ANNIVERSARY 1968 OCT 02: Bob Gibson Sets World Series Strike Out Record

I missed the 50th anniversary of this a year ago so we are catching up today.

1969 Topps #162 World Series Special Game 1 Gibson Fans 17

Yes 51 years ago Bob Gibson Struck out 17 Tigers in Game one of the 1968 World Series.

Number of things to like on this card:

- Newsprint style format
- Gibson's face is a bit in the shadow, but overall I think this is a good photo from the era
- Great headline, subheader and synopsis
- Sponsorship by The Sporting News
- It's BOB freaking GIBSON

Gibson's 17K day broke the previous record set by Sandy Koufax 5 years prior, also on October 2 and in a game 1, Gibson struck out every Detroit hitter in the starting lineup at least once with the 3 & 4 Htiters Al Kaline and Norm Cash each whiffing 3 times. Other notable victims include Hall of Famer Eddie Mathews who went down on strikes as a Pinch Hitter, Bill Freehan and Willie Horton.

According to Baseball Almanac the record still stands today.

Flip

1969 Topps #162 World Series Special Game 1 Gibson Fans 17 (b-side)

The back of the card has a box score for the Cardinals 4-0 victory. Note the 17 Putouts credited to Tim McCarver. Lots of other big names on the Cardinals, HOF Lou Brock's hit was a Home Run which accounted for the single run in the 7th.

While the Cardinals won this battle, the Tigers would eventually win the War taking the 1968 Series in 7 games.

1968 Topps World Series Special Subset
The subber for the 1968 World Series runs 8 cards from #162-169, one for each game plus a summary. Hall of Famers earning cards in the set other than Gibson are the aforementioned Kaline and Brock.  

Sources and Links
1969 Topps Baseball
Bob Gibson Hall of Fame Index
1969 Topps World Series Special Subset
baseball card database
Baseball-Ref
Baseball Almanac

Father's Day: Curt Schilling 1998 Fleer SI Then & Now

There are a couple of Father and Son/Daughter cards out there, this is one of my favorites.

1998 Fleer SI Legends of Today #130 Curt Schilling

Understandably the card a favorite of Curt Schilling. Last month he posted this via his Twitter account.

Twitter by @Gehrig38

Curt is pitching to his eldest son Gehrig in the photo (the @Gehrig28 referred to in the Curt Schilling's tweet).

This Past Friday Gehrig and his sister Gabby were featured in an SI.com article discussing bullying and internet bullying.    
 
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1998 Fleer SI Legends of Today #130 Curt Schilling (b-side)

The reverse of the Schilling card contains some comparisons to a few pitching legends. This is before the three World Championships and he is being held up to the standards of a Legend like Bob Gibson. The presence of reliever Rollie Fingers in the graphic seems odd, however the walk rates for him and Schilling appear to be somewhat similar. 

Sources and Links
baseball cardpedia
Sports Illustrated - Jeff Bradley
Gehrig Schilling
Curt Schilling

Happy Anniversary Bob Gibson 3000 Ks: 1975 Topps #3

Busy here Phungo HQ, but I wanted to put up this quick posting.

Thursday July 17th marks the 40th anniversary of the ngiht Bob Gibson recorded his 3000th Strike out.

 

 1975 Topps #3 '74 Highlights Bob Gibson Throws 3000th Strikeout 

Topps honored the event with the #3 card of their 1975 Set,

 1975 Topps #3 '74 Highlights Bob Gibson Throws 3000th Strikeout (b-side)

Sources & Links
Phungo Bob Gibson HoF Index
Game Dated Cards Index

Reading the Competition: 1959 Topps #514 Bob Gibson (RC)

The Phillies are on the road visiting the St Louis Cardinals this week and I thought it would be a good time to revisit a favorite card.

1959 Topps #514 Bob Gibson (RC)

We have discussed Bob Gibson Hall of Fame credentials previously and I will just re-mention here that he won 251 games, 2 World Series Rings, and a league MVP (1968). 

FTC
The 2009 posting link above is one of the first where I did an e-bay check to look at pricing on a card. Today we re-examine those numbers.

Bob Gibson RC Low Prices for Ungraded Card

Date	$$$
2009-06-xx	$61
2009-12-07	$30
2009-12-xx	$35
2013-07-xx	$48
2013-07-xx	$58
2013-07-xx	$59

Back when I first looked at this card in 2009 it had a low auction of $61.  This was during the season which may have buoyed the price. Also back then the eBay recent auctions function may not have spun back as far as it does currently.  When I ran a similar check in December of that year the low auction was $35.  The green $30 price was for the card pictured, which was picked up at a show in Valley Forge.

Today the lowest finsher is $48, I included the three lowest auctions for comparison.

Bob Gibson RC Auction Population for Ungraded Cards (2013 07 21) 

Price Range	Auctions
< $59	3
$67-73	5
$79-90	9
$95-107	5

 
The three auctions under $59 are the three mentioned in the first table.  I sort of broke the table out into ranges that cards fell together.  Pretty much one can assume the Bob Gibson RC can be found ungraded for under $75 if your willing to look aound for it.  Below $50 would be quite good.

Bob Gibson RC Graded

Graded	$$$	Date
BGS 7 VG+	$140	2009 - 06 -xx
PSA 8 NM	$925	2009 - 06 -xx
Graded ???	$1,384	2009 -11 -22
SGC 5.5 (EX+)	$152	2013 - 07 - xx
PSA 6 (EX-MT)	$203	2013 - 07 - xx
PSA 7 (NM)	$435	2013 - 06 - 09
PSA 8 (NN-MT)	$843	2013 - 05 - 19

Finally the above chart tells us what the card is going for in various grades. For the $1,384 card I didn't bother recording the condition, but I certainly hope it was MT.      

Other Voices
'59 Topps: one f/g card at a time - a loving tribute to the Bob Gibson RC

Phungo Bob Gibson HoF Index
1964 Topps #460
1969 Topps #162 (Record 17Ks in 1968 World Series Game 1)
1970 Topps #530 (HoF Profile)
1975 Topps #3 (3000 Ks)

sources
baseball-ref.com
ebay.com

Card Show Report - 2010 04 18 Look who is hanging out in the Dollar Bin

1964 Topps #460 Bob Gibson

This card is in not in anywhere near perfect condition. It generally looks good, the corners are soft and it is dimpled throughout, but there aren't any real creases, and it is not written on. The color is tsill go and it is a fine looking card of Bob Gibson.

So why the hell is it in the dollar bin? I have no clue - I can think of a bunch of reason it has to be rescued from that squalid neighborhood.

#1) It's Bob Gibson!
#2) 1964 Topps - 45+ years old card of a Hall of Famer
#3) It's a Semi-High Number in the '64 High Series
#4) Try and find this baby for under $5 on an auction site.
#5) I have to say it again - It's Bob Gibson!



1964 Topps #280 Juan Marichal

Another 64 HoF for a dollar.
1965 Topps #399 Ray Herbert

Typically I wouldn't pick a 1965 card out of the dollar bin, but the Herbert card is a High Number and those are a bit scarcer in the topps 65 set. I think I crossed 3 Phils off my Topps Want lists over the weekend. The other two were 80s cards out of a dime box.

1962 Topps #575 Red Shoendienst
1989 Topps #81 Frank Viola

One more Hi-Number Vintage HoF - unfortunately poor Red has been sent to the bargain bin for having his position shifted from 2b to Manager. This may be Shoendienst's last card as a player.

And what the heck is with this Giant Frank Viola Card? Stay tuned for more info later in the week.

2008 Topps Heritage Double Box Break

I picked up two boxes of 2008 Topps Heritage at the Philly Show earlier this month.

I have been working on the original 1959 Topps Set and thought building the companion Heritage set would be an interesting project. The two boxes went for $90.00 combined and these are the results:

Each box is composed of 24 packs of 8 cards each. Within each box there are 3 rows of 8 packs. Within each of the rows, I think 7 of he 8 packs contained either a chrome card, short print or insert. And one of the special cards per box is a relic or auto - usually relic - I think the odds of pulling and auto are about 1:10 Boxes. There is also a 1:2 box chance of pulling a buyback of an original 1959 Topps Card.

Buyback
1959 Topps #161 Frank Baumann
1959 Topps #161 Frank Bamann (2008 Heritage 50th Anniversary Buyback)

Unfortunately the #161 card of The Red Sox Frank Baumann was not one that I needed for my 1959 collection,but I will keep it as part of the 1959 Topps Auxiliary Collection. For even more detail on the opening of this Buyback please check this entry over at A Pack to Be Named Later. This card came from box 1.

Relics

Fortunately these Game Used Relic Cards found the right collector. I don't open a lot of boxes, and I doubt I have ever pulled a Phils auto or relic. I usually just pick them up via trade or auction. Still it is neat to actually get one in a box I have opened. I fall in the camp of Phillies Fans that appreciated Bobby Abreu - He had his shortcomings but I always thought he was a strong contributor and he was fun to watch. The Howard Relic is nice with a stripe on the jersey and is from the most common Relic Group D. The Abreu bat card came from Relic Group C (1:90).

Both relic cards were pulled from a pack in the leftmost row of the box - Howard was the 7th or 8th pack in the row from Box 1. Abreu was the relic from box 2, column 1, 2nd pack. Bollocks for me as I typically pull my Packs from the Right Hand side of the box.

Parallels - Chrome

Box 1 yielded 4 Chrome Cards one of which was a refractor parallel - Unfortunately the Ubaldo Jiminez card has a slight scar on the Right Hand side.

Box 2 yielded 5 Chrome Cards. Pudge is a Refractor. Box 2 also feature a 2nd Refractor of Ryan Braun which I did not feature here as his regular chrome card is above. The Refractor Chrome cards are numbered to 559 while the regular chrome are numbered to 1959.

Flashbacks




Between the 2 boxes there were 9 Flashback cards 4 News FBs and 5 Baseball Flashbacks. The Brooks Robinson Card was present in both boxes. The Top set of 4 cards above is from Box 1, while the latter set is from Box 2.

New Age PerformersGood and Bad here - The Good is that one of the New Age Performers Card was of Ryan Howard. The Bad is that both boxes contained Mr Lackey. Between the two boxes I got duped on both the NAPs and on the BB FBs. The Howard Card was contained in box 2.

Then and Now

No Dupes here. Only observation from here is that both of the "Then" halves of these cards are higher Cache players. Johnny Podres was the pitching coach of the 93 Phils and will forever be the Yoda Like Zen master for that staff. And of course Eddie Mathews is far to cool to be paired up with Diva Rodriguez. Mathews and A-Rod were from Box 1, Podres and Bedard Box 2.

I placed the Short Printed Ichiro All-Star card here as well. Box 1 yielded 9 SPs while Box 2 had 8, although 2 of the Shorts in Box 2 were from Box 1. Between the two boxes I received 15 unique short prints.

The Numbers

Box 1
Base = 165/420 (39%)
Shorts = 9 (11, 315, 381, 427, 430, 431, 457, 464, 493)
Chrome #d1959 = 3 (24, 40, 43) Chrome #d559 = 1 (77 Jiminez)
Baseball FBs = 3 (1, 7, 10)
News FBs = 2 (4, 6)
New Age Performers = 1 (8 Lackey)
Then and Now = 1 (Matthews/DivARod)
Relic = 1 #CC-RH Ryan Howard
Buyback = 1 #161 Frank Baumann

Box 2 Base 169/420 (40%) - numbers in red below are dupes from box 1.
Shorts = 7 (11, 433, 437, 454, 464, 479, 490, 492)
Chrome #d1959 = 3 (37, 57, 90 ) Chrome #d559 = 2 (24 Braun, 28 Ivan Rodriguez)
Baseball FBs = 2 (5, 7)
News FBs = 2 (3, 8)
New Age Performers = 2 (8 Lackey, 10 Ryan Howard)
Then and Now = 1 (Podres/Bedard)
Relic = 1 #CC-BA Bobby Abreu
Combined Set Building Stats
Base 276/420 (65%)
Shorts 15/80 (18%)
Dupes 58

Ok, I made up my own rules for set building. The first thing I did was throw out differentiating between the Green and Black Back Parallels. If I had one of the two cards for that card number, I crossed the number off my list - I will not let Topps control my set building - It's my hobby and I will collect as I see fit!

Secondly I have decided to build the base set threw #425. There are 5 Short Prints in there (11, 231, 315, 381, and 409). Above 425 is mostly short prints with a few base thrown in the mix. Perhaps at some point in the future I will verify that I have all the "Hi" Base cards but not right now.

Overall I came up with just under 2/3 of the base set, which is about what I expected. The Cards that I already had in the Phungo Collection that did not overlap the box break numbered about 40(including short prints). I still need 127 cards to complete the base set.

The only disappointment was having FOUR duplicates (5 if you include the Braun Chrome) in the insert cards. That is a bit high I think, I purposely picked two boxes next to each other in hopes that would minimize collation issues.

And one other complaint and a curiosity - I received very few of the hero numbered cards in this box. I didn't get any of the cards that ended in hundreds, and only 2 of the 4 '50' cards. I didn't pull #1 Vlad Guerrero either. Mathematically I would of expected to pull 6 of these 9 hero numbers but only came up with two. Could it be that some of the star cards were quietly short printed?

If you need even more 2008 Heritage info click here for the A Pack to be Named Later entry for a pack from box 1.

Or click here for a little bit more insight on the buyback.

Sources and Links
Ryan Howard PC Index
Bobby Abreu PC Index
Bob Gibson HoF Index
Eddie Mathews HoF Index
Minnie Minoso Index

Philly Card Show Report - Splurge the 1959s

1959 Topps #514 Bob Gibson

If you are building a vintage set you at some point have to decide how you are going to handle the star cards, special cards, short prints and Hall of Famers. Because of the laws of supply and demand, these cards are typically both harder to locate and more expen$ive.

For the most part my 59 set is made up of cards I would describe as in good condition. I avoid cards that are written on, torn cut up etc. Dinged Corners and surface wear don't bother me to much.

That brings us to 1959 Topps #514 Bob Gibson. This is THE rookie card of the 1959 Topps Set. It is also part of the somewhat scarcer high number series of 59 Topps. I already have all three Mantle cards from the Set and the Mays base card, so I was well aware that this was likely the next big fish from the set.

This card has some minor creasing, surface wear and soft edges. If I were a Cardinals fan and wanted a Gibson Rookie to be the center of my collection, I would probably have passed on this card.

But as a good card of a big name Hall of Fame player that I need to build a 50 year old vintage set - This card is perfectly fine.
For the Collector

This particular card went for $30. On ebay a card in similar condition just sold for $34.99 shipped. A noticeably better conditioned card went for $39.98 which appears to be a pretty good deal to me. Beyond that there are several auctions that finished in the $85-$100 range. A really crisp graded card top ended at $1384.00 on November 22nd.



1959 Topps #317 NL Hitting Kings Ashburn and Mays

I believer there are three cards featuring Willie Mays in the 1959 Topps set, this one also features Phillies Hall of Famer and fan favorite Richie Ashburn. This went for a reasonable $4.50. I also picked up the #20 Duke Snider card for $2.50, but it is in really poor condition, and looking back I probably should have bypassed that card.
Commons



1959 Topps #517 Joe Koppe
1959 Topps #440 "Lou" Burdette
1959 Topps #206 Carl Furillo
1959 Topps #359 Bill White

The Koppe card is really not a common, it is part of the High Numbered Series which start at #507. The "Lou" Burdette card is notable for the misspelling of his first name LEW short for Lewis. This card "inspired" the much derided 2007 Topps Heritage super-scarce parallel "Jon" Smoltz card. What is Carl Furillo doing in the bargain bin??. And finally Bill White, who was one of the first black players in the Majors and as the President of the National League (1989-94) was the first African-American to hold such an office for a Major Sports League.

The Joe Koppe card as well as 7 other hi numbers went for $1.75. The regular set commons of which I picked up about 30 went for 35 cents each.

If you would like to contribute to the Phungo 1959 Topps Set Building challenge please let me know, I have lots of common duplicates to trade. My 1959 Topps Want List is chronicled here.

Speaking of 1959 Topps and 2007 Topps Heritage

Yep this was Team Phungo's last splurge of the 2009 Collecting Year. I finally broke down and decided to build the Topps 1959 Homage set - 2007 Topps Heritage. The two boxes went for a reasonable 90.00 combined and I got the dealer to toss in some new hobby packs 09 Heritage High Numbers at a discount.

Hall of Fame Thursday - Bob Gibson

1970 Topps #530 Bob Gibson

This week Philadelphia Phan Favorite Jamie Moyer tied the immortal Bob Gibson for career wins at 251. Of course it took Moyer 6 seasons and roughly 120 more games to accomplish the feat. Still it is an impressive accomplishment.

Bob Gibson played 17 seasons with the St Louis Cardinals. In addition to his 251 wins, 3117 strikeouts, 2 Cy Young awards, and an NL MVP in 1968 (22-9, 1.12 ERA) Gibson was a tremendous Post Season pitcher. He was the Ace for three of the Cards World Series teams (1964, 67, 68) two of which won defeating the New York Yankees in 1964 and the Boston Red Sox in 1968. His career World Series record was 7-2 with an ERA of 1.89 over 81 innings pitched. He completed 8 of his 9 World Series Starts.

In addition to being a great pitcher Gibson was also a good fielder who collected nine Gold Gloves and competent hitter with 2 World Series Homers on his resume.

For The Collector:

There are a variety of Bob Gibson Autos out there with the 94 Nabisco All-Star Legends Card going for $9.51 in a recent auction. The 94 Nabisco cards are an unliscensed product thus Gibson is not identified as a Cardinal. If you're interested in Hall of Fame autos for cheap the 94 Nabisco's are a good way to go with lots of the entire set occaisionally popping up on eBay. Other autos that are liscensed include the 1997 Donruss Significant Signature (12.88), 99 Fleer SI Greats of the Game (13.50) and the rather sharp 2008 Sweet Spot ($25.50)

The Bob Gibson Rookie Card is the much coveted 1959 Topps #514. The Gibson rookie is among the High Series of 1959 cards thus it is scarcer then the other cards in the set. Recent auctions of the card (ungraded) have gone as low as $61 with a few selling in the low $70s. Graded Cards (BGS 7 Very Good+) have sold for as low as $140. The high end for the card (PSA 8 NM) was $924.88.

1970 Bob Gibson cards in crap condition like the one above can likely be had for less than a dollar. I don't recall but I am fairly sure this one was in that range.

Price quotes above are from ebay completed auctions and include shipping. Any links to cards are strictly to show an example of the card and are not a site endorsement.