1961 Topps #290 Stan Musial
About Stan Musial
Card #290 is Musial's only card in the 1961 set, a fourth-series printing of a 40-year-old starting his 20th major league season. Behind it sat his shakiest year yet: .275 with 17 home runs and 63 RBI in 116 games, split between left field and first base, and a summer of retirement talk in the papers that he ended in September by promising another season. Going into 1960 he had taken a pay cut from $100,000 to $80,000 and hired a university physical education director to rebuild his conditioning.
Stan Musial spent all 22 of his major league seasons (1941-1944, 1946-1963) with the St. Louis Cardinals, signed out of Donora, Pennsylvania, as a pitcher in 1938 and shifted to the outfield after a 1940 shoulder injury left his throwing arm weak. Hitting left-handed from a famously coiled crouch, he won seven National League batting titles, three Most Valuable Player awards (1943, 1946, 1948) and three World Series (1942, 1944, 1946), and missed the 1945 season for Navy service. He played in 24 All-Star Games, a major league record he shares with Hank Aaron and Willie Mays, and retired in 1963 holding National League career records for hits, runs batted in, games played, at-bats, runs and doubles. He finished at .331 with 3,630 hits, 1,951 RBI and 475 home runs, then second in league history behind Mel Ott's 511. The nickname came from a September 1946 column by St. Louis Post-Dispatch writer Bob Broeg, who reported that Brooklyn fans at Ebbets Field were greeting him with "here comes the man" during that autumn's pennant race. Musial was elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1969 on the first ballot with 93.2 percent of the vote, served as the Cardinals' general manager through their 1967 championship season, and received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2011.
Sources: Wikipedia · Baseball-Reference · SABR · Baseball Almanac
Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PSA | 3,701 | 2 | 50 | 480 | 805 | 853 | 594 | 912 | 5 |
| SGC | 1,192 | 0 | 1 | 31 | 169 | 217 | 304 | 459 | 11 |
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.
Find this card
Search T206 Cards Shop 1961 Topps cards Live auctions Buy It Now on eBay Sold prices
As an eBay Partner Network affiliate, T206Cards.com may earn from qualifying purchases.
Related cards
Team card: #347 St. Louis Cardinals Team
More St. Louis Cardinals cards:
- #11 Curt Simmons
- #32 Ray Sadecki
- #52 George Crowe
- #64 Alex Grammas
- #75 Lindy Shows Larry
- #91 Walt Moryn
- #118 Chris Cannizzaro
- #127 Ron Kline
- #139 Solly Hemus
- #148 Julian Javier
- #178 Bob Nieman
- #198 Carl Sawatski
- #211 Bob Gibson
- #232 Bill White
Frequently asked questions
What is the 1961 Topps #290 card?
It is card #290 of the 587-card 1961 Topps Baseball set, picturing Stan Musial of the St. Louis Cardinals.
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.