights Maris for his record-breaking 61 home run season, Cash for being a dangerous hitter who hit /361 in 1961, Mantle as a triple crown winner in 1956, three-time MVP, and slugger of 15 Worlds Series home runs, and Kaline as a great hitter who won the AL’s batting title at just 20 years old.
1964 Topps 331 A.L. Bombers – Reverse
1965 Topps #3 American League 1964 Home Run Leaders
1965 Topps #3 American League 1964 Home Run Leaders
Mantle was third to Harmon Killebrew and Book Powell in the 1964 American League home run race. Killebrew hit 49, Powell 39, and Mantle 35.
1965 Topps #134 Worlds Series Game #3 – Mantle’s Clutch HR
1965 Topps #134 Worlds Series Game #3 – Mantle’s Clutch HR
History has a way of repeating itself, and in the 1964 World Series, Mantle hit his 16th World Series home run, beating Babe Ruth’s previous record, in Game 3 of the series against St. Louis. Mantle hit the shot in the bottom of the ninth to win the game, and he reportedly called his shot to on-deck hitter Elston Howard, telling him to go to the clubhouse because he was going to hit a home run. Ultimately, however, The Yankees lost this October battle with the Cardinals four games to three.
1967 Laughlin #61 Yankee vs. Cards World Series 1964
1967 Laughlin #61 Yankee vs. Cards World Series 1964 – Front
This 1967 Laughlin card featured a description of the 1964 World Series on the back, including Mantle’s 3 HRs, bringing his career total to 18.
1967 Laughlin #61 Yankee vs. Cards World Series 1964 – Reverse
It’s cool that we can explore Mickey Mantle’s home run legacy through baseball cards. Despite a hobby hiccup when the 1968 Topps Game card depicted Mantle hitting a single (Mays is on the home run card), it’s clear that baseball card manufacturers duly recognized Mantle’s home run-hitting achievements. Happy collecting!
“For those with cash, here are the top 25 most expensive baseball cards,”…as reported in the October 1993 issue of Sports Cards Magazine.
What really stands out is that there wasn’t a single contemporary or modern card on the list (“Sorry, there are no Frank Thomas or Ken Griffey rookie cards on this list”). However, the author also pointed out there wasn’t even a Ted Williams or a Joe DiMaggio (despite their popularity in the hobby at the time). The “youngest” card was a 1952 Topps Mickey Mantle (though only 41 years old at the time), which is like including a card from 1983 on a list today.
I published an article the other day about the 1939 Play Ball baseball set, emphasizing the three Ted Williams Rookie Cards. I thought I would do something similar in my analysis of the 1956 Topps White and Gray back cards by focusing on the Mickey Mantle cards (the last Mantle card to use artwork instead of photographs).
1956 Topps #135 Mickey Mantle Gray Back – Front
1956 Topps #135 Mickey Mantle Gray Back – Reverse
First, some 1956 Topps baseball basics. 1956 marked the beginning of the Topps monopoly as they had just purchased Bowman. So, while 1954 and 1955 Topps didn’t have Mickey Mantle cards since he was signed exclusively with Bowman, he was back in the Topps lineup in 1956 (along with many other players).
The 1956 Topps set has 340 numbered cards and two unnumbered checklists, marking the first year that checklists (and team cards) appeared in a set. The set came out in four series: series one is cards 1-100, series two is 101-180, series three is 181-260, and series four is cards 261-340. Also, the cards measure 3-3/4’’x 2-5/8″ and were the last oversized cards.
While the fronts of the cards have the same design format, what’s most interesting to me about the 1956 Topps baseball set are the printing variations due to the card stock Topps used; cards 1-180 have either white or gray backs, while the last 160 cards all have gray backs. More specifically, cards 1-100 have more white backs, while the second series, 101-180, has more gray-back examples.
1956 Topps #33 Roberto Clemente – Gray Back
1956 Topps #33 Roberto Clemente – White Back
Some collectors don’t think the back color impacts prices much, but the white-backed series two cards definitely carry a premium, and some 1956 collectors have argued the series one gray backs have a 10% premium over white backs. Unfortunately, PSA only started differentiating the back around October 2008, so the pop report on the gray vs. white backs isn’t super accurate in guiding our analysis.
1956 Topps #130 Willie Mays – Gray Back
1956 Topps #130 Willie Mays – White Back
I read a write-up from a collector with three fully graded 1956 Topps sets. He said that for cards 1-100, the white backs are much more common (4 or 5:1) but have a negligible premium since there are still so many gray backs (Topps always seemed to print more first series cards across all their sets as baseball cards were hot when they first hit the market in the spring). However, for cards 101-180, he said the gray backs are significantly more common (12 to 15:1), so the white backs carry a hefty premium, especially at higher grades (PSA 7+) since the white-backed cards seem to be more brittle, too. Another collector added that the white backs have at least a 50% premium and that putting together an all-white back run in decent condition would be almost impossible today.
You may already have gathered that Mikey Mantle’s card (#135) happens to fall in the second series. While I mentioned that PSA’s population report won’t ever be completely accurate, with the high prices that Mantle cards command, it behooves a collector with a white back card to get the card re-slabbed with the correct designation.
The following table shows that PSA has graded over 9,500 1956 Topps Mickey Mantle cards (as of October 16th, 2024), with about a 9.5:1 ratio of gray vs. white-backed cards. Also, the average gray-back grade looks to be between four and five, while the average white-back grade appears to be closer to three.
PSA’s 1956 Topps Mickey Population Table
It’s tough to compare high-grade prices since so few exist and so few move publicly around the market. However, the white backs sell for more than the gray backs when you find examples from similar periods; here’s a summary of PSA 5-10 sales.
1956 Topps #135 Mickey Mantle Gray Back Sales
PSA 10: $360k in May 2017
PSA 9: $148.7k in Jan 2022, $137k in Oct 2021, $150k in Oct 2021, and $175k in August 2021
PSA 8: $19k in Oct 2024, $19.6k in Aug 2024, and $15.9k in Feb 2024
PSA 7: $5.8k in Aug 2024, $5.7k in July 2024, and $5.8k in May 2024
PSA 6: $4.2k in Oct 2024, $3.5k in Sept 2024, and $4.2k in Sept 2024
PSA 5: $2.5k in Oct 2024, $2.8k in Sept 2024, and $3.2k in Aug 2024
1956 Topps #135 Mickey Mantle Gray Back – Front
1956 Topps #135 Mickey Mantle Gray Back – Reverse
1956 Topps #135 Mickey Mantle White Back Sales
PSA 10: No sales
PSA 9: None Exist
PSA 8: $20.2k in Sept 2017
PSA 7: $19.8k in Apr 2022 and $3.4k in Aug 2018
PSA 6: $5k in Aug 2024, $5.2k in Mar 2022, $3.5k in Oct 2020
PSA 5: $2.8k in Aug 2024, $3.3k in Aug 2024, and $2.5k in May 2024
1956 Topps #135 Mickey Mantle White Back – Front
1956 Topps #135 Mickey Mantle White Back – Reverse
If you’re a 1956 Topps baseball collector looking to complete a master set, I wish you the best of luck, particularly in getting those second-series white-backed cards; happy collecting!
