1961 Topps #285 Sherm Lollar
About Sherm Lollar
Card #285 lands Lollar in the fourth series of the 1961 set, his tenth season as Chicago's regular catcher and one of the better late-career years he put together. He caught Early Wynn on Opening Day out of the eighth spot in the order, then hit .282 with 10 doubles, 7 home runs and 41 RBIs across 116 games, drawing 37 walks against just 22 strikeouts. Behind the plate he was nearly perfect: one error all season in 107 games caught, a .998 mark that led American League catchers in fielding percentage. Al Lopez's Sox went 86-76 and finished fourth, 23 games back of the 109-win Yankees.
John Sherman Lollar Jr. (1924-1977) was a right-handed-hitting catcher who spent 18 seasons in the major leagues, debuting with the Cleveland Indians in 1946 before stops with the New York Yankees and St. Louis Browns, then settling in with the Chicago White Sox from 1952 through 1963. Chicago got him from the Browns in an eight-player deal in November 1951, and under manager Paul Richards he grew into the American League's steadiest receiver: seven All-Star selections beginning in 1950, the first Gold Glove ever awarded to a catcher in 1957, and repeat Gold Gloves in 1958 and 1959. He anchored the staff of the 1959 pennant winners, hit a career-high 22 home runs, and in the World Series collected five hits and five runs batted in, including a three-run homer off Roger Craig in Game Four, as the Los Angeles Dodgers took the series in six games. A workhorse behind the plate, Lollar threw out better than 46 percent of would-be base stealers and retired holding the highest career fielding percentage, .992, of any major league catcher to that point. He won a ring as a Yankees reserve in 1947 and another coaching for the 1966 Orioles, later coached Oakland and managed in the minors, and died of cancer in Springfield, Missouri, at 53.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference · Baseball Almanac
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 379 | 1 | 28 | 174 | 122 | 40 | 9 | 5 | 0 |
| SGC | 17 | 0 | 1 | 7 | 4 | 3 | 0 | 2 | 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
Team card: #7 Chicago White Sox Team
More Chicago White Sox cards:
- #30 Nellie Fox
- #56 Russ Kemmerer
- #79 Joe Ginsberg
- #90 Jerry Staley
- #124 J.C. Martin
- #132 Al Lopez
- #152 Earl Torgeson
- #157 Cal McLish
- #170 Al Smith
- #185 Herb Score
- #205 Bill Pierce
- #227 Juan Pizarro
- #247 Billy Goodman
- #271 Jim Landis
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1961 Topps #285 card?
It is card #285 of the 587-card 1961 Topps Baseball set, picturing Sherm Lollar of the Chicago White Sox.
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.