Happy 80th Birthday Willie McCovey and the birth of the Topps All-Star Rookie Team

On January 10th First Ballot Hall of Famer Willie McCovey celebrates his 80th birthday.

To mark the occasion I would like to take a look at McCovey's rookie card.

 1960 Topps #316 Willie McCovey

Not only is this a Rookie Card but it is also Topps first ever All-Star Rookie Cup card.

Therefore here we have a card that historic for not one but two reasons. The card is the beginning of some interesting Topps history. 

Check out the text at the top of the yellow circle. It specifies that McCovey was "Selected by the Youth of America"

What does that mean? Well Topps actually sent out ballots to the Boy Scout, YMCA, Boys Club of America and other youth organizations to vote on the All-Star Rookie team. I believe this was part of a greater effort to attract young collectors.

The Following Ad appeared in an issue of The Sporting News during the summer of 1959.

 The Sporting News 1959 Jul 15  

A couple of things to unpack here, first The trophy looks terrific. The clipart used for the Trophy on early Topps cards looks fine, but here we have a bit more detail, I mean who knew the pedestal was a Top Hat?

The text above is where I got the info on the clubs involved in the rookie all-star election.

Further down in the ad we have additional info:

 

The Sporting News 1959 Jul 15

 

Check it out there was an actual trophy presentation ceremony with an associated bonus of $125! According to the CPI Inflation Calculator that is a little bit over a grand in today's money.

To the right is a "Sample Ballot". Kids write in the players name, team and position, and send their vote to Topps Bazooka office in Brooklyn.

The final thing I want to point out is the "Honorary All-Star Election Committee" which consists of various media representatives plus JACKIE ROBINSON, who is referred to not as Major Leaguer, World Champion, All-Star, or Future Hall of Famer. Nope for purposes of this exercise he was Vice President, Chock Full O' Nuts, Inc.

According to a TSN article the 1959 All-Star Rookie election consisted of 1.5 Million votes. Topps eligibility requirements to make the team were no more than 45 Days in the Majors, 90 Plate Appearances, or 45 innings prior to the season.

Banquet

The Sporting News 1960 Apr 20

And there they are Topps Historic First All-Star Rookie Team. They are pretty much in the order that they appear on the 1960T checklist. Willie McCovey is on the left followed Pumpsie Green, Jim Baxes, Phillies Shortstop Joe Koppe (the shortest guy in the shot) Bob Allison, Ron Fairly, John Romano and Jim Perry. Willie Tasby and Jim O'Toole who could not make the outing are shown in an inset bottom left.

The Subset
The Initial All-Star Rookie subset is unique within the history of the on card award as it is the only time the cards are presented consecutively running from #316-#325.

They also run in position sequence using scoring notation, except they start at 1B rather than pitcher. I don't know if this is luck or if Topps wanted one of the two Rookie of the Year award winners to lead off the subber. The AL ROY was Bob Allison. Regardless if planned or happy accident it is a nice touch that the first All-Star Rookie card EVER went to a 500 Home Run guy and future Hall of Famer. 

 Flip

1960 Topps #316 Willie McCovey (b-side)

The back of the All-Star Rookies are essentially the same as the base backs. Note McCovey took home NL ROY honors despite only getting involved in 52 games. Perhaps it had to do with his HOT start. I always loved how 1960T bullet pointed highlights from the players 1959 season. Check ou the first five of these HighLights for Stretch. The man puts up notable games FOUR days in a row right at the top of his career

Sources and Links
Phungo Willie McCovey HOF Index
1960 Topps Rookie Topps Index
The Sporting News
Baseball Card Database
Cardboard Connection
Baseball-Ref
CPI Inflation Calculator

Swag from Rhubarb_Runner

I highly Recommend trading with Twins fan Rhubarb_Runner from é rayhahn, rayhahn


Need I say anything more?!?!

Oh and he sent me some Phillies Cards too.

The New

2010 Topps #23 Shane Victorino
2010 Topps #300 Chase Utley
2002 Post #14 Scott Rolen
2010 Topps #146 Jimmy Rollins

I only picked up a couple packs of 2010 Topps so far, and really haven't gotten many Phils. It was great to get the three of these, who are all stars - The J-Roll card is my first Opening Day card of 2010.

The Rolen card is of course from the Post set of a few years ago. I have posted it here for comparison.

The Vintage
1963 Topps #29 Rookie Stars Including Ray Culp and John Boozer
1961 Topps #179 Joe Koppe
1963 Topps #13 Phillies Team Card

David knocked out several cards from my vintage want lists including the above gems from the early 60s.

The Retro
2010 Topps Peak Performance #PP-6 Steve Carlton

This Carlton card is an insert from 2010 Topps. It honors Carlton's 1972 Cy Young Season. Every once in a while you learn something from a baseball card. Carlton threw THIRTY Complete Games in 1972. It has not been done since in the National League, and likely will not be done again. Catfish Hunter completed 30 for the 1975 Yankees and is the only player to accomplish the fete in the Junior circuit.

With Glavine, the Unit, Smoltz all retired or semi-retired and neither Pedro or Bartolo Colon both not hooked up yet - there are only 4 active pitchers with over 30 CAREER CGs (Halladay, Liv Hernandez, Wakefield, and Jamie Moyer)

I could dedicate about 5 posts to the cards David sent me. He has a very comprehensive want list and I recommend you look it over. Plus he is pretty organized and can send you out great trade lists with lots o vintage.

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.