#40 George Kell

Hall of Famer George Kell was a ten-time All-Star who played 15 big league seasons. He played about half his career with the Tigers and the rest with the Phils A's (his first club), the White Sox, Red Sox and, finally, the Orioles in 1956/57. He won the AL batting crown (.343) in 1949 by a whisper over Ted Williams. But his best year came right after that. In 1950 he hit .340, led the league in hits (218) and doubles (56) and drove in 101 runs with only eight dingers.

Kell finished his career with a .306 batting average and was a pretty slick glove guy as well. He led the AL third basemen in fielding on seven occasions and in assists four times. He was the Orioles regular at 3rd before the spot was claimed by Brooks Robinson. In Kell's final season, 1957, he hit .297 in 345 at bats.

After he retired as a player he opened a car dealership (still open in Arkansas) and was a popular broadcaster for the Tigers for 37 seasons. He was elected to the Hall by the Veterans' Committee in 1983.

#2 Bob Lemon

The 1958 set rolled out future Hall of Famers at spots #1 and #2 (and at #5, coming up soon). Bob Lemon was an infielder and outfielder in the Indians chain prior to his Navy service during WWII. He evolved into a successful starting pitcher in the mid-40s and went on to win over 200 games. He helped the Indians win the 1948 World Series with a couple of victories but lost both his games in the '54 Series against the Giants.

He was a seven time 20 game winner and spent his entire big league career in Cleveland. Those Indian clubs he played on had some of the best staffs in the history of the game. They featured, not only Lemon, but Bob Feller, Mike Garcia and Herb Score.

Following his playing career he stayed in the game as a coach, scout and manager. After a nice run skippering in the PCL  he managed the Royals, White Sox and most notably the Yankees with whom he won the 1978 Series. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1976.

The front of this card suffers from the same 'scuffed' look as the Ted Williams. It's one on many in my '58 binder with glue/gum/whatever staining on the reverse.

#310 Ernie Banks

Everyone reading this is probably very familiar with the story of Mr. Cub, Ernie Banks. He's a Hall of Famer, 11 time All Star, member of the 500 Homer Club, two time NL MVP and iconic sports figure in a town that loved it's iconic sports figures.

His glitzy baseball record is all right here. In 1958 he led the NL in the following: home runs, RBIs, games played, at bats, slugging pct., ab per homer and extra base hits. He won the first of two consecutive MVPs.

The scan did what it does to a lot of these old '58s..it highlights it faults. In hand this card looks much better than it does here. These yellow cards (and there are a lot of them!) seem to show surface wear and marks in scans that are not readily visible in hand. Odd but true.

This Banks card put me within three of finishing the set, and it completed this page in my binder. It wasn't until I slid it into it's pocket that I realized that Ernie was sharing a page with Brooks Robinson not to mention Duke Snider, Walt Alston and one of my favorite pitchers of the era, Bob Friend. As a bonus the Red Sox team card has Ted Williams in the top row!

As I was admiring the page I noticed that many of the guys here are interrelated. Bob Purkey popped right out at me because, like Friend, he appears to be wearing a batting helmet instead of a cap. The Pirates were the only team that had that look back then and checking I saw that Purkey was a member of the Pirates in 1957. So that's a pretty involved airbrushing job on Purkey's card.

Now look at Bob Rush. He was a Cub in '57 and was airbrushed into a Braves cap. The artist failed to take into consideration the Braves' red cap bill. And furthermore Rush's jersey has the same neck piping as Ernie does.

Paul Giel was coming off two years of military service. Prior to that he was with the NEW YORK Giants for a couple of seasons. It's unlikely that Topps got a shot of him in a SF Giants cap in 1958 in time to use on this card so that's likely another 'cap cover-up'. But I have to say that it's one of the best I've ever seen on a Topps card pre-Photoshop. It really looks authentic.

Gail Harris was a Giant prior to 1958. His jersey in this photo has been blanked out. Another pretty good job of applying a cap logo though.

And finally Snider and Alston are posing in Ebbets Field. Their caps have been altered to the Los Angeles Dodgers logo in a pretty haphazard manner. Like Bob Rush's card the caps have a blob of unmatched blue paint covering the old logo.

So there's the story of one of the better pages in the 1958 Topps binder. Lots of star power and lots of airbrushing. And only one yellow card. That's highly unusual for this set and the subject for another post soon enough.

#100 Early Wynn

Early Wynn won 300 games (exactly) in a big league career that stretched from 1939 through 1963 for the Senators, Indians and White Sox. He was a seven time All Star and the 1959 AL Cy Young Award winner. Wynn pitched for a couple of World Series teams, the '54 Indians and those '59 Sox. He went 1-2 in five Series starts overall.

He had double digit wins every year from 1949 to 1960 and managed to go 17-15 for the 1947 Senators who only won 65 games total. In 1958 he went 14-16 and led the league in strikeouts for the second consecutive season. He tossed a 1-2-3 inning and was the winner of that year's All Star Game in Baltimore.

Wynn stares mournfully out at us from his card. The S-O-X logo has been added to what is probably an Indians cap. In December of '57 he was brought over to Chicago in a deal that sent Minnie Minoso to Cleveland.

A bit of surface wear doesn't take much from this card which is one of the better ones I got in my original large lot purchase. The scan makes the corners look better than they are but they are still pretty solid.

WikiFacts: Wynn was the last active major leaguer who played in the 1930s, becoming one of only 29 players in baseball history to have appeared in major league games in four decades. His durability helped him lead the American League in innings three times (1951, 1954, 1959) and propelled him to an AL record for most years pitched (23).

Wynn was remembered for his toughness and for the frequency with which he threw at batters. He once stated, "I'd knock down my own grandmother if she dug in on me." He also said to reporters: "Why should I worry about hitters? Do they worry about me? Do you ever find a hitter crying because he's hit a line drive through the box? My job is getting hitters out. If I don't get them out I lose. I don't like losing a game any more than a salesman likes losing a big sale. I've got a right to knock down anybody holding a bat." When he was then asked whether he would have the same opinion if the batter were his own mother, he paused and responded, "Mother was a pretty good curveball hitter."

In fact, when Wynn was with the Indians, he actually threw a pitch at his own 15-year-old son, Joe. Wynn was throwing pre-game batting practice to Joe, and Joe hit two long drives in a row. Ushers in the nearly empty stadium began to clap. Moments later, Joe was lying flat on his back in the batting cage, frightened by his father's knockdown pitch. Wynn said later, "He was leaning in on me, and I had to show him who was boss.

#187 Sandy Koufax

Welcome to the first post of this blog dedicated to the glory that is the 1958 Topps baseball set. I hope you will come to enjoy these cards as much as I do.

I've mentioned in other places that this set contains the first baseball cards I ever held in my hands, or saw for that matter. Having just moved out from Brooklyn I was a second grader in Jericho, Long Island and a girl who lived in our neighborhood had some. I don't remember her particularly, or which cards she had but I remember being enamored with the bright, colorful cardboard photos.

I was just becoming a fan and the cards connected me to players I was beginning to learn about by watching and listening to Yankee games with my Dad. It was right around this time that he began taking me to ballgames and I was soon hooked..a status I've maintained (with the exception of the post-1994 strike/lockout period) ever since.

I don't think I owned any '58 Topps cards. My collecting began the following season with some '59 packs I received at Easter and grew to a 'hobby' in 1960. Those three sets form the 'cornerstone' of my decades long collecting 'bug'.

This is the final one of the three that I am chasing and blogging. It's been a fun adventure so far and I hope you will make this a regular stop on your blog reading journey. Let's get started. And there are few better ways to kick off a new blog than with a post featuring Sandy Koufax, am I right?

In 1958 Sandy Koufax was still a few years away from being Sandy Koufax!! He went 11-11 in 26 starts as he moved into the Dodgers' rotation on a nearly full time basis. He led the NL with 17 wild pitches and walked 6 per 9 innings. Both of those indicating that he had yet to harness his incredible 'stuff'. 

The first of many 'head shots' in the '58 Topps set (hence the blog's title) Koufax has a Brooklyn Dodgers' cap on here. The card's back touts 'bigger things to come' for him. I'd say they were correct.

WikiFact: On September 29 [1957] Koufax became the last man ever to pitch for the Brooklyn Dodgers before their move to Los Angeles, by throwing an inning of relief in the final game of the season.