Ruth/McManus/Brandt/Maranville - 1935 Goudey 4-in-1 #27
1935 Goudey 4-in-1 #27 — Babe Ruth / Marty McManus / Ed Brandt / Rabbit Maranville
The set’s grail: Babe Ruth’s final card as an active player, issued during his last spring as a 1935 Boston Brave. The portrait recycles his 1933 Goudey Yankees-era artwork with “Braves” printed beneath. Exists with four different puzzle backs (1J, 3A, 4A, 5A).
The backs of 1935 Goudey cards are puzzle pieces, not player bios: each is marked "PICTURE N — CARD X" and builds one of the set's nine puzzles. This front was printed with 4 different backs (1J, 3A, 4A, 5A), so it counts 4 entries toward the 114-combination master set.
Puzzles 1-7 were each printed twice with different front panels, and one side of each pairing is much scarcer: for this front, 4A is the short-printed combo (per Beckett's tags and the Dec 1995 VCBC press-panel analysis).
The card & its puzzle backs
About Babe Ruth
George Herman Ruth learned the game at Baltimore's St. Mary's Industrial School; when Orioles owner Jack Dunn signed him in 1914, veterans tagged the rookie “Dunnie's babe,” and it stuck. Sold to the Red Sox that July, he became a brilliant left-handed pitcher — three World Series (1915, 1916, 1918) and 29⅔ scoreless Series innings — before his bat moved him to the outfield. With the Yankees from 1920 to 1934, “the Bambino” (christened by Italian fans near the Polo Grounds) hit 54 home runs in 1920, launched 60 for 1927's Murderers' Row, and delivered the fabled called shot in the 1932 World Series, adding the 1923 MVP, a 1924 batting title, seven pennants, and four more titles. He finished with 714 home runs, a .342 average, 2,214 RBI. Traded to the Boston Braves for 1935, he bowed out with three homers at Forbes Field on May 25 — the last the first ball ever hit completely out of that park — and retired June 2. This panel, Goudey's 1933 Ruth artwork relabeled “Braves,” found with four puzzle backs, is the set's grail: the Sultan of Swat's final card as an active player. Cooperstown elected him in 1936 with its inaugural five.
Sources: Wikipedia · Baseball-Reference · SABR
About Marty McManus
Chicago-born Marty McManus served two Army years in the Panama Canal Zone, then broke into pro ball with Tulsa in 1920 and spent 15 big-league seasons as a hard-hitting infielder for the St. Louis Browns, Detroit Tigers, Boston Red Sox, and Boston Braves. He drove in a career-high 109 runs for the 1922 Browns, who fell one game shy of the Yankees, hit .333 in 1924, and led the American League with 44 doubles in 1925 and 23 steals in 1930, finishing at .289 with 1,926 hits and 992 RBI. He was Red Sox player-manager in 1932–33 and closed his career with the 1934 Braves, homering in his final big-league game — timing that lands him on the set's grail card, the 4-in-1 panel featuring Babe Ruth's final card as an active player, alongside Ed Brandt and Rabbit Maranville. By the time it reached packs in 1935, he was managing St. Paul; he later skippered the Kenosha Comets and South Bend Blue Sox of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League.
Sources: Wikipedia · Baseball-Reference · SABR
About Ed Brandt
Spokane southpaw Edward Arthur Brandt — “Big Ed” for his 6-foot-1 frame — came up through the Pacific Coast League’s Seattle Indians, going 19-11 in 1927 before the Boston Braves bought his contract for $20,000. He lost 21 games as a 1928 rookie, then blossomed under Bill McKechnie into one of the National League’s elite lefties, winning 18, 16, 18, and 16 games from 1931-34 with a 2.92 ERA in 1931 (tenth in MVP voting) and 2.60 in 1933. On Opening Day 1935 he outdueled Carl Hubbell 4-2 while new teammate Babe Ruth homered — the spring this card reached candy counters. One of only six players on two fronts in the 36-card set, Brandt anchors card #23 and card #27, the latter beside Ruth’s final card as an active player. That December Boston traded him and #23 panel-mate Randy Moore to Brooklyn; he wound up 121-146 with a 3.86 ERA after stops with the Dodgers (1936) and Pirates (1937-38). Brandt died at 39 in 1944, struck by a car in his hometown.
Sources: Wikipedia · Baseball-Reference · SABR
About Rabbit Maranville
Walter "Rabbit" Maranville picked up his nickname at New Bedford in 1912, when a seven-year-old fan decided the 5-foot-5 shortstop hopped and bounded around like one — and it fit for a record 23 National League seasons, a mark unbroken until Pete Rose. Signed out of Springfield semipro ball in 1911, he reached the Boston Braves in September 1912 and became the cleanup-hitting sparkplug of the 1914 "Miracle Braves": he played all 156 games, finished second to double-play partner Johnny Evers in Chalmers Award voting, and hit .308 as Boston swept Connie Mack's Athletics, sealing Game Two with a game-ending double play. Beloved for his waist-high "vest-pocket" catch and clowning that ran from goldfish-swallowing to needling umpires with eyeglasses, he moved through the Pirates, Cubs (as 1925 player-manager), Robins, and 1928 pennant-winning Cardinals before returning to Boston, retiring with 2,605 hits and a positional-record 5,139 putouts at shortstop. A shattered leg erased his 1934 season; his 23-game farewell came with the 1935 Braves, which lands him on this grail panel, card #27, beside fellow departing legend Babe Ruth. Cooperstown called in 1954, just weeks after his death.
Sources: Wikipedia · Baseball-Reference · SABR
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 394 | 0 | 0 | 5 | 6 | 13 | 38 | 311 | 21 |
| SGC | 163 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 9 | 132 | 20 |
Graded population — a scarcity guide, not a price. Snapshot 2026-08-06. Half-grades fold down (8.5→8). Totals are summed across this front's graded back combinations.
PSA by back: 1J 154 · 3A 170 · 4A (SP) 25 · 5A 45
SGC by back: 1J 60 · 3A 69 · 4A (SP) 14 · 5A 20
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Related cards
Ed Brandt also appears on: #23 Randy Moore / Shanty Hogan / Fred Frankhouse / Ed Brandt
More Boston Braves cards:
- #23 Randy Moore / Shanty Hogan / Fred Frankhouse / Ed Brandt
- #29 Al Spohrer / Flint Rhem / Ben Cantwell / Larry Benton
Other fronts in the same puzzle pictures:
- #1 Charlie Berry / Bobby Burke / Red Kress / Dazzy Vance
- #4 Mickey Cochrane / Charlie Gehringer / Tommy Bridges / Billy Rogell
- #5 Hughie Critz / Dick Bartell / Mel Ott / Gus Mancuso
- #6 Joe Cronin / Carl Reynolds / Max Bishop / Bill Cissell
- #8 George Earnshaw / Jimmy Dykes / Luke Sewell / Luke Appling
- #10 Frankie Frisch / Dizzy Dean / Ernie Orsatti / Tex Carleton
- #11 Burleigh Grimes / Chuck Klein / Kiki Cuyler / Woody English
- #14 Willis Hudlin / Glenn Myatt / Adam Comorosky / Jim Bottomley
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1935 Goudey 4-in-1 Ruth/McManus/Brandt/Maranville card?
It is one of the 36 unnumbered fronts of the 1935 Goudey 4-in-1 set (R321), picturing Babe Ruth / Marty McManus / Ed Brandt / Rabbit Maranville. The 2-3/8 by 2-7/8 inch card carries four color portraits on the front and a puzzle piece on the back. Checklists that number the set (Old Cardboard / the Burdick Collection convention, alphabetical by the upper-left player) list it as #27 of 36.
How many backs does this card have?
4: 1J, 3A, 4A, 5A. Every 1935 Goudey front was printed with two to four different puzzle-piece backs, and collectors chasing the 114-combination master set track each front/back pairing separately. The 4A printing is short prints per Beckett and the VCBC press-panel analysis.
Is this Babe Ruth's last baseball card?
It is his final card issued while he was an active player: 1935 Goudey came out during Ruth's last season, his short 1935 stint with the Boston Braves. The portrait recycles his 1933 Goudey artwork with 'Braves' printed beneath. It exists with four backs (1J, 3A, 4A, 5A); 4A is the short print.
How many cards are in the 1935 Goudey 4-in-1 set?
36 fronts, each with four players (144 panels picturing 138 different men). Counting the two-to-four puzzle backs each front was printed with, the master set runs to 114 front/back combinations, 42 of them short prints. A complete set of all nine puzzles requires 72 different backs.
Sources: Trading Card Database, Old Cardboard, the Burdick Collection catalog (Metropolitan Museum of Art), SABR Baseball Cards research, Baseball-Reference, PSA & SGC population reports, and the Dec 1995 VCBC press-panel analysis. Card data compiled and maintained by T206Cards.com. Page last updated 2026-08-14.