1961 Topps #243 Frank Lary
About Frank Lary
Both leader cards here score his 1960 season. Card #48 lines up his 15 wins with Chuck Estrada, Jim Perry, Bud Daley, Art Ditmar and Milt Pappas as the American League's top winners; card #50 lists his 149 strikeouts fourth behind Jim Bunning, Pedro Ramos and Early Wynn. He had also led the league in starts and complete games in 1960 and made his first All-Star team. Card #243 is his own Tigers card, and it reached packs during the best summer he ever had: 23-9, a league-leading 22 complete games, a Gold Glove and third place in the Cy Young vote for a club that won 101 games.
Frank Strong Lary was a hard-throwing right-hander who anchored the Detroit Tigers rotation from 1955 through 1961 and earned three All-Star selections across 1960 and 1961. Born April 10, 1930 in Northport, Alabama, the sixth of seven sons of a cotton farmer and semipro spitball pitcher, he learned the game on a mound his father built in the family's front yard, then pitched the University of Alabama into the 1950 College World Series. Detroit signed him that summer; the Army took the next two years. He led the American League with 21 wins in 1956, paced the league in complete games in 1958, 1960 and 1961, and peaked at 23-9 in 1961, when he also won a Gold Glove and finished third in the Cy Young voting behind Whitey Ford and Warren Spahn. The nickname lasted: the Yankee Killer went 27-10 against New York from 1955 through 1961, years the Yankees won six pennants. A sore arm arrived in 1962 and never left, and he closed out with the Mets, Braves and White Sox. Final line: 128-116, 3.49 ERA, 21 shutouts, 1,099 strikeouts over twelve seasons. He coached and scouted, then ran a construction business in Tuscaloosa, and entered the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame in 1978. He died December 13, 2017.
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 | 241 | 1 | 12 | 101 | 70 | 27 | 19 | 11 | 0 |
| SGC | 14 | 0 | 2 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 0 |
Graded population — a scarcity guide, not a price. Data as of 2026-09-04. PSA counts are straight grades only; PSA half grades (PSA 1.5 among them) and qualified slabs are not included. SGC half grades fold down (8.5→8). Slabs of the two cards printed #463 are joined by description, never by number alone.
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Related cards
More Frank Lary in this set: #48 League Leaders, #50 League Leaders
Team card: #51 Detroit Tigers Team
More Detroit Tigers cards:
- #13 Chuck Cottier
- #14 Don Mossi
- #37 Charlie Maxwell
- #67 Ossie Virgil
- #83 Bob Bruce
- #95 Norm Cash
- #112 Chico Fernandez
- #151 Jim Donohue
- #171 Paul Foytack
- #192 Dick Brown
- #208 Larry Osborne
- #223 Bob Scheffing
- #251 Bill Bruton
- #269 Harry Chiti
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1961 Topps #243 card?
It is card #243 of the 587-card 1961 Topps Baseball set, picturing Frank Lary of the Detroit Tigers.
How many cards are in the 1961 Topps Baseball set?
587 cards, tracked as 596 collectible states. Numbers run from 1 to 589, but #426, #587 and #588 were never issued and two different cards were printed #463 - Jack Fisher and the Milwaukee Braves Team card, catalogued 463b - and eight cards carry catalogued print variations that the master set counts separately.
Sources: Trading Card Database, PSA CardFacts, Cardboard Connection, The Topps Archives, Baseball-Reference, the SABR BioProject and the National Baseball Hall of Fame, PSA & SGC population reports. Card data compiled and maintained by T206Cards.com. Page last updated 2026-10-05.