March 19, 2020: Spring Auction
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 3/19/2020
Presented is a massive accumulation of vintage Topps baseball cards from two decades spanning 1956-76, an old-fashioned style auction lot that includes more than 150 Hall of Famers and even more Specials, Rookies and minor stars, found in the kind of gradually improving condition range that is often a hallmark of mature accumulations. By the nature of this enormous undertaking, it is the kind of lot that begs for a good deal of close examination and careful scrutiny. It is headlined by a BVG-slabbed 1968 Topps Mickey Mantle. Cards from 1956-65 are broadly Good to Very Good, then improving a bit after that, with year-by-year characterizations provided from that point on. Card totals are approximations; by the time the card totals get larger in the mid-1960s, there can be duplication, growing in scale with the expansion of yearly totals. The breakdown: 1956 (9); 1957 (16); 1958 (4); 1959 (33); 1960 (93); 1961 (72) including Brooks Robinson and Mathews, four League Leaders; 1962 (70); 1963 (17); 1964 (169) including six Hall of Famers – Kaline (2, one is Poor), Aparicio, Fox and Snider, plus four League Leaders and four World Series subset; 1965 (315) including 17 Hall of Famers – Kaline, Drysdale, Spahn, Torre, Stengel, Brooks Robinson, Stargell, Mazeroski (2), Marichal, Bunning (3), Roberts and Uecker (2), plus four Teams and 10 League Leaders; 1966 (180) condition improves a bit, perhaps Good to VG-Ex, with quite a few Excellent, including six HOFers – Bunning, Mathews, Cepeda, Herman and Hunter, plus five Checklists, three Teams and three Specials; 1967 (150) Good to VG-Ex, with quite a few Excellent, including (2) Hall of Famers Frank Robinson and Santo, plus six World Series, eight Teams, four Checklists, five Specials and three League Leaders; 1968 (225) mostly VG-Ex, with some above and below and emphasis to Very Good, with a dozen HOFers – Cepeda, Drysdale (mkd), Williams, Perry, Torre and Schoendienst, plus 10 Checklists (seven marked), eight All-Stars, four Teams and one World Series subset; 1969 (725) mostly Good to Excellent, with emphasis to Very Good, with 100 high numbers, 13 HOFers – Stargell (2), Rose (Fair), Gibson (Poor), Cepeda, Durocher, (2) and Aparicio (2), plus 30 League Leaders, two World Series, 10 All-Stars, five Combination cards and four Checklists (3 are marked); 1970 (960) winder condition range, perhaps Very Good to Near-Mint, with emphasis to Excellent, with 10 HOFers – Ted Williams, McCovey, Jenkins (2), Fingers, Marichal and Wilhelm (3), plus 42 League Leaders, 16 Teams, eight All-Stars and 18 Checklists (seven are marked); 1971 (1,750) Excellent to Ex-Mt, with some below and even some Near-Mint, with emphasis to Ex-Mt, including two dozen HOFers – Ted Williams (6), Torre (2), Sutton (4), Perry (3), Hunter (3), Niekro (2), Hodges (6) and Kaat (7), plus 30 Checklists (eight are marked), 30 Playoff subset, 14 World Series subset, 40 Teams and 18 League Leaders; 1972 (525) Ex-Mt to Nr-Mt, with some below and emphasis to the upper end of the spectrum, super clean cards with many seemingly uncirculated and revealing coveted “vending bend,” with four HOFers – Ted Williams, Perry (2) and Schoendienst, plus Hodges, five Checklists, 22 League Leaders and 16 Teams; 1973 (340) Excellent to Ex-Mt, with some above and below and emphasis to Excellent, with six HOFers – Kaline, Billy Williams, Hunter, Weaver, Niekro, plus nine Teams, 10 World Series and two League Leaders; 1974 (975) Ex-Mt to Near-Mint, really clean cards, with long stretches of Near-Mint blazers, with almost three dozen HOFers – Hunter, Torre (3), Perry (3), Aparicio (2), Alston (3), Berra (3), Mathews (3), Marichal (2), Santo (2), Perry (2) and Fingers (2), plus 32 Teams, 14 Playoffs/World Series, three League Leaders and five Checklists; 1975 (45) Near-Mint or better, with four Teams, a League Leader and MVP subset card; and 1976 (1,250) Nr-Mt to Nr-Mt to Mt, with some below and emphasis to Nr-Mt, blazing group with great color and gloss, along with “vending bend,” with two dozen HOFers – Jackson (2), Seaver (2), Hunter (3), Palmer (2), Carter (2), Jenkins (5), Brooks Robinson (3), Fingers, Brock (3), Cobb All-Time All-Star and Kaat (7), plus five Record Breakers, 35 Teams, 14 World Series and 11 Checklists.
Enormous Grouping of 1956-76 Topps Baseball, 160 HOFers, BVG Graded 1968 Mantle (7,750)
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