1962 Topps #173 Chico Fernandez
About Chico Fernandez
The bat was the story in 1962. Fernandez had 19 home runs in six big league seasons and had never hit more than six in a year; then he put 20 into the seats, drove in 59, hit .249 and raised his fielding mark at shortstop to .960. After his fourth homer, off Early Wynn, Detroit Free Press writer Joe Falls took to calling him George Herman Fernandez. It was the best year of his career, though the Tigers slipped to 85-76 and fourth place. The card is 1962 Topps #173, from the second series, and it comes two ways: 173a with no green tint and 173b with the green tint.
Humberto "Chico" Fernandez was a Cuban-born shortstop who played in the majors from 1956 to 1963 with the Brooklyn Dodgers, Philadelphia Phillies, Detroit Tigers and New York Mets. Born in Havana on March 2, 1932, he batted and threw right-handed and stood an even 6 feet. Signed by the Dodgers in 1951, he was the International League's All-Star shortstop at Montreal in 1954 and batted a career-best .301 there in 1955, but Pee Wee Reese blocked the road to Brooklyn. In April 1957 the Dodgers sent him to Philadelphia for five players and $75,000, and on Opening Day he became the first player of color to take the field for the Phillies; he held their shortstop job for two seasons. A December 1959 trade brought him to Detroit, where he was the club's first Latin regular position player and its shortstop for three years. He closed out in the majors with the 1963 Mets, a .240 hitter with 666 hits and 40 home runs, then kept playing in Japan, Mexico and the minors. He made his home in Detroit, sold insurance, and died June 11, 2016, in Sunrise, Florida.
Sources: Wikipedia · SABR BioProject · Baseball-Reference
Print variations
Two states of #173 are tracked individually: 173a - No Green Tint and 173b - Green Tint. The difference is on the front of the card (green tint).
States catalogued by the PSA master set registry; each is tracked here individually.
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Graded population (PSA & SGC)
| Grader | Total | 10 | 9 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 1-4 | Auth |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 173a - No Green Tint | |||||||||
| PSA | 203 | 0 | 4 | 45 | 97 | 40 | 12 | 5 | 0 |
| SGC | 11 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 3 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| 173b - Green Tint | |||||||||
| PSA | 82 | 0 | 5 | 23 | 29 | 21 | 3 | 1 | 0 |
| SGC | 6 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
Graded population — a scarcity guide, not a price. Snapshot 2026-09-24. Half-grades fold down (8.5→8), and PSA's qualified grades are counted separately from the straight-grade rows shown here. Where a grader registers a variation separately its population is listed under that variation. Slabs of the three cards printed #139 are joined by description, never by number alone. PSA registers the green tints as a separate set; a tint's population is listed under that state of the card it belongs to.
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Frequently asked questions
What is the 1962 Topps #173 card?
It is card #173 of the 600-card 1962 Topps Baseball set, picturing Chico Fernandez of the Detroit Tigers.
Does 1962 Topps #173 have variations?
Yes. Two states are catalogued and tracked separately: 173a - No Green Tint (No green tint - the standard first printing) and 173b - Green Tint (Green tint - the color-shifted second printing of series 2). Owning any one of them fills the #173 slot; the master set counts each state.
How many cards are in the 1962 Topps Baseball set?
600 cards, tracked as 708 collectible states. The numbers run from 1 to 598 with no gaps, but three different cards were printed #139 - two Hal Reniff poses, catalogued 139a and 139b, and the Babe Hits 60 Babe Ruth Special, 139c - so 598 numbers make 600 cards; 93 cards carry catalogued print variations, the series-2 green tints among them, that the master set counts separately.
Sources: Baseball Almanac, Trading Card Database, PSA CardFacts, Cardboard Connection, BaseballCardPedia, 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 2026-10-03.