#432 Bob Gibson AS - St. Louis Cardinals

All-Star cards returned to Topps sets in 1968 under The Sporting News banner for a three-year run between 1968 and 1970.  Topps included 20 All-Star cards in its 1969 set, featuring 10 All-Stars from each league and one player from each position, including both a right-handed and left-handed pitcher.  

Building the Set / Card #640

September 21, 2025 from The Philly Show (Richie's Sports Cards)

On Sunday morning, September 21st, I made the hour-long drive to the Greater Philadelphia Expo Center in Oaks, Pennsylvania for the latest installment of the Philadelphia Sports Card & Memorabilia Show, known to its friends as The Philly Show.  The show has a legitimate official sponsor (eBay) and the advertisement for the event notes the show is in its 50th year.  I hadn't attended a baseball card show since the last Philly Show in December, and I was flying solo to this one as our oldest son is in his first month of college at Villanova.  I posted a full summary of the show over at The Phillies Room.

I made stops at six tables at the show, all yielding needed cards for our 1969 Topps set, and I left the show with just 16 more cards to go for my version of a complete set.  After about 90 minutes of walking and buying, while running low on funds, and even lower on stamina, I found a nice display of vintage Topps star cards at Richie's Sports Cards, from Manalpan, New Jersey.  I quickly and easily picked up six more star cards needed for our set from Richie's, my fourth stop of the show.  This is the sixth of those six cards and it cost around $9 after a discount.

The Card / Cardinals Team Set / Pete Rose Puzzle

Nine-time All-Star Bob Gibson (#200) started the All-Star Game twice in his career, in 1968 and again in 1970.  In between those two years, his teammate Steve Carlton (#255) got the start, with Gibson relieving Carlton in the fourth inning.  Gibson struck out a pair, but allowed a run on an RBI-single by Bill Freehan (#390).

Linked below is a great article from Sports Collectors Daily, and the author did his best in tracking down the origins of the action photos appearing on these All-Star subset cards.  The black and white photo behind Gibson is actually him, and Topps repurposed a photo originally appearing on a 1968 Topps World Series subset card.

The backs of these All-Star cards contain a puzzle piece of either Pete Rose (#120) or Carl Yastrzemski (#130).  The back of Gibson's card features half of Rose's face, and with all All-Star cards now collected for the set, I can present the full Rose puzzle below.  This one turned out even more off-kilter than my Yaz puzzle!

Topps All-Star Card Appearances (2):  1968-69

1968 Topps #154

1968 Topps #378

Sources:  
Baseball Reference

Sports Collectors Daily - Mistaken Identities

#431 Bill Freehan AS - Detroit Tigers / #433 Denny McLain AS - Detroit Tigers

#200 Bob Gibson - St. Louis Cardinals

Robert Gibson
St. Louis Cardinals
Pitcher

Bats:  Right  Throws:  Right  Height:  6'1"  Weight:  189
Born:  November 9, 1935, Omaha, NE
Signed:  Signed by the St. Louis Cardinals as an amateur free agent before 1957 season
Major League Teams:  St. Louis Cardinals 1959-75

World Series Appearances:  St. Louis Cardinals 1964, 1967-68
Died:  October 2, 2020, Omaha, NE (age 84)
Hall of Fame Induction:  1981

One of the best, most feared and most competitive pitchers of his generation, Bob Gibson was a nine-time All-Star, a two-time World Series winner (1964 and 1967), a two-time Cy Young Award winner (1968 and 1970) and the second pitcher in history to reach the 3,000 strikeout plateau.  Along with his 1968 Cy Young Award, he also took home that season's MVP award as he went 22-9 with a 1.12 ERA, 28 complete games, 13 shutouts and 268 strikeouts in one of the most dominant seasons of pitching in baseball history.  Gibson won 20 or more games five times.  If that wasn't enough, he also won nine Gold Gloves for his fielding and was a lifetime .206 batter with 24 home runs.  He retired after 17 seasons with 251 wins, 56 shutouts and 3,117 strikeouts and the Cardinals retired his #45 in September 1975.

Gibson was a first ballot inductee into the Hall of Fame in 1981, the same year he returned to baseball as a Mets coach on the staff of former teammate and Mets manager Joe Torre (#460).  He moved with Torre to the Braves in 1982 where he stayed through 1984.  He coached one last time for Torre with the Cardinals in 1995.  Gibson passed away on October 2, 2020, 52 years after his dominant performance in Game 1 of the 1968 World Series in which he pitched a complete game shutout and struck out 17 Tigers batters.

Some text for this post originally appeared on my 1965 Topps blog.

Building the Set / Card #636

September 21, 2025 from The Philly Show (Richie's Sports Cards)

On Sunday morning, September 21st, I made the hour-long drive to the Greater Philadelphia Expo Center in Oaks, Pennsylvania for the latest installment of the Philadelphia Sports Card & Memorabilia Show, known to its friends as The Philly Show.  The show has a legitimate official sponsor (eBay) and the advertisement for the event notes the show is in its 50th year.  I hadn't attended a baseball card show since the last Philly Show in December, and I was flying solo to this one as our oldest son is in his first month of college at Villanova.  I posted a full summary of the show over at The Phillies Room.

I made stops at six tables at the show, all yielding needed cards for our 1969 Topps set, and I left the show with just 16 more cards to go for my version of a complete set.  After about 90 minutes of walking and buying, while running low on funds, and even lower on stamina, I found a nice display of vintage Topps star cards at Richie's Sports Cards, from Manalpan, New Jersey.  I quickly and easily picked up six more star cards needed for our set from Richie's my fourth stop of the show.  This is the second of those six cards and it cost about $36 after a discount.  This was one of four cards I spent more than $30 on at the show, along with Bobby Cox (#237), Harmon Killebrew (#375) and Rod Carew (#510).

The Card / Cardinals Team Set / Accuracy Index +5

I feel this is one of the more iconic Gibson cards, as it captures him following his incredible 1968 season.  He's all over the 1969 Topps set, and this is one seven cards of Gibson in the set.  He's on three League Leaders cards (#8, #10, #12), the 2nd Series Checklist (#107), the World Series Game #1 card (#162), this base card and an All-Star card (#432).  The back of the card justifiably focuses on his prior season.

Gibson's 1959 and 1968 Topps cards have been reprinted by Topps a ton over the years, and I was surprised to see this card has never been reprinted, at least as far as I can tell.

Accuracy Index:  Gibson's card easily earns a +5.

Inserts:  Gibson is included in the 35 card Topps Deckle Edge insert set and is one of 48 decals in the Topps Decals insert set.  He's one of 27 players to appear in both insert sets.

1969 Season
There was really nowhere to go but down after Gibson's all-time great season in 1968, but he still led the league with a 10.4 bWAR and 28 complete games.  From his SABR biography, written by Terry Sloope: 

Things went downhill for the Cardinals after 1968, although Gibson still had some productive seasons ahead of him. [Orlando] Cepeda (#385), their clubhouse cheerleader, was traded to the Atlanta Braves for Joe Torre before the 1969 season.  As the players union threatened to delay the start of the 1969 season with a strike, owner [August] Busch publicly blasted his team in spring training for being complacent and too concerned with monetary matters, further lowering club morale.  Although Gibson went 20-13 with a 2.18 ERA, the Cardinals dropped to fourth place in the National League’s new Eastern Division.

1959 Topps #514

1965 Topps #320

1968 Topps #100

1971 Topps #450

1975 Topps #150

Other Notable Baseball Cards
First Mainstream Card:  1959 Topps #514
Topps Flagship Set Appearances (18):  1959-75, 1988
Most Recent Mainstream Card:  2025 Topps Archives #297
Total Non-Parallel Baseball Cards:  2,253 in the Beckett online database as of 2/15/26.

Sources:  
Baseball Reference / SABR / Wikipedia

National Baseball Hall of Fame
Beckett Database / The Trading Card Database
1965 Topps Blog

#199 Jim French - Washington Senators / #201 Russ Snyder - Cleveland Indians

#162 1968 World Series Game 1 - Gibson Fans 17; Sets New Record!

The 1968 World series marked the last time two teams faced off in the Fall Classic without having to first advance via a playoff series.  With Major League Baseball expanding to 24 teams in 1969, the two leagues were split into four divisions and a League Championship Series would determine the World Series opponents between 1969 and 1993.

The Cardinals and Tigers were powerhouses in their respective leagues, easily advancing to the World Series.  This was a rematch of the 1934 World Series, when the Gashouse Gang of the Cardinals had bested the Tigers in seven games.  The Tigers would prevail this time, winning their first title since 1945, and their third World Series title overall as the Cardinals couldn't repeat after winning in 1967 against the Red Sox.

World Series cards were a key subset in Topps flagship sets throughout the 1960s and 1970s, with a card highlighting each game along with a series capping "Celebration" card.  Topps designed its World Series cards in its 1969 set to have the appearance of the front page of a newspaper, with The Sporting News getting some free publicity as the paper's banner.

Building the Set / Card #564
September 21, 2025 from The Philly Show (America's Pastime)

On Sunday morning, September 21st, I made the hour-long drive to the Greater Philadelphia Expo Center in Oaks, Pennsylvania for the latest installment of the Philadelphia Sports Card & Memorabilia Show, known to its friends as The Philly Show.  The show has a legitimate official sponsor (eBay) and the advertisement for the event notes the show is in its 50th year.  I hadn't attended a baseball card show since the last Philly Show in December, and I was flying solo to this one as our oldest son is in his first month of college at Villanova.  I posted a full summary of the show over at The Phillies Room.

I made stops at six tables at the show, all yielding needed cards for our 1969 Topps set, and I left the show with just 16 more cards to go for my version of a complete set.  The first place I stopped was a table with well-organized and well-marked binders of commons and semi-stars with 20% Off notes across the front of each binder.  

I took my time and found 32 commons and semi-stars needed before asking to see the dealer's star cards from the set.  It turned out this first purchase was also my biggest, as I spent over half my allotted budget here, America's Pastime from Fair Lawn, New Jersey, before moving on to my second stop.  This was the fifth of 36 total cards bought from America's Pastime, and the fifth of 91 cards for set added overall on the day, and it cost a little less than $10 after the dealer discount.

The Card / Tigers Team Set / Cardinals Team Set

It was a pitching match-up for the ages with the Tigers' Denny McLain (#150), 31-6 in the regular season with a 1.96 ERA, facing off against the Cardinals' Bob Gibson (#200), 22-9 in the regular season with a 2.12 ERA.  There was no score in the game until the bottom of the fourth, when Roger Maris and Tim McCarver (#475) both walked with one out.  Mike Shannon (#110) singled home Maris and both McCarver and Shannon would come home a batter later on a Julian Javier (#497) single to right.  Tigers' manager Mayo Smith (#40) pinch-hit for McLain in the top of the sixth, with reliever Pat Dobson (#231) taking over.  Lou Brock (#85) gave the Cardinals a 4-0 lead in the seventh with a solo home run off Dobson.  That's all Gibson needed, and he'd strike out the side in the ninth - Al Kaline (#410), Norm Cash (#80) and Willie Horton (#180) - to secure the Game 1 win and set a new strikeout mark for a World Series game.  Sandy Koufax held the prior record of 15 strikeouts in a game, set during the 1963 World Series, and Gibson's record still stands today.

Topps reprinted this card in its 2001 Topps Archives set.

Sources:

Baseball Reference / Wikipedia

#161 John Purdin - Los Angeles Dodgers / #163 1968 World Series Game 2

#12 N.L. Strikeout Leaders - Bob Gibson / Fergie Jenkins / Bill Singer

Beginning in 1961, Topps started including league leader cards in its sets and there are 12 league leaders cards kicking off the 1969 Topps set.  League leader cards can be found at the beginning of each Topps set issued in 1963, 1964, 1965, 1968 and 1969.

Building the Set / Card #561
September 21, 2025 from The Philly Show (America's Pastime)

On Sunday morning, September 21st, I made the hour-long drive to the Greater Philadelphia Expo Center in Oaks, Pennsylvania for the latest installment of the Philadelphia Sports Card & Memorabilia Show, known to its friends as The Philly Show.  The show has a legitimate official sponsor (eBay) and the advertisement for the event notes the show is in its 50th year.  I hadn't attended a baseball card show since the last Philly Show in December, and I was flying solo to this one as our oldest son is in his first month of college at Villanova.  I posted a full summary of the show over at The Phillies Room.

I made stops at six tables at the show, all yielding needed cards for our 1969 Topps set, and I left the show with just 16 more cards to go for my version of a complete set.  The first place I stopped was a table with well-organized and well-marked binders of commons and semi-stars with 20% Off notes across the front of each binder.  

I took my time and found 32 commons and semi-stars needed before asking to see the dealer's star cards from the set.  It turned out this first purchase was also my biggest, as I spent over half my allotted budget here, America's Pastime from Fair Lawn, New Jersey, before moving on to my second stop.  This was the second of 36 total cards bought from America's Pastime, and the second of 91 cards for set added overall on the day, and it cost a little over $2 after the dealer discount.

The Card / Cardinals Team Set / Cubs Team Set / Dodgers Team Set

Future Hall of Famers Bob Gibson (#200) and Fergie Jenkins (#640) were the runaway favorites to earn the league leader honors for strikeouts in 1968.  Gibson nearly missed matching his career-high mark of 270 strikeouts, set in 1965, he'd strike out one more in 1969 with 269, and he'd reach a new career best with 274 strikeouts in 1970.  He struck out 10, 11 and 11 respectively in his final three September starts.  Jenkins would lead the league a year later with 273 strikeouts in 1969.  He had led the league in strikeouts for most of 1968, with Gibson's dominant final three starts eventually overtaking him.

And Bill Singer (#575) is just happy to be here with his 227 strikeouts in 1968.  Singer would also set a career high in 1969 with 247 strikeouts.

#11 1968 A.L. Strikeout Leaders / #13 Mickey Stanley - Detroit Tigers

#8 1968 N.L. ERA Leaders - Bob Gibson / Bobby Bolin / Bob Veale

Beginning in 1961, Topps started including league leader cards in its sets and there are 12 league leaders cards kicking off the 1969 Topps set.  League leader cards can be found at the beginning of each Topps set issued in 1963, 1964, 1965, 1968 and 1969.

Building the Set / Card #546
December 15, 2024 from The Philly Show (Vintage Cardboard Collectibles)

On Sunday, December 15th, Doug and I attended the latest Philly Show, spaciously spread out inside Hall A of the Greater Philadelphia Expo Center in Oaks, Pennsylvania.  I wrote a full show report over at The Phillies Room, including some thoughts on attending the show with our oldest son, who first graced the Philly Show floors back in 2012.

Having spent the first half hour or so pulling 98 commons and semi-stars from the neon green binder of Uncle Dick's Cards, and adding the big purchase of the day, the Rollie Fingers (#597) rookie card, and after adding a few more star cards, the remaining cash I had was starting to burn a hole in my wallet.  I had noticed the common/semi-star boxes at the tables of Vintage Cardboard Collectibles, and I found 14 more cards for our 1969 Topps set and six cards for our not-yet-officially collecting 1959 Topps set.  This is the first of those 14 cards.  After the obligatory dealer discount, I handed over the last of my cash, and we exited the show for the drive home.

The Card / Cardinals Team Set / Giants Team Set / Pirates Team Set

It's Bob, Bobby and Bob on the ERA League Leaders card, and given Bob Gibson's (#200) stunningly low 1.12 ERA from the year of the pitcher, he could have appeared on this card all by himself.  Bobby Bolin's (#505) 1.98 ERA isn't too shabby either, although according to Baseball Reference, it actually rounds up to 1.99.  Baseball Reference goes the opposite way for Bob Veale (#520), rounding his ERA down to 2.05 for the season.  Gibson's historic mark is the third lowest in National League history if you count Tim Keefe's 0.86 mark in 105 innings pitched in 1880.  Mordecai Brown is a more accurate comparison, as his ERA was 1.04 in 1906 in 277 1/3 innings pitched.  Gibson's mark came over 304 2/3 innings, which included 28 complete games (out of 34 starts) and 13 shutouts.  This was the only year in Gibson's 17-year career in which he led the league in ERA.  Bolin and Veale would never have a mark this low again.

The back of the card lists every eligible pitcher with at least 162 innings thrown in 1968, rounding out with the Phillies' Rick Wise (#188) and his 4.55 ERA in 182 innings pitched.  Having some more room, Topps gave collectors a list of essentially the top relievers, with Ronnie Kline (#and his 1.67 ERA leading the way.

#7 1968 A.L. ERA Leaders / #9 1968 A.L. Pitching Leaders

#10 1968 N.L. Pitching Leaders - Juan Marichal / Bob Gibson / Fergie Jenkins

Beginning in 1961, Topps started including league leader cards in its sets and there are 12 league leaders cards kicking off the 1969 Topps set.  League leader cards can be found at the beginning of each Topps set issued in 1963, 1964, 1965, 1968 and 1969.

Building the Set / Card #286
November 18, 2023 from The TWP Card Show - Sicklerville, NJ (Sal's Sports Cards & Memorabilia)

I wrote about this show back in December at The Phillies Room.  My wife Jenna found an announcement on Faceback for a baseball card show to be held at St. Charles Borromeo Hall in Sicklerville, New Jersey on November 18th.  That Saturday, I gathered my lists and we made the short drive to what the organizers called the "First Ever Sports Card Show" in Washington Township, which I find hard to believe given the number of baseball card stores in the area back in the 1980s and 1990s.  Potential mislabeling aside, it was a decent-sized show with mostly modern stuff and slabbed Pokemon cards.  

I found the one dealer selling vintage cards, and cleaned him out of every 1969 Topps card I needed for our set, along with a few 1959 Topps cards for our next set build.  This League Leaders card was one of seven cards added to our 1969 Topps set, and the priciest of the bunch.  Credit to Jenna for finding the show, and if it happens again, I'll gladly make the 10 minute drive over there.

The Card / Giants Team Set / Cardinals Team Set / Cubs Team Set

Three future Hall of Famers grace this card.  I've mentioned it somewhere before, but it's always baffled me why Topps didn't call this card Victory Leaders or Win Leaders instead of the nebulous Pitching Leaders.  In any event, Juan Marichal (#370) led the way with 26 wins, which would be his career high. 

Eventual Cy Young Award winner Bob Gibson (#200) had 22 wins to go along with his league leading 1.12 ERA.  No other pitcher received consideration for the Cy Young Award in 1968, as Gibson won unanimously.  Fergie Jenkins (#640) squeaked onto the card with his 20 wins, earning his 20th win on the final day of the season with a complete game victory over the Pirates.  If not for Jenkins' win, this card would have been a lot more crowded as there were three 19-game winners in 1968 - Nelson Briles (#60), Jerry Koosman (#90) and Chris Short (#395).

The four pitchers with seven wins each and just missing being listed on the back of this card were Don Cardwell (#193), Clay Carroll (#26), Rich Nye (#88) and George Stone (#627).

#9 1968 A.L. Pitching Leaders / #11 1968 A.L. Strikeout Leaders

#107 2nd Series Checklist 110-218 / Bob Gibson

As I did for the checklists in the 1965 Topps set, I'll use these posts to give a brief state of affairs as it relates to building the 1969 Topps set and life in general.  As of this writing, on January 6, 2023, we've got 40 cards out of the eventual 666 I plan to collect - the 664 base cards and then the two variations for the players traded early in 1969, Clay Dalrymple (#151) and Donn Clendenon (#208).  The cards have come together in dribs and drabs, and there are a few major purchases coming up in future posts from the December 2022 Philly Show.

Our sons are as busy as ever, with Doug now pole vaulting for his high school winter track team and spending at least two days a week doing some baseball activities.  Ben is taking a break from school sports, still taking tennis lessons and gearing up for cross country in the spring.  His piano playing continues to improve and amaze us.  They are both excellent students, getting great grades and we're immensely proud of both of them.  Work is work.  Recently, and for the first time, I allowed myself to do the actual math and determine the earliest date at which I could retire with some pension benefits.  The date is actually a little closer than I had thought it was, and knowing the exact date gives me a strange sense of calm.  It's crazy to think I have more work days in my past than I do in my future.

I didn't think I'd want to do a complete set blog again so soon after completing our 1965 Topps set, but I'm glad I made the decision to move forward with this set.  I'm cheating a little, copying and pasting sections from my prior blog as players repeat, but still learning new things about a lot of players who had retired before I was born.  The bottom line is, this is fun for me and even if I'm the only person ever reading this, it's brought me happiness and relaxation.  It's incredibly important to have enjoyable hobbies.

Building the Set / Card #26
September 9, 2022 from La Verne, CA
In early September, I found myself taking the first of two required work trips and I purchased Wifi access on a flight to Orlando in order to catch up on work e-mails.  Dutifully catching up, and not having enough time to watch a full movie, I turned to eBay for the duration of the flight and found a Gus Suhr Diamond Stars card for sale at a very reasonable But It Now price from seller earhart47.  Not wanting the card to travel by itself from La Verne, California, I found four more cards for future set builds at reasonable prices and from high above somewhere over Georgia I clicked Add to Cart on those four cards too.  One of the random cards added to my cart was this checklist card, the first of seven checklists to be added to our set.  The cards were waiting for me when I got home late on the night of September 9th.  Sadly, during the second work trip, this time to Dallas, no new baseball cards were purchased while in flight.  Ironically enough, as I write this, I'm getting ready to go on another work trip, departing on Sunday night.  Maybe I'll need to do some online shopping during the flight . . .

The Card / Cardinals Team Set / Checklists

I like the idea of adding a star player to a checklist card.  With Bob Gibson appearing here, there's a chance the card wouldn't have been immediately discarded by a young collector and it allowed another chance for Topps to feature some of the game's top players.  Topps added star cameos to its checklists between 1967 and 1969, and I'm just now realizing Gibson is featured on the checklist in which his base card (#200) also appears.  He was by far the biggest star in the game in 1968.  Looking ahead to who else received recognition on the checklists in the set, there aren't any surprises.  Topps opted to go full checklist mode with the set's third series, allowing for the 33-card Deckle Edge set to be included as well.

There are two versions of this checklist available, and I've added the error version listing card #161 as "Jim" Purdin.  The corrected version shows him as John Purdin.  I don't feel the need to track down the corrected version - sorry, John.

#106 Jim Hannan - Washington Senators / #108 Tony Taylor - Philadelphia Phillies