1951 Topps Red Back #28 Elmer Valo
About Elmer Valo
The 1950 Athletics celebrated their 50th anniversary with a huge party and then finished last, 46 games out of first. Valo hit .280 with 125 hits in 129 games, and his 10 home runs were a career high, double the 5 he had hit in 1949. His runs batted in fell from 85 to 46 and his runs from 86 to 62. He stole 12 bases and played 117 games in the outfield.
Elmer Valo, born Imrich Valo in Rybnik, Czechoslovakia, came to the United States with his family at age six and reached the majors with the Philadelphia Athletics on September 22, 1940, at nineteen. Left-handed at the plate, he gave the Philadelphia A's thirteen seasons, with Army service costing him 1944 and 1945, then moved with the club to Kansas City for 1955. Later stops took him to the Phillies, Dodgers, Indians, Yankees and the Senators, the franchise that relocated to Minnesota for 1961, and he closed out twenty big-league seasons back in Philadelphia. Valo hit .300 or better five times, peaked at .364 in 1955, and cleared a .400 on-base percentage in eight of the ten seasons from 1946 through 1955, finishing at .282 with 601 runs batted in. A fearless right fielder who crashed into outfield walls, he became a superb pinch-hitter late on, setting 1960 major-league pinch-hitting season records for games, walks and times on base plus a career mark of 91 pinch-hit walks. He hit for the cycle on August 2, 1950, and on May 1, 1949 became the first big leaguer to hit two bases-loaded triples in a game. He later coached for Cleveland and scouted for the Phillies, and he is honored on the Philadelphia Baseball Wall of Fame.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference · Baseball Almanac · BaseballCardPedia
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 260 | 0 | 48 | 56 | 20 | 25 | 48 | 63 | 0 |
| SGC | 32 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 20 | 0 |
Graded population — a scarcity guide, not a price. Data as of 2026-10-19. Half grades fold down for both graders (8.5→8); PSA qualified slabs (OC, ST, PD, MC and the like) are not counted.
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Related cards
Team card: Team card Philadelphia Athletics
More Philadelphia Athletics cards:
- Red Back #3 Ferris Fain
- Blue Back #15 Eddie Joost
- Connie Mack's All-Star Mickey Cochrane
- Connie Mack's All-Star Connie Mack
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1951 Topps Red Back #28 card?
It is Red Back #28 in the 135-card 1951 Topps Baseball checklist, picturing Elmer Valo of the Philadelphia Athletics.
How many cards are in the 1951 Topps Baseball set?
135 cards across five issues - the Red Backs and Blue Backs (52 each), nine Team cards, and eleven each of Connie Mack's All-Stars and the Major League All-Stars. With the Zernial and Holmes variations and both versions of each Team card the master set is 146. All 135 count toward the full set; Jim Konstanty, Robin Roberts and Eddie Stanky, the three rarest Major League All-Stars, are so rarely seen that collectors often count a complete set as 132 without them.
Sources: PSA, BaseballCardPedia, Trading Card Database, Baseball-Reference, PSA & SGC population reports. Card data compiled and maintained by T206Cards.com. Page last updated 2026-10-26.